One of the Leadership Council's New Year’s resolutions for 2015 is to get the IONiC community more involved with small projects on VIPEr.

It may be the first day of class, but my first inorganic exam is already coming up (January 28). We thought it would be fun to get some great exam questions on the website in time for everyone's first exam. Exam questions are easy to write and post (as problem sets). We’d love it if you participate in our first-ever exam question challenge.

The challenge. By Wednesday, January 21, post your favorite exam question. It can be an exam question you’ve already used or one you’d like someone to try out. You can use any question format that you like.

The constraints. We’re looking for small contributions. Quality, low bar questions are great.

• Your question must be on atomic orbitals, electron configurations and/or periodic trends.
• It should be posted as a problem set question with a minimum of the question and answer and student learning outcomes.
• Your question must not be from a textbook - it has to be an original.

I’ll be doing a quick review of all of these questions (other than my own) and they will be on the website no later than Jan 22 so that everyone can try them out on their exams. I will send a prize to the first LO submitted and the one that I find most original. I also plan to post assessment data and comments on any questions that I use on my first hour exam. I hope you’ll join me in this challenge!

Look for monthly questions challenges from Nancy (symmetry/MO) in February, Chip (crystalline solids) in March, and Adam (final exam questions) in April.