To join/pay your dues (if you are a member already), please use the following link:
CSAAPT Statement on Racism and Prejudice
The Chesapeake Section of AAPT condemns racism and prejudice in all forms and strives to promote diversity and equity in the classroom and society at large. We stand in solidarity with peaceful protesters across the country and the world working to draw attention to violence against Black people and build coalitions for change. We are proud to be a local section of the national American Association of Physics Teachers; an association that in recent years has increasingly spotlighted and supported work and resources related to diversity and equity. Read the national AAPT Statement on Racism and Violence Against Black People.
As educators, we all have an important role to play in promoting equity and diversity in our classrooms and society more broadly. Students’ learning cannot be separated from their culture and experiences outside the classroom. We owe it to our students to try to understand the contexts in which they learn and to do our best to ensure all students feel safe and valued in our classes and in the broader physics and astronomy community. As each of us reflects on what we can do in our own classroom to support these goals we recommend the following resources:
- AAPT Team-Up Report on elevating African American representation in undergraduate physics and astronomy
- The Underrepresentation Curriculum Project with resources and lesson plans for addressing equity and inclusion in science
- The Physics Teacher special volumes on Sex and Gender in Physics and Race and Physics Teaching
Many of us are just beginning the long journey to understand systemic racism and bias, the relationship between personal identity and physics, and the steps we can take inside and outside the classroom to combat injustices faced by many of our colleagues, students, and neighbors. Anyone with ideas for how CSAAPT can better support equity and diversity is encouraged to contact CSAAPT President, Alex Barr, at abarr@howardcc.edu.
These are trying times and we encourage everyone to remember their own self-care. We are all part of a community of physicists and educators and we encourage you to reach out to CSAAPT and your other communities with questions and suggestions.
Sincerely,
CSAAPT Executive Board
Alex Barr, President
Jason Sterlace, Vice President
David Wright, Secretary
Brett Taylor, Treasurer
Deonna Woolard, Section Representative
Elena Kuchina, Communication Liaison
Archived Announcements
The Advanced Laboratory Physics Association (ALPhA) is pleased to announce the twelve sites for the 2018 ALPhA Laboratory Immersions. ALPhA’s Immersion experiences provide participants with typically two to three days of intensive hands-on work with a laboratory experiment. Enrollment is limited to two to three participants per experimental setup in order to ensure that every participant learns the experiment well enough to be confident in teaching it themselves.
For more information about each of the experiments (listed below) and to pre-register for the Immersion of your choice, please visit:
www.advlab.org/immersions.html
Equipment grants: We are pleased to announce the fourth year of the Jonathan F. Reichert Foundation’s ALPhA Immersion grant program. These grants support the purchase of equipment (up to $7500) so that your institution can implement a new experiment that you learned about at an Immersion. The details of the grant program, previous awards, and the application process can be found at: jfreichertfoundation.org/alpha-immersions/
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2018 ALPhA Immersions
May 28 – 30 Whitman College (WA)
• Single Photon/Entangled Photon Experiments
June 5 – 7 Colgate University (NY)
• Experiments on Photon Quantum Mechanics
June 13 – 15 Bethel University (MN)
• FPGA Exercises in the Advanced Lab
• Low Cost Ultrafast Optics
• Nano-Plasmonics and Surface-Enhanced Spectroscopy
June 20 – 22 Caltech (CA)
• Electrodynamic Ion Trapping
• Precision Measurements Using Interferometry
• FFT, Filtering, and Feedback
• Small Signals with Lock-Ins
• Mastering the Digital Oscilloscope
June 25 – 27 UC-Berkeley (CA)
• Practical Light Microscopy: Abbe theory, phase contrast, and fluorescence using student-built microscopes
June 27 – 29 Univ. of Florida (FL)
• Optical Trapping for Biological Physics
• Fluorescence Correlation Spectroscopy
July 6 – 8 Univ. of Washington (WA)
• Lamb Shift – Hydrogen Fine Structure
• NMR Spectroscopy Off-Resonance
July 9 – 11 Buffalo State (NY)
• Pulsed NMR and 1D Imaging
• Modern Interferometry
• Fourier Methods
• Earth’s Field NMR
• Diode Laser Spectroscopy
• Condensed Matter (full week! July 9 – 13)
• High Tc Superconductivity
• Noise Fundamentals
July 13 – 15 Univ. of Chicago (IL)
• Brownian Motion Using Particle Tracking
• Positron Emission Tomography
• Electron Spin Resonance
July 16 – 18 Univ. of WI-Madison (WI)
• CosmicWatch Muon Detectors
Aug. 2 – 4 Rose-Hulman (IN)
• AC Faraday Effect
• Astronomical Spectra with Small Telescopes
Aug. 8 – 10 Willamette Univ. (OR)
• Magneto-optical Traps
• Inexpensive Fluorescence Correlation Spect.
• Flow Instabilities in Taylor-Couette Flow
If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact Lowell McCann, Chair of the ALPhA Immersions Organizing Committee
Active Learning in Introductory Physics Courses: Research-Based Strategies that Improve Student Learning
Special Short Course June 19-21, 2018, Portland, Oregon
Priscilla Laws Dickinson College
David Sokoloff University of Oregon
Ronald Thornton Tufts University
Designed for those who teach introductory physics at universities, colleges and high schools, this hands-on course is designed for those wanting to make learning in their introductory courses more active, using research-validated, classroom-tested strategies that have been demonstrated to improve learning.
Participants will be introduced to strategies for each component of the introductory course such as Interactive Lecture Demonstration (ILDs), RealTime Physics (RTP) labs, Collaborative Problem-Solving Tutorials, Workshop Physics (WP), Physics with Video Analysis (PVA), and related online video analysis exercises. The course will also include the use of video analysis to identify analytic functions describing real data. Among other recent developments are (1) new 3rd ed. RTP E & M labs using video analysis, (2) ILDs using clickers, and (3) online homework using Interactive Video Vignettes (IVVs). Topics will be chosen from both semesters of introductory physics. Research on the effectiveness of these strategies will also be discussed.
The tools and software used in these active learning curricula are compatible with Macintosh and Windows OS, and with the popular interfaces and sensors. Participants will receive complimentary printed copies of the curricula (published by Wiley and Vernier, and also available for high school use as the ABP High School E-dition). Teaching Physics with the Physics Suite, a comprehensive book by E.F. Redish (University of Maryland) on strategies for implementing physics education research-based curricula, will also be distributed.
The course fee is $225. (EARLY BIRDS: Note that a reduced Early Bird course fee of $195 applies until April 15!)
* Up to three graduate credits from the University of Oregon will be available for an additional $90/credit.
For more information please contact
Presented by Edward Prather and Gina Brissenden (Steward Observatory, Univ. of Arizona) and is hosted by Duncan Brown, Peter Saulson, and the Syracuse Univ. Physics Dept.
Saturday & Sunday, November 11-12, 2017
8:00 am – 5:30 pm
Syracuse University
Physics Department, Room Coming Soon!
Syracuse, New York 13244
315-443-1870
Please register with CAE for this workshop here:
https://astronomy101.jpl.nasa.gov/workshopdetails/index.cfm?workshopID=156
Are you a current or future instructor teaching Astronomy or Space Science? Would you like your classroom to actively engage your students in discourse about the big ideas of your class, how evidence is used to understand the universe, and the role of science in society? We invite you to come to our CAE Teaching Excellence Workshop. Spend time with your colleagues and become an effective implementer of active-learning instructional strategies. Learn how to transform your classroom into a vibrant learning environment that will:
1. increase students’ conceptual understandings
2. improve their abilities to think critically, interpret graphs, and reason about quantitative data
3. motivate them to actively engage in their learning
4. improve their self-efficacy
By participating, you’ll become part of a nationwide community of practice, along with over 4000 past workshop participants and other educators of Earth, Astronomy, and Space Science. Our CAE community of practice is dedicated to helping each other in a supportive online environment through advice and recommendations, as well as conversations about effective implementation strategies, effective pedagogical resources, science education research, public policy, specific classroom resources, and more.
Our Tier I Teaching Excellence Workshops will provide you with the experiences you need to create effective and productive active-learning classroom environments. We will model the best practices in implementing many different classroom-tested instructional strategies. Most importantly, you and your workshop colleagues will gain first-hand experience in implementing these proven strategies yourselves.
During our many microteaching events, you will have the opportunity to role-play the parts of student and instructor. You will assess and critique each other’s implementation in real-time as part of a supportive learning community. You will have the opportunity to face and conquer your fears of unfamiliar teaching in collaboration with kind and gentle friends and mentors before you try them by yourself in front of your students.
Tier I Workshop topics will include:
• Creating inclusive classroom environments
• Strategies to improve retention & diversity of STEM majors & grads
• Collaborative group learning
• Interactive lectures, demonstrations, and videos
• Effective uses of writing
• Think-Pair-Share (Peer Instruction, Clicker Questions)
• Lecture-Tutorials
• Ranking Tasks
• Assessment strategies (including homework, grading, and exams)
We at CAE are continually evolving our workshops based on the needs and recommendations of our workshop participants. If it’s been a while since you participated in one of our Teaching Excellence Workshops, we encourage you to participate again, as they have likely changed!
Fall 2017 Meeting of The Appalachian Section of the American Association of Physics Teachers
October 13-14, 2017
Anderson Hancock Planetarium
Marietta College
Marietta, Ohio
- Contributed Talks
- Planetarium Show
- Make-and-Take Workshop
- “Build Your Own Speed of Light Experiment”
- Sigma Pi Sigma Public Science Lecture (McDonough Auditorium)
Dr. Steven L. Snyder
CEO, Fleet Science Center
San Diego, CA
Senator Chris Coons (D-DE) and Jerry Moran (R-KS), co-chairs
in partnership with the American Chemical Society and American Physical Society
Invite you to join them to discuss
Strengthening the Innovator Pipeline
Tuesday, June 7, 2016 3 p.m. – 5 p.m.
Senate Hart Office Building, Room 902
Catered reception begins at 3:00 PM;
Program to follow at 3:30 PM.
The Senate Competitiveness Caucus is pleased to partner with the American Physical Society and American Chemical Society to host an event highlighting the importance of increasing the number of qualified science teachers in K-12 education, diversifying the STEM workforce, expanding research experiences for undergraduates and boosting federal science funding for graduate research projects.
Senator Coons will be joined by industry scientists to discuss the importance of federal investments in scientific research and education, their career paths and your thoughts on these issues.
Featuring
• Senator Chris Coons, Co-Chair, Senate Competitiveness Caucus
• Dr. Zachary Keane, Staff Physicist, Northrop Grumman Corp.
• Dr. Piali De, Co-founder and CEO, Senscio Systems
• Dr. John Gavenonis, Global Technology Manager, DuPont Science & Innovation
RSVP for this event by Friday, June 3. https://bit.ly/acsaps-innovRSVP
The Senate Competitiveness Caucus, co-founded by Sens. Chris Coons and Jerry Moran, is a bipartisan forum for fostering greater awareness and understanding of issues critical to U.S. economic growth. The American Chemical Society (www.acs.org) is a non-profit scientific and educational organization, chartered by Congress, with nearly 157,000 chemical scientists and engineers as members. The world’s largest scientific society, ACS advances the chemical enterprise, increases public awareness of chemistry, and brings its expertise to state and national matters. The American Physical Society (www.aps.org) is a non-profit membership organization working to advance and diffuse the knowledge of physics through its outstanding research journals, scientific meetings, and education, outreach, advocacy and international activities. APS represents over 53,000 members, including physicists in academia, national laboratories and industry in the United States and throughout the world.
“My Million Dollar Invention” by Dana Molloy
Dana Molloy won the best student paper award at our CS AAPT meeting in 2013 in Virginia Beach where she presented her “metal detector” in the presentation titled “Physics Almost Saved the President”. This project grew into a narrative that was published in AAPT’s The Physics Teacher in March 2014. Here is what Donna wants to share with all the CS AAPT members:
“We were thrilled to learn about our little project being published. Shortly after the issue was released, we were contacted by a production company who works closely with the Smithsonian Channel- they were interested in our story! Last May, I was fortunate enough to travel back down to Towson to meet with the crew and do a day of filming for their new series!
After much anticipation, I am happy to announce the arrival of the program entitled “My Million Dollar Invention”. The first episode actually aired last night on Smithsonian and it will continue to air on Sundays at 8pm. Our episode, titled Life and Death, is set to air on July 19th at 8pm. We are so excited about this finally coming out since it seems like forever since we filmed! Other details about the series can be found here: www.smithsonianchannel.com/shows/my-million-dollar-invention/1003748
I hope you’ll join me on July 19th in watching what started out as just a silly side project! I am so excited to share this with you and hope you enjoy the result as much as I’ve enjoyed working on it! ”