United States

Physics students enter into a broad range of careers. It can be challenging to know not just what kinds of positions physics majors can apply for but how physics students can find jobs that they are well suited for. This lighthearted talk will briefly provide data round undergraduate student employment but focus on how students can find and how advisers can help undergraduates apply for positions.

AAPT SM 20

Careers for Undergraduate Physics Majors

careers

undergraduate

education

The 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting brought together physics educators from around the globe to learn about the latest in physics theory, research methodology and education from leaders in their field. The program featured plenary speakers, sessions, workshops and many special activities.

For more information please visit the 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting page at: https://www.aapt.org/Conferences/SM2020/index.cfm.


The 2020 AAPT Virtual Summer Meeting brought together physics educators from around the globe to learn about the latest in physics theory, research methodology and education from leaders in their field. 

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Following the example in "Developing scientific decision making by structuring and supporting student agency" by N.G. Holmes, et al, students designed the research question in a three-week sequence and a written lab report was replaced with an online synchronous oral lab report, followed by time for questions from student colleagues. I will report on enhanced student engagement in class and in office hours and will share anecdotal comments. Students participated in a "belonging intervention". I will share practical lessons learned.

Giving students agency increased engagement at just the right time

Next Generation Physical Science and Everyday Thinking (Next Gen PET) – a research-based, guided-inquiry, physical science curriculum has been implemented at the University of Northern Iowa (UNI) in a required science course for elementary education majors since Fall 2016. We teach the studio version of Next Gen PET in 4 sections of the course each Fall and Spring Semester. Since Summer 2016, we have offered an on-line version of the course for 6 weeks to help meet demand for the course. In Spring 2020, the course transitioned from on-campus, in-person instruction to on-line instruction in March due to the outbreak of COVID-19. This presentation will share how we have transitioned to on-line instruction with Next Gen PET and include insights we have gained with comparisons made of going on-line by choice versus being forced due to COVID-19.

Transitioning to Online Instruction with Next Gen PET

Hands-on Minds-on Engagement through Remote Learning

Active learning has been shown to be more effective than passive lecture methods, but more work must be done to understand what mechanisms lead to effective active learning environments. The first step in understanding the mechanisms of active learning pedagogies is to establish a vocabulary with which to characterize them. One such method we have used is the Classroom Observation Protocol for Undergraduate STEM (COPUS), which codes student and instructor activities in two minute intervals. These profiles give us a picture of what kinds of activities are occurring in the classroom with the implementation of a given pedagogy. We have gathered COPUS profiles for six active learning pedagogies in physics. We discuss the individual characteristics for each pedagogy and present results from latent profile analyses.

Characterizing Active Learning Environments in Physics using COPUS

One argument for keeping the physics GRE is that it can help applicants who might otherwise be missed in the admissions process stand out. In this work, we evaluate whether this claim is supported by physics graduate school admissions decisions. We used admissions data from five PhD-granting physics departments over a 2-year period to see how the fraction of applicants admitted varied based on their physics GRE scores. We compared applicants with low GPAs to applicants with higher GPAs and applicants from large undergraduate universities to applicants from smaller undergraduate universities. We find that for applicants who might otherwise have been missed (e.g. have a low GPA or attended a small school) having a high physics GRE score did not seem to increase the applicant’s chances of being admitted to the schools. However, having a low physics GRE score seemed to penalize otherwise competitive applicants.

The Physics GRE does not help "overlooked" applicants

Modern wireless sensor technology coupled with integrated programming tools allow students to measure characteristics of the complex motion of falling chain systems and compare them to predictions created by their Blockly computer code. Because the data collection only takes a few seconds, this can easily be converted to a distance learning activity by providing students with the data files, software, and lab handouts. Programming techniques allow for accurate predictions to be made by introductory students about systems that would otherwise be too complex. We will look at the motion of a chain draped over a pulley and the force of a dropped chain striking the ground. The labs are appropriate for AP and introductory college physics classes. A link to student lab handouts, teacher guides, and sample data files will be provided.

Measuring and Modelling the Motion of a Chain

This session will dive into strategies to help promote a vibrant SPS chapter or club. Whether you are starting a new chapter, reviving a dormant chapter or wanting to explore opportunities to elevate your current chapter activities, this talk is for you. We will focus on the motivation and engagement of your students, and how to leverage resources from a local, regional and national level in efforts to help your SPS chapter flourish.

Elevate Your SPS Chapter

Science Cafés as an informal collaborative activity for professional learning.

At one point in March 2020, many instructors of introductory lab courses had to perform a magic trick, transitioning their courses from in-person, hands-on lessons to distance-learning. Portland State University uses a quarter system, and this transition was achieved in a couple weeks between the end of the Winter and the beginning of the Spring terms. While Winter term was effectively still all in-class, Spring term became a fully remote course. The topics covered in our Spring term are waves, optics, and thermodynamics. We designed a curriculum using simulations resembling the in-class labs and a term long student project. The project highlighted experimental design, modeling, and measurement uncertainty. We asked students to pick their own topic and work with tools they had at home. We present our transformed course curriculum and preliminary research results on the effect of the new curriculum and environment on student attitudes.

Transitioning to a fully remote one-term introductory lab in two weeks: Early results

The acoustic impedance is an important quantity in characterizing the behavior of an acoustic system. The acoustic impedance of musical instruments determines the instrument’s response to excitation, reveals resonance frequencies, and shows which notes can be played. While the acoustic impedance is easy to calculate for simple shapes, it is very complicated to do so for the shapes of real musical instruments. This talk outlines an interactive method of calculation of the acoustic impedance of an arbitrary shape of an axially symmetric air column by approximating the air column by a series of cylindrical elements. We demonstrate the feasibility of the method by comparing the iterative result with the closed form solution for air columns of simple shape. Moreover, we discuss the calculation of the acoustic impedance of a trumpet-like instrument and show how different parts of the instrument affect its acoustic behavior.

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