AAPT: American Association of Physics Teachers

Meet Ann

I joined AAPT in my first year as a tenure-track assistant professor at Penn State. I was located at a "branch campus" which only educated students in their first two years of the university. My assignment then and now was mostly introductory physics for science and engineering majors. Through the years, the teaching opportunities widened to include courses for nonscience majors, which are now described as "general education," and included courses in introductory astronomy. General education courses are a magnificent opportunity to educate students who may not aspire to be scientists or engineers but who we are privileged to show some of the amazing realities of our universe. Currently, I am vice-chair of the AAPT Committee on Space Science and Astronomy, and it has been my pleasure to promote programming at AAPT to bring topics in astronomy and astronomy education to physics educators.