Conversation moved rapidly from topic to topic. More questions seem to have been posed than answered, including:

• What is the trend on lab reports? Should they be written primarily outside or inside the lab? Would oral reports or roundtables be more effective methods for getting the same results? Would lab logs be a good alternative?
• Are people on favor of prescriptive labs? Is guided inquiry really science? How can you create an open-ended lab and still make sure students don't overlook the essentials?
• Is student enjoyment important? Is enjoyment time-dependent? In this view, how many labs should be in a semester? Should lab be omitted around breaks, exams, etc.?
• How do you ensure fair division of labor?

The members of this group reported using varying degrees of interfacing technology.

Some ideas for labs for non-majors:

• Let them keep small items they build like motors, telescopes, etc.
• Simulations
• Co-operations with other departments
• Include reading and discussing books

A list of goals for labs was generated and sorted into 5 basic areas, as follows:

1. Conceptual - better conceptual understanding, have students construct/invent physical concepts
2. Testing Models/Real World Applications - (more quantitative) - see mathematical commonalities among phenomena
3. Experimental Methods - technological skills, data analysis
4. Personal Skills - teamwork, communication
5. Design - could also include having students design tests for presented hypotheses

Q: Which of these areas is most important?
A: This is a tough question! Part of the answer depends on the course clientele.

We took a vote - each person ranked the 5 areas above from 5 (high) to 1 (low) and totals were recorded.

These are tough choices - we all want it all!

Based on Corinne Manogue's (Oregon State Univ.) presentation of OSU's new curriculum, "Paradigms in Physics", the session consisted of attendees posing lots of questions, and Manogue providing many details.

Essentially, the Paradigms approach covers the upper-division physics courses with a set of new 2- credit (term hours, as OSU is on a Quarter system), 3-week courses. The courses are designed to cut across traditional subject categories and also to provide a more intensive experience. There are seven class hours in a typical course week: one each on MWF, and two 2-hour classes on Tuesday and Thursday arranged so as to utilize regular university time slots. They are convinced that there must be interactive elements in the course (not all lecture)!

FIPSE support is being sought, and they plan to use it to disseminate the Paradigms system to other institutions of different types.

Ask for comments on:

1. Site visit program
2. Other things NTFUP might do

Note that we want to address everything departments do with undergraduates in physics.

• Make sure that site visit team includes people who have made systemic change happen in their departments (e.g. University of Illinois ) - change has been institutionalized.
• A metropolitan campus (e.g. University of Central Florida) would be a good candidate for a site visit.
• Faculty don't have a good sense of what the problem is, that the function of the UG program is not only to produce grad students (and then physics faculty).
• Need to justify (to congress, e.g.) why decline in physics majors is bad.
• How will liberal arts colleges fit into this picture? Task Force needs to pay attention to 4-yr institutions.
• Faculty who do innovative things often see their course evaluations plummet - this is a disincentive. (Grade inflation is also a problem.) Others have learned how to mitigate this - need to disseminate this information.
• Case studies could be very helpful in avoiding some of these problems.
• Information is available but very hard to find - compiling this (e.g. What is being taught, innovative courses) would be very valuable.
• Council on Undergraduate Research does this for research activities. Also, they do informal evaluation of department. NTFUP site visits will be different, make this clear (i.e. not doing evaluation).
• Why is accreditation so controversial? Because community objects to standardization of curriculum. Note that chemistry uses accreditation as a defense against things they don't like, e.g. distance learning.
• ABET is a tremendous headache (likewise the general university accreditation) but can be used as a club to get what you want (e.g. more lab support).
• Will Site Visit team go to bat for department with its administration? No - but can help prepare to do battle.
• Should include a HBCU, e.g. Alabama A&M, in site visits.
• Also include small departments (3-5 faculty). Note that one retirement is a large percentage, gives opportunity for big change. Site visit could help such departments think about how to move into the future.
• Perhaps program should also visit departments whose innovation has failed, to learn why.
• In disseminating "best practices", need to put forward ideas of why it worked, and how it can be adapted. Adapt the same habit of mind as we use in research! Read the literature about how institutions respond to change. For example, "resisters" object because mechanical aspects aren't attended to. (See book by Songe)
• AIP survey programs are ongoing - Task Force could add questions to these surveys if needed. Also, answers to some questions may also be known.
• Recruiting and alumni tracking are hard to do. Could tools be developed to help departments do it?
• Textbooks play a big role in defining curricula. They tend to be imitative (especially at Introductory level). How can this be changed?
• Faculty autonomy in the classroom can be a barrier to change. How can this be addressed? ABET can be used as a club, University of Illinois as a model (University of Texas - El Paso has adapted).
• What about a Faculty - in - Residence program? Get someone from a successful department to visit for a semester.
• Project Kaleidoscope is a good intermediate step for fostering change. It is trying to think on a longer-term scale.
• Experience of calculus reform movement can be useful.
• However Project Kaleidoscope is not well - focused, trying to do all sciences and math. Maybe need something like that just for physics. A strategic planning institute that departments could send teams to?
• Do departments really accept the idea of integrating career skill training into curriculum? And how do we tell companies that physics people have these skills? Physics departments focus on physics content, companies on other skills. Training vs. Education.
• What to do with the C-average bachelor's graduate? This is where skill training can be important, also curricular flexibility.
• AIP jobs bulletin board has no jobs for bachelor's graduates.
• But don't turn program inside out - continue to think of physics as a liberal art. Integrate training into education.
• AIP has information about employers of recent graduates by state.
  

Listing of Major Concerns and Interests

After extended discussion the group settled on these major conderns and interests with respect to undergraduate physics.

• Fire Hydrant approach, how to control it
• General Ed Physics - how to increase the number of students when they can choose biology or chemestry
• Seek ways to develop courses attractive as general education courses
• Recognition of the need to revitalize physics for pre-meds
• Accounting for lecture oriented, demo driven courses

The result of this discussion was the need to list courses that have been developed and are sharable with others. The appended list resulted from this discussion.

A list of courses for non-majors with contact persons and e-mail addresses in EXCEL spreadsheet format is available.

There were 14 persons in attendance. We first addressed the topic of undergraduate research, and noted that it was advantageous for students to start doing research at as early a time as possible. Their participation can lead to productive research and introduces them to projects that generate new knowledge. In some cases, the students may need increased physics and math background, but, overall, the research experience gives them a sense of community within the department that can lead to greater student retention. There are questions as to how undergraduate research would fit in with faculty loads, and how to assign student credit for this time. Most students should receive remuneration from work/study, grants and other sources, for the work they perform in laboratory, doing calculations, etc. The research experience is also good for students in that it provides them with faculty research references that make entry into graduate school easier. Of course, learning in an active research environment is an excellent means of preparing students for graduate school and many industrial environments.

The question was asked: "How about leaving out some near and dear topics at the upper undergraduate level and substituting curriculum flexibility/research?" Perhaps a lot of material could be dropped. The questions that then arise are those related to time flexibility and course sequencing. How to do it? As it is now, the "Undecideds" who may want to do Physics, find themselves having to put in an extra year, or more, and get discouraged. Our present course hierarchy is too rigid. This has an impact on the recruitment of Physics teachers in K - 12. Only 35% of high school Physics teachers have taken a course above the introductory one. We will have to be flexible with those students who come our way if we are to have an influence on those who may become teachers. The point of where to "draw the minimum line" of requirements is an important one. Our undergraduate programs should not be only driven by the needs of graduate schools, and even they will have to adjust to changing conditions. Some time was given to a discussion of the minimum number of semesters needed before taking upper level courses, where a level of maturity is required, especially in regard to math tools. These latter skills are very dependent on math instructors. Should we teach our own math? We need to provide incentives for learning math in such a way as to have it evolve from physics applications.

Hypothetically, this breakout session tore the usual curriculum apart. The message: Be creative and benefit a larger cross-section of students.

Breakout Session Attendees:

• David Hestenes, Presider, Arizona State Univ.
• Priscilla Laws, Recorder/Resource, Dickinson College
• Dave Cults, Brown Univ.
• Ron Reese, Washington & Lee Univ.
• John Anderson, Rochester Institute of Technology
• Chuck Hawkins, Northern Kentucky Univ.
• Lynn Hatfield, Texas Tech Univ.
• George Watson, Univ. of Delaware
• John Hubisz, North Carolina State Univ.

1. What constitutes PER? 

a. Published in peer reviewed journals.

2. What are difficulties with publishing PER articles?

a. Hake's data took a long time to get published in AJP (in fact it is easier to publish in Physical Review when ratio of articles submitted to articles published is taken into account.
b. One goal of Special Supplement is to publish more statistical evaluations of educational reforms.
c. TPT Editor is very negative about PER. However, he has published some papers. There is a long history of articles being rejected.

3. Can young faculty get tenure with PER?

a. Only at certain institutions where faculty are explicitly hired to do PER.

a. Every department should have a PER specialist on a tenure track job to enrich the work of non-specialists.
b. Develop an experimental section to test new educational ideas.
c. How much reform vs. PER can a new untenured faculty member be expected to do?
d. Have tenured member of department visit a PER group at another University and bring ideas back. However extreme reform takes four weeks of intensive workshop to establish activity for reform.
e. Pay for department members to attend AAPT workshops, conferences, chautauquas, and PER Conferences.
f. Experiment with new approaches (e.g. Texas Tech did FCI on Web and tried a number of diffenent approaches such as Peer Instruction, homework grading, no homework grading with next time quizzes, etc.).
g. Seminar group in teaching - (such as brown bag lunches) - build up faculty interest.

Most of the departments represented have a computational physics course and several use at least spreadsheet exercises in introductory classes, although some reported that use of computers at this level was a distraction from more pressing instructional goals. There seemed to be agreement with the need to keep serious instruction in computational methods or simulation methods in a separate course.

It was widely noted that undergraduates have a remarkable facility with computers, picking up programming quickly. Some noted that it was possible to expect students to learn single symbolic math operations on their own with Maple or Mathematica. The same was said about the use of such data acquisition tools as LabView in advanced laboratories.

There was some discussion of the curriculum for a possible BS in Physics with concentration in computational physics. Harvey Gould did not feel the need to require a programming course taught by the Computer Science department while Peter Lepage took the view that formal training in basic computer science, including an object-oriented, such as Java or C++ was beneficial. Those who commented about structured programming languages prefer Java or C++.

Where would such students find jobs? A couple of participants commented on the ready availability of jobs in industry.

Bo Hammer from the American Institute of Physics (AIP) presented a set of overheads that are available as a PowerPoint presentation by clicking here. Additional information on career paths for physics majors is available.