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There is now a CONTENT FREEZE for Mercury while we switch to a new platform. It began on Friday, March 10 at 6pm and will end on Wednesday, March 15 at noon. No new content can be created during this time, but all material in the system as of the beginning of the freeze will be migrated to the new platform, including users and groups. Functionally the new site is identical to the old one. webteam@gatech.edu
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Atlanta | Posted: January 4, 2017
A. Maureen Rouhi, Ph.D.
Director of Communications
College of Sciences
Summary Sentence:
To advance its efforts to improve the introductory physics courses at Georgia Tech, the School of Physics is launching the Physics Education Research (PER) colloquium series, beginning on Jan. 9, 2017.
Full Summary:
To advance its efforts to improve the introductory physics courses at Georgia Tech, the School of Physics is launching the Physics Education Research (PER) colloquium series, beginning on Jan. 9, 2017.
Tamara Bogdanovic
Kenneth Heller
Heather Lewandowski
Mats Selen
David PritchardTo advance its efforts to improve the introductory physics courses at Georgia Tech, the School of Physics is launching the Physics Education Research (PER) colloquium series, beginning on Jan. 9, 2017.
“The goal is to provide a summary of the current state-of-the-art, based on experiences at peer institutions that carried out successful reforms of their introductory physics courses,” says Assistant Professor Tamara Bogdanovic, who is organizing the talks.
Speakers are physicists who were closely involved in implementing online portals, redesigned laboratory and recitation sessions, and new teaching methods at their host institutions, Bogdanovic says.
First up is Kenneth Heller, a professor in the School of Physics and Astronomy in the University of Minnesota. In his talk on Jan. 9, “Preparing Physics Graduate Students for Their Future,” he will describe a program that fully integrates teaching assistantship (TA) into physics graduate education.
In the notes about his talk, Heller writes: “The good news is that people with physics graduate degrees are in demand. Starting salaries are high and unemployment is low. However, studies show the skills traditionally associated with an academic research program are necessary but not sufficient for employment as it exists now and in their future.
“Our graduate students need education in and practice of a well-documented set of so-called ‘soft skills.’ The challenge is to provide both the research skills and the soft skills for all students in the graduate program without adding significant burdens on them, the faculty, or the department.”
Integrating TA into graduate education, Heller writes, “results in graduate students that are more satisfied with their TA experience, are better prepared to function in research groups, provide a better classroom experience for their undergraduate students, and have the soft skills necessary for employment.”
Other speakers in the series are the following:
Jan. 18, 2017, Heather J. Lewandowski, an associate professor of physics at the University of Colorado, Boulder; an AMO (atomic, molecular, and optical) physicist; and developer of teaching methods for upper division physics.
Jan. 30, 2017, Mats A. Selen, a professor of physics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC), a high-energy physicist, and a chief architect of introductory physics reform at UIUC.
April, 3, 2017, David E. Pritchard, a professor of physics at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, an AMO physicist, and a leading innovator in online introductory physics instruction.
