VOLUME 5 . WINTER 2012
PhysTEC is a project to improve the education of future physics teachers. The project is led by
the American Physical Society, in partnership with the American Association of Physics Teachers.
Funding is provided by the National Science Foundation and APS’s 21st Century Campaign.
PhysTEC Adds Four New Funded Sites
From left to right: a Boston
University Learning Assistant
works with two physics
students; Virginia Tech’s TIR
with two students; two students
do a demo at SUNY Geneseo;
two students work together
at CSU San Marcos. Photos
courtesy of Andrew Duffy;
Beate Schmittmann; Kurt
Fletcher; Ed Price.
T
he Physics Teacher Education Coalition
(PhysTEC) project announced in May
2011 that it would provide funding for
four universities to develop their physics
teacher education programs. The new
awardees, which began project activities
in Fall 2011, are Boston University (BU);
California State University, San Marcos
(CSU San Marcos); State University of
New York at Geneseo (SUNY Geneseo);
and Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State
University (Virginia Tech).
The winning institutions were selected
during a two-stage review process that began
with a pool of 70 applicants. Proposals
were evaluated on a number of criteria,
including sites’ ability to develop their
programs into national models, the strength
of departmental and institutional support
for teacher preparation efforts, and the
experience and commitment shown by
the proposing teams. The review panel
included representatives of APS and AAPT,
which jointly lead the project, as well as
external reviewers.
APS leadership expressed strong support
for the project’s site selections and current
directions. “As APS’s flagship education
program, PhysTEC sets a high standard for
the reform of physics education nationwide,”
said Kate Kirby, Executive Officer of APS.
“I am confident the new PhysTEC sites will
continue to maintain this standard, while
adding new innovations to the project.”
Beth Cunningham is Executive Officer of
AAPT and serves on the PhysTEC leadership
team. “I am impressed with the understanding of local context that our new sites have
demonstrated,” said Cunningham. “They
have clearly built connections with local
school districts that will help immensely
as they prepare teachers to work in these
schools.”
The New Sites
Boston University is one of the largest
private universities in the country, and is
one of only a few PhysTEC sites located
in an urban center, as well as the only site
in New England. BU’s PhysTEC project
“I am impressed with
the understanding
of local context that
our new sites have
demonstrated.”
—Beth Cunningham, Executive Officer,
AAPT
will build on the physics department’s
existing educational efforts, which include
a transformation of the large introductory
courses to include Learning Assistants and
other reforms, and a newly added four-year
track that allows students to earn both a
physics degree and teaching licensure.
Project leaders plan to recruit future teachers
from physics majors, engineering majors,
and Learning Assistants, and to involve
area teachers in a professional learning
community that will provide mentorship
to program graduates.
CSU San Marcos is a regional comprehensive university in the San Diego area,
and is both an Hispanic-Serving Institution
(HSI) and an Asian American and Native
American Pacific Islander Serving Institution
(AANAPISI). Project leaders plan to create a physics education option within the
applied physics major, and to build on existing strengths such as a Learning Assistant
program, physics education research expertise, and collaboration between physics
and education faculty. CSU San Marcos’s
project will work closely with and recruit
future teachers from Palomar Community
College, a nearby two-year college that is
a major source of transfer students.
SUNY Geneseo is a primarily undergraduate institution (PUI) in upstate New
York, and is among the top PUIs in terms
of number of physics majors who graduate
each year. Project leaders plan to create a
five-year program leading to a bachelor’s
degree in physics, a master’s in education, and teaching certification. The site
continues on page 2
PhysTEC Conference, UTeach Join Forces Chemists Take on Teacher Education
D
uring two warm, workshop-packed
days in May 2011, 120 physicists and
educators came together in Austin,
Texas for the seventh annual PhysTEC
Conference, the nation’s largest event
focusing on physics teacher preparation.
The 2011 conference was organized jointly
with the annual meeting of the UTeach
Institute, a project based at the University
of Texas at Austin that prepares science
and math teachers at “replication sites”
around the country.
The theme of the conference was sustainability, and workshops developed this
concept in a number of contexts. Panels
explored ways to sustain various components
of teacher education projects, including
physics-specific pedagogy courses, the
hiring of master teachers to work in physics departments, and teaching reforms in
introductory physics courses. Numerous
speakers presented results from data-driven
teacher preparation and science education
efforts; such data are crucial for building
lasting support from adminstrators and
funders.
Many conference attendees remarked on
the community the PhysTEC Conference
has helped build. University of Colorado
physics professor Noah Finkelstein, a
seven-time conference veteran and frequent
presenter, said that the conference is “the
R
Laurie McNeil of the University of North
Carolina and Chance Hoellwarth of Cal
Poly, San Luis Obispo. Photo by Theodore
Hodapp.
right size and scale, friendly, and personable.” Kathy McCloud, a program officer
at the National Science Foundation added,
“It’s encouraging to see people who care
about teacher education exchanging ideas.”
The sessions on the afternoon of the
second day of the conference were open
to both PhysTEC and UTeach conference
attendees. Several participants noted that
PhysTEC was in a good position to provide
an extra push in physics for UTeach sites,
many of which have not seen the same
increases in physics teachers as they have
continues on page 2
eaders of this publication probably
know that U.S.physics teachers are in
short supply. But the problem is not
limited to physics—chemistry teaching posts
rank almost as difficult to fill, according the
American Association of Employment in
Education’s 2009 “Educator Supply and
Demand” report.
To address the nation’s critical need for
chemistry teachers, the American Chemical
Society (ACS) has taken steps toward forming
a Chemistry Teacher Education Coalition
(CTEC). PhysTEC project leaders have
been working with ACS education staff
for several years to lay the groundwork for
this effort. Chemistry faculty from departments that have endorsed an ACS statement
supporting chemistry teacher preparation
have received reduced registration fees
to PhysTEC conferences for the past two
years, and ACS representatives have led
workshops at these meetings.
In June 2011, PhysTEC project leaders
and ACS staff collaborated on a National
Science Foundation (NSF)-funded workshop
that drew chemistry and physics faculty from
universities around the country, as well as
representatives from ACS, PhysTEC, NSF,
and the Association of Public and Land-grant
Universities. Workshop participants agreed
on concrete steps for moving forward on a
CTEC project with the mission “to actively
engage chemistry departments in the preparation of future chemistry teachers.” The
ACS’s Society Committee on Education
has also endorsed the creation of CTEC,
according to Mary Kirchhoff, the director
of ACS’s Education Division.
“We couldn’t do this
without PhysTEC.”
—Mary Kirchhoff, Director of Education
Division, American Chemical Society
The CTEC project, as envisioned at the
June workshop, would be modeled after
PhysTEC in a number of ways, including
creating a competitive proposal process
for funding sites, incorporating Learning
Assistants, and holding meetings for the
chemistry teacher education community.
“PhysTEC has a number of years of experience
in this area, and that has been essential in
helping us identify the elements of a parallel initiative in chemistry,” said Kirchhoff.
“We couldn’t do this without PhysTEC.”
“Physics and chemistry are closely related
disciplines, and we see CTEC as a natural
extension of PhysTEC efforts,” said Theodore
Hodapp, Director of Education and Diversity
at APS and PhysTEC project director.
continues on page 2
2
PhysTEC Noyce Program Advances
I
n Spring 2011, ten future teachers were
selected for the third cohort of PhysTEC
Noyce scholars. Seven of these students
had received scholarships from the program in previous years, while three were
first-time applicants; seven are currently
post-baccalaureate students, two are college seniors, and one is a junior. These
students will receive up to $15,000 for
the 2011-2012 academic year; in return,
the scholars commit to teaching for two
years in a high-need school district after
graduation.
“We are really pleased with the diversity
of experience among this group of scholars,”
said Monica Plisch, Associate Director of
Education and Diversity at APS, who has
led the PhysTEC Noyce Program since its
inception. “Their applications showed that
they understand the needs and circumstances
of the students they will be teaching.”
To provide mentoring and support to Noyce
scholars as they complete their education
and start their careers, the project has offered
funding to its sites to hire Visiting Master
Teachers (VMTs). VMTs are experienced
teachers recruited from local school districts
who work with Noyce scholars as they
make the transition from university to the
classroom. The position is modeled after
the Teacher-in-Residence (TIR) position
that exists at most PhysTEC sites.
Cornell Noyce Scholar Jonathan Smythe
demonstrates physics concepts at the USA
Science and Engineering Festival. Photo
courtesy of Jim Overhiser.
Jim Overhiser, a master teacher from
Cortland, New York, served as VMT at
Cornell University during the 2010-2011
academic year. Overhiser, who had previously served as Cornell’s TIR, worked
closely with Noyce scholars Jonathan
Smythe and Andrew Flye, encouraging
their interest in teaching, and, in Smythe’s
case, serving as his cooperating teacher
Four New PhysTEC
Funded Sites
during student teaching. Smythe is now
starting a teaching position at a high-need
high school in Washington, DC. The VMT
“gives [Noyce scholars] a safe place to
ask questions, share experiences and get
advice,” says Overhiser.
“We see the VMT serving as a critical
bridge for the Noyce scholars between their
college experience and the high school
classroom,” said Jacob Clark Blickenstaff,
Teacher Education Programs Manager at
APS. Clark Blickenstaff now manages the
PhysTEC Noyce Program.
In addition to mentoring from VMTs, all
scholars in their first two years of teaching
are invited and funded to attend a summer professional development workshop,
as well as a day-long program put on by
the project in conjunction with the AAPT
Summer Meeting. The project also provides
funding for scholars to spend a summer
doing physics education research. Brittany
Johnson, a University of Arkansas Noyce
scholar, spent the summer working with
the University of Washington’s Physics
Education Group, and will present her
work at the 2012 AAPT Winter Meeting.
“AAPT has a lot of resources to offer
these teachers as they begin their careers,”
said Beth Cunningham, AAPT Executive
Officer. “And the scholars’ energy really
adds a unique element to our meetings as
well. It’s a mutually beneficial situation.”
Minority Serving Institutions Take on Teacher Preparation
M
inority groups that are underrepresented in physics generally are even
more severely underrepresented
among U.S.physics teachers. Twenty-five
percent of our nation’s black and Hispanic
students now take physics in high school,
and as Table 1 shows, they are very unlikely
to have a minority role model teaching their
physics classes.
U.S.high school
physics teachers
U.S.physics majors
U.S.college-age
population
%
Hispanic
%
Black
1.5
1.5
3
3
16
14
Table 1. Sources: American Institute of Physics;
U.S.Department of Education
Institution Type
PhysTEC Member Institutions (U.S.physics
degree-granting institutions only)
PhysTEC Supported Sites
U.S.physics degree-granting institutions
HSI
HBCU/PBI
All
14
11
226 (11% MSI)
2
2*
20 (15% MSI)
44
48
800 (12% MSI)
Table 2.*Xavier University of Louisiana suspended its PhysTEC project after Hurricane Katrina, and is
not counted in the total number of PhysTEC Supported Sites. Sources: Hispanic Association of Colleges
and Universities; U.S.Department of Education
PhysTEC has since its inception reached
out to minority-serving institutions (MSIs),
which educate almost 60% of underrepresented minorities who earn college degrees
in the US. These include Hispanic Serving
Institutions (HSIs), Historically Black
Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), and
Primarily Black Institutions (PBIs). Table 2
shows the engagement of minority serving
institutions in the project.
For more information about PhysTEC
efforts to engage minority-serving institutions, see the article on pages 7 and 8 of
the Spring 2011 edition of the APS CSWP
& COM Gazette, the newsletter for the
Committee on the Status of Women in
Physics and Committee on Minorities:
www.aps.org/programs/women/reports/
gazette/upload/spring11.pdf
Minority serving institutions are strongly encouraged to apply to become PhysTEC Supported Sites. Look for more information in Fall 2012.
PhysTEC Conference
continued from cover
in other math and science fields. Middle
Tennessee State University and the University
of Colorado at Boulder are both PhysTEC
and UTeach replication sites.
Future Directions
The 2012 PhysTEC Conference will
feature a change in the way workshops
are selected. For the first time, conference
organizers have solicited workshop proposals and are evaluating them based on a set
of criteria that include relationship to the
conference theme, potential for stimulating
productive interactions, and application
to PhysTEC project components. “With
this new format, we’re hoping to tap the
creativity of the physics teacher education
community,” said Jacob Clark Blickenstaff,
Teacher Education Programs Manager at
APS, who is lead organizer of the 2012
PhysTEC
Annual
Conference
February 3-4, 2012
Ontario, California
continued from cover
also plans to develop and test a model of
collaborative “Activity Teams,” bringing
together upper level teacher candidates,
first- and second-year physics majors,
and area high school students, in order
to encourage physics majors to consider
careers in high school teaching.
Virginia Tech is a large, public, landgrant university in southern Virginia, and
is among the institutions graduating the
most physics majors in the Appalachian
region. Project leaders plan to enhance
their teacher recruitment efforts, focusing
on high school students in the surrounding
region, and on students in their large introductory courses. Sections of these courses
will be transformed to the collaborative
SCALE-UP model, and will incorporate
Learning Assistants. Site leaders also plan
to build a strong professional development
network of program alumni, offering physical
and online meeting space, in collaboration
with and supportive of existing mentoring
programs.
According to Theodore Hodapp, Director
of Education and Diversity at APS and
PhysTEC project director, this year’s crop
of new sites shows exceptional institutional
commitment to making their programs
sustainable. “We fund sites for three years,
enough to get their programs off the ground,”
said Hodapp, “but we expect them to show
us up front how they will sustain things in
the future. We’re confident that this year’s
sites will be able to keep their programs
running after PhysTEC funding ends.”
In addition to funding new sites, the
project has made a one-time award to a
team proposing a video project illustrating
interactions Learning Assistants and students
whom they work with. This project will
be led jointly by researchers and faculty
members from Seattle Pacific University
and Florida International University, both
universities that have received PhysTEC
funding in the past.
PhysTEC is funded by a five-year, $6.5-million grant awarded by the National Science
Foundation in 2009, as well as APS’s 21st
Century Campaign.
Chemistry
continued from cover
Hodapp also points to ways in which
the engagement of chemistry departments
can enhance PhysTEC efforts at universities around the country. According to the
American Institute of Physics, most physics
teachers are also asked to teach other subjects, of which chemistry is one of the most
common. “Physics teachers who are also
prepared to teach chemistry will have a leg
up in finding jobs,” Hodapp said. “Funding
agencies and university administrators have
also made it very clear that they want to
see the science disciplines collaborating
on education.”
New Paradigms for Physics Teacher Education
The 2012 Physics Teacher Education Coalition Conference is the nation’s largest meeting dedicated to
physics teacher education. It features workshops, panel discussions, and presentations by national
leaders, as well as excellent networking opportunities. The 2012 conference will be held in conjunction
with the American Association of Physics Teachers Winter Meeting.
www.ptec.org/conferences/2012
conference. “We’re excited to see what
workshop proposals are submitted.”
Clark Blickenstaff noted that some
workshops will likely still be invited. For
PhysTEC
Annual
more information on the 2012 PhysTEC
Conference, see the announcement in this
newsletter.
PhysTEC Quick Tips
If you want to boost your department’s
efforts to prepare physics teachers, but
do not know where to start, PhysTEC has
prepared a list of steps you can take to
begin having an impact right away. Go
to www.PhysTEC.org/quicktips.
php.
3
PhysTEC Teacher Profile: Hilary Kakanis
L
ike many physics teachers, Hilary
Kakanis’ path to the profession took
a few interesting turns along the way.
In fact, her original dream was to be a
planetarium director. “I’ve always loved
talking about space,” she says. “I would
love to live in a planetarium.”
But at a meeting with a planetarium
director, Kakanis learned there were only
around a thousand planetariums in the
entire western hemisphere, meaning the
job market might be tight. So around the
end of her sophomore year at Middle
Tennessee State University (MTSU), she
decided to pursue physics teaching. Kakanis
then learned about the great need for physics teachers, and that she was good at it.
“When I started teaching, I got a whole lot
of positive feedback,” she says. “People
said I made the subject approachable, and
I made them want to listen.”
The MTSU Physics Department had
recently received funding from the NSF’s
Noyce Scholarship Program, which enabled
Kakanis to get a scholarship to fund her
final two years of education. MTSU then
became a PhysTEC site, and Kakanis took
the department’s first offering of the course
“The Teaching of Physics,” which introduces students to inquiry-based teaching
practices that are specific to physics. She
was inspired to see that other physics
majors were also becoming interested
in teaching. “I’m really excited about
programs like PhysTEC and Noyce that
are encouraging young people to get into
teaching,” she says.
MTSU project leaders expect that
Kakanis will be the first of many physics
teacher graduates who go out and teach
in high-need schools in Tennessee and
elsewhere. “We are pleased that our first
major to graduate with an endorsement
to teach high school physics in over 15
years will be Hilary,” says MTSU physics department chair Ron Henderson.
“Hilary will embody what the physics
education community has learned about
good physics instruction.”
In December, Kakanis graduated with a
bachelor’s degree in physics and concentrations in astronomy and teaching. And
although she has lived in Tennessee since
she was nine, she is planning to take her
skills to a different place, where they are
also badly needed—Texas. New standards
PhysTEC Membership Continues
to Grow
Hilary Kakanis with fellow MTSU future teachers Paul Turner (left) and Dylan Russell. Photo
courtesy of Ron Henderson.
in that state require that all students take
physics in order to graduate high school,
and Texas universities are not prepared to
supply the teachers needed to teach these
students (see “The Big Picture,” back page).
In Texas, Kakanis hopes to teach ninth
graders in a “Physics First” class, also
known as the “Inverted Curriculum,” where
students take physics before chemistry and
biology. “I like the idea of Physics First,”
says Kakanis. “Usually when kids get to
high school, they hear ‘physics’ and start
to freak out because they hear it’s a seniorlevel class and everybody flunks it. With
Physics First, you’re getting the kids when
they’re still fresh and new, and have never
done anything like that before.
“I want to catch them when they’re young!”
Learning Assistant Programs Expand
“To see the Colorado Learning Assistant Program
emulated and adapted around the country is
heartwarming.”
—Valerie Otero, Professor of Science Education, University of Colorado at Boulder
I
Updated December 2011
Map created by Nancy Bennett-Karasik, APS.
P
hysics Teacher Education Coalition
(PhysTEC) membership has reached
255 institutions (as of press time),
ranging from major research universities
to regional comprehensives, liberal arts
colleges, two-year colleges, and even one
national lab. The 226 US-based physics degree-granting members represent
nearly 30 percent of such institutions in
the country, and graduate over one-third
of U.S.physics majors.
“Joining the Coalition is
a great way for any
physics department to
start getting involved
in teacher education.”
—Monica Plisch, Associate Director of
Education and Diversity, APS
PhysTEC members endorse a statement
supporting physics department involvement in
teacher preparation, and commit to supplying
the project with physics teacher graduation
data annually. Nearly every member has
sent a representative to a PhysTEC conference or workshop, and many have applied
for PhysTEC funding or become engaged
•
Institutions in red have received PhysTEC funding
■ Supported Sites
Member Institutions
in the project in other ways. Membership
is not required for attending conferences,
but members receive steeply discounted
registration rates; membership is required
for applying for funding.
The Coalition was founded in 2003
(under the acronym PTEC), but growth
picked up in early 2005, around the time
of the first PhysTEC conference. “When
I joined the project, we had just a handful
of members, and few opportunities for
them to become engaged,” said Theodore
Hodapp, APS Director of Education and
Diversity and PhysTEC director since
2004. “We realized we needed a much
broader base to have the kind of impact
we wanted to have.”
Since then, the Coalition has grown at
a rate of around 40 institutions per year,
and shows no sign of slowing. “It has
been exciting to see the growth not just
in membership, but in the enthusiasm and
commitment toward physics teacher education,” said Monica Plisch, APS Associate
Director of Education and Diversity, who
has led the Coalition’s expansion since
2007. “Joining the Coalition is a great way
for any physics department to start getting
involved in teacher education.”
To become a PhysTEC member institution, go to www.ptec.org/join.
n November 2011, PhysTEC and the
University of Colorado at Boulder
(CU-Boulder) co-sponsored the third
Learning Assistant Workshop, which drew
over 40 science and education faculty
members from around the country. The
workshop was hosted by science and education faculty at CU-Boulder, who launched
its program in 2003 in order to improve
student learning in the university’s science
courses, and recruit future teachers. The
program recruits talented undergraduates
who work with faculty members to make
large-enrollment courses more collaborative,
student-centered, and interactive.
When CU-Boulder became a PhysTEC
site in 2004, PhysTEC project leaders recognized that the Learning Assistant model
was a method of recruiting teachers that
could be replicated around the country.
Nearly every funded site that has joined
PhysTEC since 2004 has implemented a
Learning Assistant program in some form,
as have numerous unfunded member institutions. At many universities, these programs
have spread from physics to other science
and math departments, similar to what
happened at Boulder.
“The Learning Assistant model is not just
a method for recruiting teachers, it is also a
catalyst for changing the culture of science
departments,” said Monica Plisch, Associate
Director of Education and Diversity at APS
and PhysTEC project co-director.
Cody Sandifer, professor of science
education and now PhysTEC project leader
at Towson University, attended the first
Learning Assistant workshop in 2007, and
then launched a program at Towson. “The
workshop was useful for me in understanding
the components of a successful Learning
Assistant program,” Sandifer said. “It
allowed me to have access to people who
were using Learning Assistants, and to ask
them questions.”
Although the workshops focus on
CU-Boulder’s program, this year’s schedule
also included a poster session showcasing
the programs of “experienced users and
emulators”—universities that have adapted
the model to local circumstances and needs.
For instance, Learning Assistants at Florida
International University use a curriculum
adapted from the Modeling Instruction
Program (see PhysTEC News, Fall 2010),
while Seattle Pacific University Learning
Assistants conduct mock “physics interviews”
to develop inquiry-based teaching skills.
“To see the Colorado Learning Assistant
Program emulated and adapted around
the country is heartwarming,” said Valerie
Otero, a professor of science education at
CU-Boulder, and one of the main driving
forces behind the program. “Most physics and education faculty care a lot about
their instruction, but at the same time they
face challenges that pull at their time. The
Learning Assistant program is a reasonable
solution that allows faculty and institutions
to make small- to large-scale change.”
Among the innovations featured at this
year’s workshop was the first video workshop
created by a PhysTEC-funded project led by
researchers from Seattle Pacific University
and Florida International (see “PhysTEC
Adds Four New Funded Sites,” page 1).
There was also a planning session for participants to begin developing programs at
their own institutions.
Learning Assistant workshops are
open to all member institutions, whose
representatives receive free workshop
registration. For more information about
the 2011 Learning Assistant workshop,
see www.ptec.org/conferences/cula11.
4
The Big Picture: Where Will the
Teachers Come From?
Nuts and Bolts of Teacher
Preparation: Sustainability
By Theodore Hodapp
T
he last few years have seen either
the closure or the threat of closure of
numerous physics departments in states
including Texas, Louisiana, Missouri, Maine,
Tennessee, North Carolina, and Idaho. These
are not isolated incidents. Declining state
budgets, a rising anti-intellectual stance
in some corners, and real concerns about
how public funds are spent all contribute
to this issue.
What’s more, the PhysTEC-supported
National Task Force on Teacher Education in
Physics has shown that regional universities
and former teacher colleges are some of the
largest producers of high school physics
teachers. Sadly, many of these institutions
are the ones being targeted for closure.
In Texas, five physics undergraduate
programs are slated to be closed this fall.
Five additional programs were put on
probation with the threat of closure if they
cannot boost their graduation rates in the
next few years. What is surprising, and a
matter of deep concern, is that the state of
Texas now requires all high school students
to take physics in order to graduate, but
is closing many of the departments that
have the greatest chance of educating the
teachers who serve those students.
If all states were to apply the same criteria
to their public institutions that Texas is using
(closing all programs that graduated fewer
than 5 majors per year averaged over the last
5 years), we would lose nearly half (49%) of
the physics programs at public institutions
in the US. (If we include private colleges,
the number goes up to 60%.) Included in
this group are all of the undergraduate physics programs at public Historically Black
Colleges and Universities. Reducing the
number of programs that educate qualified
teachers when there is already a shortfall
is exactly the wrong way to prepare the
next generation for the challenges of the
21st century.
What can be done? Arguing that “we must
have physics because we always have!” is
not going to win the day. Instead, committing to educating more highly qualified high
school physics teachers not only demonstrates
community engagement, but can also be
a means to increase enrollments, because
these teachers are often the best recruiters
to your physics program. In parallel, we
can make the case to policy makers that
closing departments endangers our ability
to educate physics teachers—a sentiment
that will likely resonate with constituents.
You may not convince state bean counters
that a department’s existence should continue based on precedent, but you have a
much better chance to convince them that
we are addressing the very real needs of
educating the next generation. We must
act responsibly: create sustainable, highquality programs to educate future physics
teachers; and advocate publicly about the
importance of such programs.
PhysTEC People
From left to right, Jacob Clark Blickenstaff, Robert Hilborn, Beth Cunningham and
Bushraa Khatib. Photos courtesy of APS (Clark Blickenstaff and Khatib) and AAPT
(Hilborn and Cunningham).
T
he PhysTEC project leadership has added
several new people in the past year. In
June 2011, Jacob Clark Blickenstaff
joined APS as the Teacher Education Programs
Manager, with half of his time devoted to
PhysTEC. Clark Blickenstaff’s responsibilities include managing the PhysTEC Noyce
Program, organizing the annual PhysTEC
Conference, and developing a new program
of teacher professional development for
APS. He joins the project with five years
of experience teaching high school physics
in California, a PhD in Science Education
from the University of California, Davis,
and having held professorships at Western
Washington University and the University
of Southern Mississippi.
Beth Cunningham has been AAPT’s
Executive Officer and co-Principal Investigator
to the project since January 2011. Prior to
joining AAPT, Cunningham was Provost,
Dean of the Faculty, and Professor of
Physics at Illinois Wesleyan University. In
September, Robert (Bob) Hilborn joined
AAPT as Associate Executive Officer,
and will work to connect the project with
AAPT’s networks and resources. Prior to
joining AAPT, Hilborn was a Professor of
Physics and Head of the Science/Mathematics
Education Department at the University of
Texas at Dallas. He comes to AAPT with a
long history of leadership in physics education, including a term as AAPT president
in 1996-1997.
In October, Bushraa Khatib joined APS as
Education and Diversity Programs Coordinator.
Khatib’s responsibilities will include writing, data gathering, and analysis for project
proposals, reports, and publications. Khatib
graduated from the University of Maryland,
Baltimore County, and previously worked
for APS as a Science Writing Intern.
In other personnel news, Jack Hehn,
Manager of the Education Division at
the American Institute of Physics (AIP),
has retired from AIP after twelve years
of service. Hehn served as co-Principal
Investigator on the original PhysTEC grant,
and continues to advise the project. Gabriel
Popkin, PhysTEC project manager from
2007 to 2011, is now a project consultant.
PhysTEC News
PhysTEC Management Team
Editor: Gabriel Popkin
Designer: Krystal Ferguson
Theodore Hodapp, Director of Education and Diversity, APS
Monica Plisch, Associate Director of Education and Diversity, APS
Beth Cunningham, Executive Officer, AAPT
Jacob Clark Blickenstaff, Teacher Education Programs Manager, APS
For More Information
Email: khatib@aps.org
Phone: 301-209-3297
Chance Hoellwarth,
physics professor
and PhysTEC site
leader at Cal Poly,
works with Nancy
Stauch, who is
now in her seventh
year as Teacher-inResidence. Photo
courtesy of Chance
Hoellwarth.
“True sustainability means changing institutional
attitudes so that teacher education becomes part
of a physics department’s core mission.”
—Theodore Hodapp, Director of Education and Diversity, APS
“S
ustainability” is a word that gets used
a lot these days, and it is important
for PhysTEC, too—in fact, it is one
of the project’s “key components,” which
all funded sites are expected to address.
So what does the concept of sustainability
mean for a project like PhysTEC, which
supports sites for a limited time and then
expects them to maintain project elements
on their own?
“We expect sites to find ways to fund
project components, but that is just the
beginning of what we mean by sustainability,” says Theodore Hodapp, APS Director
of Education and Diversity, and PhysTEC
project director. “True sustainability means
changing institutional attitudes so that
teacher education becomes part of a physics
department’s core mission.”
Since its inception in 2001, PhysTEC
has funded 20 sites to improve their teacher
preparation programs. The original sites
received five years of funding; since 2004,
funding has been for three years, with the
option of splitting the last year of funding
between two academic years. Though not
all sites have succeeded in sustaining all
project components post-funding, every
site has maintained some project reforms,
and many have expanded on their successes
by institutionalizing programs, bringing in
new funding, and involving other campus
departments.
Model of Success
California Polytechnic State University,
San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly), which received
PhysTEC funding from 2003 to 2007, has
funded one Teacher-in-Residence (TIR)
since the site’s PhysTEC funding ended,
and began funding a second TIR in 2010.
TIRs are master teachers who work at
universities in a variety of roles related
to teacher preparation; they often return
to the classroom after one or two years,
but sometimes take permanent positions
at a university.
At Cal Poly, both TIRs work directly
with middle and high school teaching
candidates, supervising student teachers
and teaching methods courses. They also
team-teach physical science courses for future
elementary teachers. Cal Poly provides a
variety of early teaching experiences for
potential teachers, and continues to graduate two to three physics teachers per year,
compared to less than one per year before
PhysTEC funding.
“My dean is very supportive of providing
sabbaticals for high school teachers, and
he realized that faculty may not be the best
people to supervise students teachers,”
says Chance Hoellwarth, physics professor, PhysTEC site leader, and co-director
of the Center for Excellence in Science
and Mathematics Education at Cal Poly.
“Hiring TIRs frees up tenure-track faculty,
gets us better student teacher supervision,
and builds links within the community.”
“Having TIRs teach physical science
courses for elementary teachers is an attractive funding model for department chairs
and deans,” says Monica Plisch, Associate
Director of Education and Diversity at
APS. “We have seen many sites create a
hybrid role that allows the TIR to move
into a partial faculty line in this way, while
continuing to mentor and support future
high school teachers.”
“It’s crucial that the project have broad
support on campus, and, especially in this
era of tight budgets, that all constituencies
see it in their best interest to keep things
going,” says Hodapp. “When faculty, administrators, and students are working together
to improve education, that’s when lasting
change happens.”
100K in 10
By Jacob Clark Blickenstaff
I
nspired by President Obama’s 2011 State
of the Union Address, the nonprofit groups
Carnegie Corporation of New York,
Opportunity Equation, and the NewSchools
Venture Fund launched 100Kin10, a movement to prepare and retain one hundred
thousand science, technology, engineering,
and mathematics (STEM) teachers over the
next 10 years. PhysTEC has been selected
as a member of this movement, along
with AAPT, the Science and Mathematics
Teacher Initiative (SMTI), and Florida
Robert Hilborn, Associate Executive Officer, AAPT
Sara Webb, Project Coordinator, APS
Bushraa Khatib, Education and Diversity Projects Coordinator, APS
Jon Anderson, Teacher and TIR Coordinator
International University, among others.
To become a member, the project made a
commitment to increase efforts to prepare
highly qualified physics teachers in the
coming decade. Funding partners like JP
Morgan Chase, the Gates Foundation, and
Dow have pledged millions of dollars to
support the movement. To see the PhysTEC
commitment, along with all the other commitments from 100K in 10 partners, go to
www.100Kin10.org