June 28, 2024 Issue #31

SPOTLIGHT is the OPTYCs bi-weekly newsletter. It brings you OPTYCs activity updates, highlights from recent publications related to physics education, and news & resources for Two-Year colleges.

Summer recess: The next issue of SPOTLIGHT will be published on August 29. 

Upcoming events

• LHC Physics In the Classroom  July 7, 2024 in Boston, MA. Join us at AAPT Summer Meeting for this co-sponsored workshop with QuarkNet.

• TEAM UP Together & Transfer Students: Supporting student transfer between two- and four-year institutions. July 7, 2024 in Boston, MA Join us at the AAPT Summer Meeting for this workshop to support transfer students.

• Integrating Computation into Your Intro Physics Class July 30, 2024-August 1, 2024  Join PICUP for this 3-day virtual workshop to develop a computation activity for use in your classroom. This workshop is a very basic primer on integrating computation into introductory courses with easy-to-use, readily available computational tools. No programming experience whatsoever is necessary to participate.

• Undergrad Research 2024 Workshop August 9, 2024 from 3:00pm - 5:00pm EDT
  Learn about three different models for students conducting research at two-year colleges. We will describe: a project-based assignment in a course, a course-based undergraduate research experience (CURE), and an extracurricular student research project. Facilitators Dwain Desbien (Estrella Mountain CC, AZ) Wayne Manrakhan (Harford CC, MD) Kendra Sibbernsen (Metropolitan CC, NE)

• LaTeX 2024 Workshop August 30, 2024 from 2:00pm - 4:00pm EDT
  In this free, virtual workshop, you will use LaTeX to write a solution to physics problems of your choice following an approach that has been used for  in a two semester introductory calculus-based physics course at a two-year college. This workshop is especially suited for anyone who is interested in helping their students use LaTeX as a tool to professional present their written work. Facilitator: Joe Heafner (Independent Scholar, Coordinator for OPTYCs Continuing Professional Development Workshops).

• Students with Disabilities 2024 Workshop September 21, 2024 from 12:00pm -3:00pm EDT
  Join us in this free, virtual workshop as we explore practical ways to provide better accessibility for students with disabilities in your classes. We will offer tips and tools for accommodations related to mobility, neurodiversity, and auditory and visual impairments. Facilitators: Tony Musumba (Riverside City Community College)Dean Stocker (University of Cincinnati - Blue Ash College)Alex Bohn (Northern Virginia Community College) Shahida Dar (Mohawk Valley Community College)

• Physics Toolbox 2024 Workshop October 5, 2024 from 12:00pm - 2:00pm EDT
  Physics Toolbox Sensor Suite (https://www.vieyrasoftware.net/) is a free Android and iOS mobile app developed for physics teachers and their students to gather data using sensors. Come to this free workshop to learn about more than 25 laboratory experiences you can have your students do with their smartphones. Facilitators:  Rebecca & Chrystian Vieyra (Vieyra Software)

Transparency is so important for equity in our classes; being upfront about our expectations, our goals, our reasons for choices we make helps demystify academics for many students. We’re born knowing how to learn, but somehow, by the time we reach college, we’ve lost that knack of trying, making mistakes, using these experiences for alternatives, and trying again. So, helping college students understand how learning works, that it is difficult, and normalizing confusion and errors is part of this transparency. In Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom (West Virginia University Press, 2022), authors  Kelly A. Hogan and Viji Sathy write, “We like to imagine we are running a semester-long marketing campaign for how learning works and how we are aligning our teaching to these best practices.” Explaining that small group discussions helps learners refine their thinking, for example, shows students that you care about their learning and have made choices to maximize their opportunities. 

• The American Association of Physics Teachers 
• Committee on Physics in Two-Year Colleges (AAPT area committee)
• Join the TYC Google group: Send an email to tycphysics@googlegroups.com
• PhysPort Recommendations about teaching methods, assessment, and results from PER
• PER Central A resource collection for physics education researchers 
• Physics Review Physics Education Research Fully open access journal for PER 
• arXiv Physics education The arXiv repository for physics education papers
• AIP Statistical Research Center Data on education, careers, and diversity in physics, astronomy and other physical sciences

optycs.aapt.org

The work of OPTYCs is supported by NSF-DUE-2212807.