November 21, 2024                                               Issue #38

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.

Upcoming events

• Assessment and Equity December 13, 2024 from 3:00 pm - 4:30 pm EST 
  In this talk, I will motivate the need for the next generation of physics assessment tools and present a few projects that my physics education research lab at Michigan State University has been working on. In particular, I will discuss our efforts to build a more diverse set of tools to use within our classrooms in order to better understand our students’ learning as well as how we can best support them throughout their time in higher education. Facilitator: Rachel Henderson (Michigan State University)
• AJP TPT Info Session 2025 February 15, 2025 from 1:00pm - 2:00pm EST
  Join us for this lively information session on how and what to publish in both AAPT journals: American Journal of Physics and The Physics Teacher. Editors for each journal will present on the publishing process and relevant topics and content sought. Facilitators: Beth Parks (Colgate University and editor for AJP) and Gary White (The George Washington University and editor for TPT)   

Setting the right tone at the first class meeting is an important equity strategy, as Kelly A. Hogan and Viji Sathy suggest in their book Inclusive Teaching: Strategies for Promoting Equity in the College Classroom (West Virginia University Press, 2022) Greet students as they enter the classroom; this demonstrates that you see them as people. “Even if the instructor doesn’t greet all the students, many others are noticing.” Learn students’ names, and pronounce them correctly; incorrect pronunciation can be a microaggression. If students sit in the same places during each class, create a seating chart. (I created seating charts for each class, forcing students to work with different people. Not only did this allow me to learn my students’ names quickly, but it had the added benefit of creating community in the class since students worked with so many different classmates.) Hogan and Sathy suggest using a photo roster. You might not learn all of your students’ names, but if you use some names  in each class “students will assume you know more names than you do.” Similarly, consider avoiding using pronouns (unless you have asked for them from your students). You might use a student’s name instead, or use a general term such as “your classmate” in place of her/him/their. And when you make a mistake (say with a student’s name), especially in the first class meeting, point this out to your students. It “sets the stage for an environment in which it feels safe to make mistakes.”

• 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.