Teacher Preparation Section

Alma Robinson, Virginia Tech

As pre-service teacher educators, it is incumbent on us to not only provide our future physics teachers with the training to become good teachers, but to also inform them of the ongoing resources they’ll need to help them grow into excellent ones. This issue of the Teacher Preparation Section highlights the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) and the Supporting Teachers to Encourage the Pursuit of Undergraduate Physics for Women (STEP-UP 4 Women) project.

Kelsey Sheridan describes the ways in which AAPT supports physics teacher preparation programs and physics teachers during all stages of their careers from a scholarship for future physics teachers to curricular materials aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards. Through peer-reviewed journals, workshops, conferences, and a database of online resources, AAPT provides physics teachers the ability to participate in a rich community of physics educators.

The percentage of women that make up undergraduate physics majors in the United States is about 20%. Kathryne Sparks Woodle explains a new initiative from the American Physical Society (and others, including funding from the National Science Foundation) which attempts to bring that percentage up to 50% by working directly with high school physics teachers. This isn’t an intractable problem: If half of the high school physics teachers were able to recruit one new woman to major in physics each year, 50% of the incoming physics majors would be women. “The STEP UP 4 Women project has demonstrated that teaching two research-based lessons and implementing “Everyday Actions” can make the difference.”

By sharing these resources with your future physics teachers, you can help them stay engaged with other physics teachers throughout their careers and make a more positive impact on their students. Please don’t assume that they will hear about these programs once they start their careers. Instead, inform them of these resources now, and they may become the teacher leaders who share these programs with their colleagues!

Disclaimer – The articles and opinion pieces found in this issue of the APS Forum on Education Newsletter are not peer refereed and represent solely the views of the authors and not necessarily the views of the APS.