From the Chair

Chandralekha Singh

First of all, I would like to thank Larry Woolf for doing an excellent job as the FEd chair this past year and to Bruce Mason, who was absolutely fabulous as the FEd Secretary/Treasurer for the past six years. Fortunately, Larry will be on the executive committee for another year as the past-chair and will chair the FEd fellowship committee. I would also like to convey our appreciation to the other outgoing members of the FEd executive committee, the past chair, Peter Collings, and the members-at-large, John Thompson and Stamatis Vokos.

I would also like to welcome the new members on the FEd executive committee. Paul Cottle is the new vice-chair, Scott Franklin is the new Secretary-Treasurer, and the new members-at-large are Greta Zenner Petersen and Angie Little.

Renee Diehl, who is the energetic FEd Chair-elect, is also the chair of the FEd program committee for the APS March and April meetings in 2012. If you have suggestions for possible sessions that could be sponsored or co-sponsored by FEd for either of these meetings, please let Renee know. Paul Cottle is the chair of the FEd nominating committee which is charged with nominating candidates for vice-chair and the two members-at-large (one of whom must also be an AAPT member) for next year. If you have suggestions for candidates for any of these positions, please let Paul know.

In addition to organizing invited sessions at the March and April meetings, FEd sponsors three newsletters in fall, spring and summer. The editors for next fall, spring, and summer newsletters are Andrew Elby and Rachel Scherr, Paul Dolan, and Richard Peterson, respectively.  Please consider writing an article for any of these upcoming newsletters. Also, please go to the APS FEd website to browse through the past newsletters. In those newsletters, you will find useful articles on a variety of topics related to graduate, undergraduate and K-12 education and also on informal physics education and outreach.

Executive committee members can be contacted from the governance page on the FEd's website. I am also looking for suggestions on how to improve the FEd activities. In particular, I would like suggestions on how to further engage the more than 4000 FEd members in FEd activities. Please drop me a line if you have ideas.

I look forward to working with you.

Chandralekha Singh is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the University of Pittsburgh. She is Chair of the APS Forum on Education and is the Chair of the editorial board of the Physical Review Special Topics: Physics Education Research.

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.