Pathways Reports of Physics Activities

1
Pathways Reports of Physics Activities

• Contributors
• Partnership for the Integration of Computation
  into Undergraduate physics courses (PICUP)
• Communities for Physics and Astronomy Digital
  Resources in Education (ComPADRE)
• Practitioners from the physics teaching
  community

Norman Chonacky Editor in Chief - Computing in
Science and Engineering
2
Panelist names and activity

• Representing PICUP
• Norman Chonacky, Department of Applied Physics,
  Yale University norman.chonacky_at_yale.edu
• Special issue on "Computing in Undergraduate
  Physics" reports findings of a national survey on
  use of computation in physics courses Computing
  in Science and Engineering September/October 2006
  (Vol. 8, No. 5). http//www.computer.org/portal/si
  te/csdl/index.jsp
• Next step toward computational integration into
  undergraduate physics "Visioning Workshop"
  conducted at Argonne National Lab - May 2007.
  http//compphysed.shodor.org/
• Workshop results This coming (spring) American
  Journal of Physics, April 2008, special issue on
  Computational Physics.
• PICUP Vision Computation is an integral part of
  the education of every physics student.
• PICUP Mission Create a community of educators,
  forum for discussion, collection of resources,
  and a set of strategies/tactics to support the
  development and improvement of computational
  physics education.

3
Panelist names and activity

• Representing ComPADRE
• David Winch, Department of Physics (emeritus),
  Kalamazoo College winch_at_kzoo.edu
• Organize planning committee to design a structure
  for computational community within ComPADRE.
  http//www.aapt.org/Projects/ComPADRE.cfm
• First step toward establishing a presence for
  computational physics in ComPADRE
  http//www.aapt.org/Projects/comPADRE.cfm.
• Community Vision Collection of materials and
  services that support the integration of
  computation into all undergraduate courses.
• Design objectives
• Connect the new computing resources to all other
  communities across ComPADRE's collections.
• Cross-list computational physics resources with
  those of Computational Science Educational
  Reference Desk (CSERD) http//www.shodor.org/refd
  esk/
• Goal - Launch the computational community by June
  2008.

4
Panelist names and activity

• Representing current computational practitioners
• Richard Gass, Department of Physics, University
  of Cincinnati mailtogass_at_physics.uc.edu
• Designing new educational computational
  activities that include the use of high
  performance computing in collaboration with the
  Ohio Supercomputing Center http//www.osc.edu/
• (additional points)?
• Vision Computation infused into the major
  curriculum - first year through graduation.
• Objectives
• Include integration in our service courses - less
  than successful
• Plan dedicated computational physics course,
  spring 2007 - desktop to HPC
• Collaboration with Ralph Regula School
  http//www.rrscs.org/

5
Panelist names and activity

• Representing current computational practitioners
  (cont.)
• Richard Gass, Department of Physics, University
  of Cincinnati mailtogass_at_physics.uc.edu
• Ralph Regula School collaborates in Ohio virtual
  computational science education programs
• Goalcomputationally literate students
• Practice
• Courses taught both locally and by distance
  learning
• Student access to faculty and more specialized
  courses
• Faculty generate high quality, peer reviewed
  computational modules

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Panelist names and activity

• Representing current computational practitioners
  (cont.)
• Richard Gass, Department of Physics, University
  of Cincinnati mailtogass_at_physics.uc.edu
• Ralph Regula School collaborates in Ohio virtual
  computational science education programs
• Degrees and minors in computational science
• Use facilities of Ohio Supercomputing Center
• Constellation of 2 and 4 year, public and
  private, liberal arts and research I institutions
• Major and minor degrees granted by individual
  participating institutions

7
And therefore ?

• Enlarge the tent by enlarging our database of
  interested practitioners
• Provide information about your computational use
  experiences by responding to the Computing in
  Science and Engineering (CiSE) physics
  computational practices questionnaire.
  http//www.computer.org/cipcs
• Enlarge the tent by participating in succeeding
  conferences
• July 2007 AAPT Topical Conference in
  Computational Physics for Upper Level Courses at
  Davidson College http//www.opensourcephysics.org
  /CPC/index.html
• Gordon Conference on Computational Physics - June
  2008 http//www.opensourcephysics.org/GRC/index.h
  tml
• Supercomputing '08