How do we know if we are doing a good job in physics teaching?

Robert Ehrlich

Citation: American Journal of Physics 70, 24 (2002); doi: 10.1119/1.1424267

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 How do we know if we are doing a good job in physics teaching?
Robert Ehrlich
Physics Department, George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia 22030
共Received 8 August 2001; accepted 3 October 2001兲
Whether it be at the level of the individual, the academic department, or the entire physics teaching
profession, nearly all of us want to do a good job. But how can we know if we are succeeding? To
what extent can we trust traditional measures of excellence in teaching, and what alternative
measures resting on different—perhaps even unfashionable—assumptions might we
consider? © 2002 American Association of Physics Teachers.
关DOI: 10.1119/1.1424267兴

THE VALUE OF STUDENT EVALUATIONS job it was to get them into shape physics-wise. Apparently,
however, some students would have preferred not to have
Note: This article is based on a talk that was delivered at their lack of knowledge put on display before their class-
the AAPT summer meeting in Rochester upon receiving the mates, and were looking for more of a hand-holder than a
2001 AAPT Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teach- drill sergeant. I still am uncertain why my supposedly iden-
ing. tical approach in the two recitation sections led to drastically
The topic for this talk was prompted by the fact that the different student ratings—one class loving it and the other
day before I received the letter notifying me that I had been hating it.
given the Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching Award, I I can only speculate that the classroom is a chaotic
had just received last semester’s student evaluations. It system—no news there! In a chaotic system, small and
seemed to me that unless there were some evidence of ex- subtle changes in the initial conditions—in this case the na-
cellence in my teaching, I would, in good conscience, have ture of the instructor’s comments or the state of mind of the
to decline the award. To my chagrin I had received in one students or instructor—lead to large differences in the state
recitation section of our pre-med physics course, the worst of the system. Anyway, the bottom line is that the student
student evaluations I ever got. One student even wrote on the evaluations didn’t tell me very much about the success of my
form that I should be fired! ‘‘strongly interacting’’ system for conducting the recitation,
Interestingly, the students in my other recitation of the only that in one case the strongly interacting force was at-
same pre-med physics course 共scheduled immediately after tractive, and in the other case it was repulsive. Regardless of
the first one兲 gave me some of the highest ratings I ever the ratings, my gut instinct was that my approach was
received, and yet as far as I was concerned I had done ex- successful—even if some students hated it—and I plan to
actly the same job in both sections. I was particularly inter- continue using it, but with greater attention to the wording of
ested to see how I would be evaluated in these recitation my comments. I don’t cite this anecdote because I think stu-
sections, because I had reverted to a form of instruction that dent evaluations are worthless, but I do think they need to be
I had not used in quite a while. Namely, I treated the two taken with a very large grain of salt.
sections as literal recitations, where students would solve
homework on the blackboard, and explain their solutions to WHAT DO OUR STUDENTS LEARN?
the rest of the class. I would then comment on the student
work, either praising it, or through questioning, uncover er- The obvious place to look for a validation of the job we
rors and misunderstandings. I would also sometimes raise are doing in the classroom would seem to be in the perfor-
additional questions that went beyond the actual wording of mance of our students as a result of instruction in our classes.
the particular problem, in an attempt to encourage students to As Joe Redish has pointed out, however, ‘‘many physics fac-
think about the generality or limitations of their solution. ulty come away from teaching introductory physics deeply
Sometimes it happened that students whose written work dismayed at how little the majority of their students have
at the board was flawless were unable to answer the simplest learned.’’ 1 Even among those students who do perform well
question about what they had written. In such cases, my on problem-based exams, there often seems to be little gain
questions were probably particularly resented, and some- in conceptual understanding. Joe and others in the Physics
times they were greeted with either stony silence or Education Research community have shown that with tradi-
mumbled nonsequiturs from students. Although I usually tional instruction, there is minimal gain in conceptual under-
tried to avoid appearing to ‘‘hound’’ a student with follow-up standing, as measured for example by normalized gains on
questions when it was clear they were floundering, some- the Force Concept Inventory 共FCI兲 test. Moreover, Richard
times I couldn’t resist—especially when a student appeared Hake has shown that in classes having a strong component of
to bluff with an answer based entirely on random guesswork. ‘‘interactive engagement’’共IE兲, roughly twice the normalized
Often my follow-up questions would make it clear to both gain can be achieved without any deleterious effects on
the student and the rest of the class that they had a very poor problem-solving ability.2 These results have been given a
grasp of the material. My feeble attempts at humor in such great deal of attention in recent years, and justifiably so.
cases may well have been misinterpreted as ridicule by the Taken at face value they would seem to imply that traditional
unfortunate student. instruction, that is, lecturing, is of very little value, while
At one point I did lamely suggest to my recitation students instruction that interactively engages students yields much
that they should think of me as their drill instructor, whose greater gains.

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 Although I strongly believe in the value of interactively student motivations than the pedagogy used. Recall that in
engaging my students, and I would do it regardless of introductory courses most students are taking physics only to
whether it could be proven to have actual value in improving fulfill a requirement. Starting with that initial student per-
understanding, I am unwilling to take the preceding claims at spective, only an extremely skilled instructor might be able
face value for at least four reasons. First, I am not convinced to get the majority of his/her students to see the intrinsic
that the claim of greater conceptual understanding gains on beauty of our subject, and not merely a hurdle to get over.
the FCI test in IE classes may not be due in part to some
amount of ‘‘teaching to the test.’’ Second, the IE versus
non-IE comparison is hardly a double blind one, because STUDENT CAPABILITIES AND ATTITUDES
both Hake and the course instructor knew both the category
the course is being placed into 共IE or non-IE兲, as well as the Perhaps it should not be too surprising that most students
FCI gain for that class. think that physics is all about ‘‘memorizing and using for-
Third, and most important of all, the IE versus non-IE mulas,’’ because that’s how average students get their aver-
classification is a blurry one. There is clearly a continuum on age grades. It would be extremely interesting, however, to
the ‘‘interactive engagement’’ or IE scale that ranges from see how student attitudes about what it takes to succeed in
lecturing with zero student involvement, all the way to stu- physics correlate with their grades in physics. Thus, even if
dent peer discussion groups with little if any lecturing. More- there were no overall improvement in student attitudes after
over, good lecturers may, through a judicious use of peer taking physics, we might have greater confidence that we
discussion à la Mazur,3 engage their students to a greater were doing a good job if our A and B students were more
degree than teachers who do no lecturing. In fact, according likely to agree that physics is not primarily about ‘‘memoriz-
to Joe Redish, some of the largest FCI gains he has ever ing and using formulas.’’ Conversely, if we found that stu-
observed were in a large 共though highly interactive兲 lecture dents who received high grades in our courses were the ones
class.4 In short, contrary to the rhetoric of some, we should who more frequently claimed that physics is all about memo-
not equate instruction via lecture mode to passive student rizing and using formulas, we should be especially con-
experiences. As David Bligh has shown in ‘‘What’s the Use cerned and take a hard look at our exams and our pedagogy.
of Lectures?,’’ lecturing when done properly, can engage What I am saying is that, in evaluating our success as a
students.5 Finally, I would be more willing to accept that IE physics teacher, we need to pay more attention to the differ-
classes show greater conceptual gains if those gains were ences in attitudes between our A and B students and our D
shown to be of value in follow-on courses, specifically if and F students, and how the attitudes of each group change
they led not only to greater student entre in the major, but during our courses.
more importantly to higher numbers of physics graduates. The idea of measuring our success as a teacher by looking
Regardless of my skeptical comments about taking com- at student attitudes of our ‘‘better’’ students runs counter to a
parisons between IE and non-IE courses at face value, I do, number of widely held beliefs, and possibly also to the ide-
as I noted previously, applaud efforts to strive for greater ology of many educational reformers. The physics education
student engagement—though I prefer doing it within the research effort is aimed at developing a curriculum to help
overall lecture format, which as I noted can be quite interac- all students learn physics better. It does not seem overly in-
tive. In addition, I agree that we need to place greater em- terested in ‘‘intrinsic’’ differences between students that en-
phasis on deep conceptual understanding without compro- able some to succeed with little effort, while others ‘‘get it’’
mising our student’s problem-solving skills. only after considerable struggle if ever. I can still remember
a time, however, when the conventional wisdom was that
some students have what it takes to develop a mastery of a
STUDENT ATTITUDES TOWARD PHYSICS difficult subject such as physics, while others simply did not,
even after expending considerable effort.
To assess the job we are doing as physics teachers, I be- Unfortunately, the ‘‘conventional wisdom’’ of that earlier
lieve that we need to consider what effect we are having on era may also have wrongly put most female and minority
our students, both in terms of their understanding of the sub- students into the pool of those who were unlikely to succeed
ject as well as their attitudes toward it. in physics. However, just because it is now clear that the
For that reason it is dismaying that, as Joe Redish has capability to succeed in physics knows no gender or racial
shown, student attitudes about physics based on his Mary- boundaries, it does not necessarily follow that students’ abili-
land Physics Expectations 共MPEX兲 survey become less ‘‘fa- ties are unimportant in determining their success in physics
vorable’’ after most traditional courses.6 Two examples of courses, or that such abilities are less important in determin-
unfavorable student attitudes are that physics is primarily ing success than the type of instruction we offer. On the other
about ‘‘memorizing and using formulas’’ and that physics is hand, it is equally true that we need to work with the students
‘‘unrelated to experiences outside the classroom.’’ Redish we get, as much as we might wish that more of them came to
also found that nontraditional instruction using tutorials fares us with better preparation or ability.
no better than traditional courses in shaping student attitudes, Still, there is a real question of where we set the bar, and
although workshop physics classes at Dickenson College do whether the bar should be set at the same level for all stu-
show an improvement.6 However, because the results for dents, or alternatively whether grades should be instead a
Workshop Physics were at only one particular school—a measure of progress made, given an individual student’s
school that lacks an engineering college—it is possible that starting point. In today’s era of students as consumers, many
the key factor was the type of student body rather than the students and some faculty believe that our courses should be
style of instruction. structured so that conscientious students who put in a ‘‘rea-
The unfavorable attitudes that most students seem to de- sonable’’ amount of time and effort are entitled to a decent
velop as a result of taking traditional 共and possibly also non- grade in a course. I would respectfully disagree.
traditional兲 introductory physics courses may say more about All of us can learn a great deal from our failures in life,

25 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 70, No. 1, January 2002 Robert Ehrlich 25

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 and students need to be given an opportunity to fail as well to improving access, it may be easy to become persuaded
as to succeed. Contrary to the prediction of self-esteem that the bar has not been lowered, when in fact it has—
theory, failure actually seems to motivate some students, ac- especially when issues of race and gender are involved.
cording to educational researcher Martin Covington.7 Many For example, one method of assessment in the new peda-
of us have observed examples of students who persevered gogy relies on group projects in lieu of exams. When used in
after receiving several early D’s and F’s, and eventually introductory courses, I believe that group projects, although
graduated with a physics degree. Moreover, if an early fail- they might have good motivational value, invariably lower
ure in first-year/sophomore physics should dissuade a student standards. Written group projects, if not monitored with great
from a less than suitable career path, that failure may be a care, allow weaker or lazy students to coast, and they encour-
kinder blow than inflated mediocre passing grades which de- age the inappropriate use of internet Web sites.11 Both of
lay students’ recognition that they have made a wrong choice these kinds of abuses can be very difficult for instructors to
to much later in their college careers. detect—especially in introductory courses having large num-
For example, around 90% of biology majors at George bers of students.
Mason University consider themselves to be on the pre-med So, getting back to my main subject, how do we know if
track when they start out, but only about 7% of these stu- we are doing a good job in our teaching? There needs, obvi-
dents end up going to medical school. If we made a con- ously, to be some non-negligible fraction of students who do
certed effort to see that no one got left behind, and somehow reasonably well in our courses, though it could fall far short
saw to it that all students passed the intro course 共presumably of 100%, depending on the nature of the course. A calculus-
also including those that never bothered to come to class兲, based course for engineering and science students might
we really wouldn’t be doing pre-meds any favors. In that have a much higher percentage of poor performers than a
case, medical schools with their limited number of spaces, liberal arts physics course, where we need be less concerned
would just set the required GPA bar a bit higher, and would about compromising high standards or ‘‘watering down’’ the
rightly conclude that physics teachers had inflated their course.
grades. I would justify lower standards for conceptual physics
Clearly, we cannot afford to throw up our hands and put courses in terms of promoting greater science literacy among
the blame for failure on our students if we should find that students who otherwise would not take any physics. More-
say 95 % fail intro physics. However, I would claim that we over, a good case can be made that we are not actually ap-
should also worry if 95% of our students are doing well in a plying lower standards, just because many more students
calculus or algebra-based physics course. It gives me no successfully complete conceptual physics courses. Even
pleasure to see a single student fail my classes, but I believe though many mathematically challenged students perceive
that the only way that at least 95% of students could do well these courses as being easier, they may cover extremely so-
in introductory physics is if we have dumbed-down our phisticated concepts—and hence in some sense they are cer-
teaching to an unconscionable degree. tainly not ‘‘easy.’’
I don’t know exactly what percentage of poor physics If we are doing a good job in our teaching, we need to
grades I would find acceptable, but I do know that it should respect our students as individuals 共regardless of their abili-
be higher than many other subjects, given the nature of our ties兲, and have them respect us as well. We need to approach
discipline, and the mathematical and reasoning skills of each new semester with enthusiasm, and with a willingness
many of today’s college students. I believe that the higher to try new things and honestly evaluate the results. We
drop rates in physics compared to other subjects is due pri- should not be wedded to any one particular approach, be it
marily to the subject’s greater difficulty, and the greater old-fashioned lecturing, the latest fad in interactive teaching,
amount of work needed to achieve a good grade. A claim has or the latest Web applications. We need to be open to the use
been made by Seymour and Hewitt that the higher drop out of appropriate technology, but not be so enamored of it that
rates in the sciences are an indicator of the poor teaching in we view our courses through the prism of technology, that is,
those subjects.8 However, that claim has questionable rel- searching for uses of the technology, rather than thinking
evance for physics, because physics majors were a small
about the best way to teach our subject. If we are successful,
fraction of the students interviewed, and also because they
some fraction of our students still won’t succeed—even if
interviewed no students who dropped out of subjects outside
they spend a considerable amount of time and effort. How-
the sciences. Tobias is probably correct with her thesis that
ever, among those who do succeed in the challenging subject
students who now do poorly in our introductory physics
that is physics, there will be many that find it useful to their
courses ‘‘are not dumb, they’re just different.’’ 9 However,
future studies and their chosen careers. We may even be
those ‘‘differently-abled’’ students are probably less likely to
lucky enough to hear from some occasional students, who 10
successfully complete a physics major, no matter what peda-
or 20 years later drop by, and tell us that ‘‘hey that course I
gogy we adopt in our introductory physics courses—at least
took with you was great and really made me think, although
I am unaware of any data that show the contrary.
I only got a C.’’
Physics teachers who try to assess their own competence
ACCESS AND ACADEMIC STANDARDS are in a similar position as professionals in any field. As
Kruger and Dunning have shown, incompetent people gen-
Most educational reformers not only claim that the high erally are quite unaware of the depths of their incompetence,
drop out rate in physics courses is an indicator of poor teach- and rarely examine their own performance critically.12 Con-
ing, but that the denial of access of large numbers of students versely, highly competent people are highly critical of their
to certain fields and careers is bad for society. They would own performance, and are continually seeking ways to im-
further claim that by changing our teaching methods, we can prove. So, if you think that you are doing a great job in your
in fact greatly improve student access without lowering the physics teaching and long ago have found the method for
bar.10 Again, I am unconvinced. If one is strongly committed doing it well, chances are that you’re fooling yourself.

26 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 70, No. 1, January 2002 Robert Ehrlich 26

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 Summary: You are likely doing a good job if you physics, but hating math’’ syndrome is partly a consequence
of enrollment in high school conceptual physics courses.
䊉 and your students respect each other
共This increasingly popular offering might help explain why
䊉 start each semester with enthusiasm
high school physics enrollments are now probably higher
䊉 try and evaluate new teaching methods
than any time since World War II, yet the number of physics
䊉 keep up with advances in physics
baccalaureates continues to decline.13兲
䊉 encourage deep understanding Although it is important that courses stress conceptual un-
䊉 maintain high grading standards derstanding as well as problem solving, I think it would be
䊉 take student evaluations seriously—but not too seriously insanity to add a track to the major in ‘‘qualitative physics,’’
even though it might make the major much more accessible
SUCCESS AT THE DEPARTMENTAL LEVEL to mathematically challenged students. Interestingly, there is
a unit on our campus, ‘‘New Century College,’’ which until
So far I’ve talked mainly about how we can know if we’re last year, would have allowed students to design a major in
doing a good job as an individual physics teacher. Let’s now ‘‘qualitative physics’’ 共or almost anything else for which they
consider how we can answer the question at the level of an could find an advisor兲. Fortunately, that unit is now sub-
academic department, and also for the physics teaching pro- sumed within the College of Arts and Sciences, and self-
fession. Note that my talk title stresses how we 共not someone designed majors can no longer be watered down versions of
else兲 can know if we’re doing a good job. At the department existing majors.
level, in other words, I’m not concerned here with what it The preceding criticism of a ‘‘qualitative physics’’ degree
takes to keep the dean happy. Although, of course, in real life does not extend to versions of the major that may be of great
such outside perceptions can be a matter of life and death for value for students pursuing a wide range of careers outside
a department such as physics, which is often under the gun physics, as long as the program has a sufficient level of
for having low enrollments and very few majors. In fact, mathematical rigor. Clearly, the ‘‘devil is in the details’’ in
much of the pressure on departments to innovate comes from such cases.
such outside forces, which are on balance desirable in pre-
venting departments from becoming complacent.
However, let’s keep the focus on a physics department’s ASSESSING STUDENT PERFORMANCE
self-assessment of their performance. For example, I believe
that efforts to increase the number of majors and decrease The access issue is a crucial one for physics departments,
attrition rates are intrinsically neither desirable nor undesir- in view of the high drop rate in the major, especially if one
able. If such efforts either water down the major or transform should find that minority students or females should be
the subject matter into something that it is not, then I believe overly represented among the students that drop out. A de-
they are undesirable. ‘‘Holding the line’’ on standards for the partment must be sure that the introductory courses are
major is all the more important in a world where all the equally accessible and welcoming to all groups, and also that
outside pressures are in the opposite direction. Could you help is provided to struggling students. But beyond that, I
imagine any dean ever telling your department that it needs think it is inappropriate to adjust methods for assessing stu-
to tighten up its curriculum and increase standards so as to dent performance, with the explicit goals of either increasing
reduce an overly large number of majors and unqualified the size of underrepresented groups, or decreasing the attri-
persons entering the profession? We should preserve the in- tion of weaker students. Traditionally, assessment is done
tellectually challenging nature of our subject 共for majors兲, using grades on exams. If your grading scheme doesn’t truly
while simultaneously making the subject as accessible as reward deep student understanding of physics—then change
possible to the general student body in science 共or physics兲 it. But, don’t keep changing it in order to achieve some goal
literacy courses. deemed socially desirable. Assertions that we need to replace
As my department’s undergraduate coordinator, I am the our so-called ‘‘gatekeeping’’ courses with courses that are
one who signs the form when students drop out of the major. more welcoming to students smack of hidden and not so
I often will jokingly tell students who bring the form to me hidden agendas.14
that we don’t permit students to drop out. 共I might eventually Finally, when we tinker with methods of assessing student
find one who believes me!兲 I always ask students who wish performance, we introduce a large measure of circularity into
to drop out why they have decided to leave the major. Rarely efforts to reform pedagogy and curriculum. If you want to
does the stated reason relate to any dissatisfaction with spe- prove any educational innovation is a ‘‘success,’’ you can
cific courses, instructors, or pedagogy. The most recent two always find some method of student assessment under which
students to drop out of physics had not yet taken a single it will be superior.
course in the subject at the college level. They both ex- The goal of designing new methods of student assessment
plained 共in identical words兲 that while they loved physics, that allow disadvantaged students to succeed in greater num-
they hated math, and they were put off by the amount of bers is being given a big boost by a new science education
math needed to complete the major. Obviously, in these cases program funded by the NSF.15 Undoubtedly, most people
I did not attempt to dissuade the two students from their submitting grant proposals will sincerely believe that such a
decisions to drop, but the comment about loving physics and goal can be met without compromising standards in the ma-
hating math made me wonder where students get the idea jor. But, when one pits the prospect of major grant funding
that they could pursue their interest in majoring in physics against intellectual honesty, I’m not convinced that most
without a significant amount of math. One of the two stu- project directors will be entirely objective about whether or
dents had taken advanced placement physics in high school, not academic standards have been truly compromised. The
and was obviously aware of the mathematical nature of the physics education community and the nation will not be well
subject, but I am uncertain what high school physics back- served if the end result of this well-intentioned NSF initiative
ground the other student had if any. Perhaps the ‘‘loving is to water down the physics major at many schools.

27 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 70, No. 1, January 2002 Robert Ehrlich 27

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 Maintaining high standards for the major should be the creating a scientifically literate citizenry as well as in pro-
first prerequisite of a department that is ‘‘doing a good job.’’ ducing future generations of physicists. Clearly, we need to
But, maintaining standards need not mean that we are at- do a better job on the first score, given the low state of
tempting to preserve the status quo and refusing to innovate. scientific literacy in the nation, and the increasing number of
We must do a better job to ensure that course content and public policy issues—such as global warming and nuclear
particularly course exams focus on the physics knowledge missile defense—that have a large physics component. Al-
and skills we especially value. As the nature of our discipline though U.S. graduate physics programs have increasingly
changes, a department needs to be sure that it is keeping up been a magnet for those from abroad seeking a first rate
with new developments, and adding courses and options that education, the decline in numbers at the undergraduate level
reflect those developments. Conscientious departments will continues unabated. We can make all sorts of arguments
also engage in interdisciplinary ‘‘trespassing,’’ by offering about how physics graduates are well suited to a wide range
options relating physics to other fields such as biology, engi- of professions both within and outside of physics itself
neering, or computer science. They also need to better moti- 共which they are!兲, and how the nation really needs more
vate students 共and retain them in the major兲 by adopting physicists, whether it knows it or not. But, if our arguments
instructional strategies from some of those other disciplines. don’t reverse a 12-year-long downtrend in physics baccalau-
Engineering students, for example, routinely work on design reates, we need to either offer fewer degree programs 共or
projects, which could work just as well in some upper-level degree programs in related areas兲, or alternatively help ad-
physics courses. A physics department that is doing a good ministrators understand why physics programs need to be
job in teaching will have lots of majors working on research preserved even though they graduate very few majors. Obvi-
projects with faculty—a technique that is perhaps the very ously, the difficulty of that ‘‘sale’’ approaches infinity as the
best motivator of all in attracting and keeping students in the number of graduates approaches zero.
major. These kinds of one-on-one experiences are just as
valuable for students who seek immediate employment upon
graduation as they are for students who intend to go to
graduate school. A department must not measure its success CONCLUDING NOTE
based on the relative percentage of its majors that go on to
graduate school. When delivered at the 2001 AAPT Summer Meeting, this
The number of majors that a department graduates each talk generated somewhat polarized reactions—perhaps be-
year will invariably be carefully scrutinized by the adminis- cause some listeners interpreted it as an attack on the physics
tration. With the drop in output in recent years, the average education reform movement. However, no such attack was
number of bachelors per U.S. physics program is only four, intended. As in the case of any ‘‘movement,’’ there may be a
and the most common number in a given year is actually certain degree of demonization of outsiders. By challenging
zero, that is, more schools produce zero bachelors in a given certain assumptions held by some of those involved in phys-
year than any other number.16 Could a department that ics education reform, I wanted to remind listeners that all of
graduates an average of say 0.5 students per year consider us are 共or should be兲 concerned with how to do a better job
itself ‘‘successful?’’ I would say that the answer is ‘‘yes,’’ in our teaching, whether we consider ourselves reformers or
assuming that it is successful by all other measures. My not.
claim that a department producing very few graduates could
still consider itself successful seems ludicrous only if we
think of the department as a company producing an un-
wanted product. The claim is not so ludicrous if we think 1
E. F. Redish, ‘‘Teaching Physics: Figuring Out What Works,’’ Phys. Today
instead of the department more as an artist, author, or parent 52, 24 –30 共January 1999兲.
whose success is not measured by the quantity of their out- 2
R. R. Hake, ‘‘Interactive-engagement versus traditional methods: A six-
put. Obviously few departments housing a program graduat- thousand student survey of mechanics test data for introductory physics
ing few majors are going to admit that maybe they should go courses,’’ Am. J. Phys. 66, 64 –74 共1998兲.
3
E. Mazur, Peer Instruction: A User’s Manual 共Prentice–Hall, Upper
out of business in the best interests of the profession as a
Saddle River, NJ, 1997兲.
whole. Opinions may differ on whether such an attitude is 4
E. F. Redish 共private communication兲.
merely a matter of parochial self-interest or reflective of 5
D. Bligh, What’s the Use of Lectures? 共Jossey-Bass, 2000兲.
valid institutional need. 6
See Ref. 1. ‘‘Favorable’’ attitudes are, by definition, those that a group of
expert physics instructors mutually agreed on at least 90% of the time.
7
Summary: Your department is doing a good job if it M. Covington, Making the Grade: A Self-Worth Perspective on Motivation
and School Reform 共Cambridge U.P., Cambridge, 1992兲.
䊉 maintains high academic standards 8
E. Seymour and N. M. Hewitt, Talking About Leaving: Why Undergradu-
䊉 encourages and welcomes all students ates Leave the Sciences 共Westview, 2000兲.
9
䊉 adds new options in major as needed S. Tobias, They’re Not Dumb, They’re Different: Stalking the Second Tier
䊉 tries different forms of instruction 共Science News Books, 1994兲.
10
For example, see ‘‘A Professor at Notre Dame Sparks a Quiet Revolution
䊉 offers student research opportunities in How Chemistry is Taught,’’ in the May 25, 2001 Chronicle of Higher
䊉 offers a range of nonmajor courses Education, which notes that the retention rate in introductory chemistry
䊉 listens to its students taught by Dennis Jacobs has been increased by 55%.
11
䊉 graduates some majors! A number of anti-plagiarism Web sites exist, perhaps the largest being
Turnitin.com, which checks about 6000 papers daily, and compares them
to more than 2 billion web sites, according to an article in the June 11,
THE PROFESSION AS A WHOLE 2001 issue of USA Today. More than 23% of papers tested by Turnitin turn
out to have been plagiarized from the web.
With regard to the physics teaching profession as a whole, 12
J. Kruger and D. Dunning, ‘‘Unskilled and Unaware of It: How Difficul-
our success needs to be measured both by the job we do in ties in Recognizing One’s Own Incompetence Lead to Inflated Self-

28 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 70, No. 1, January 2002 Robert Ehrlich 28

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 Assessment,’’ J. Pers Soc. Psychol. 77, 1121–1124 共1999兲. 15
NSF Program 01-82, ‘‘Assessment of Student Achievement in Under-
13
See: http://www.aip.org/statistics for the Enrollment and Degrees Report. graduate Education.’’
14 16
‘‘Balancing the Equation: Where Are Women and Girls in Science, Engi- R. Ehrlich, ‘‘Where Are the Physics Majors?,’’ Am. J. Phys. 66, 79– 86
neering and Technology,’’ National Council for Research on Women, 2001 共1998兲; ‘‘Long-Term Trends in Physics Bachelor Degree Output,’’ Phys.
Report. Teach. 36, 12–17 共1998兲.

ENGINEERS AND PHYSICISTS

NEWTON: When you work that switch by the door, what happens, Richard?
INSPECTOR: The light goes on.
NEWTON: You establish an electrical contact. Do you understand anything about
electricity, Richard?
INSPECTOR: I am no physicist.
NEWTON: I don’t understand much about it either. All I do is to elaborate a theory about it on
the basis of natural observation. I write down this theory in the mathematical idiom and obtain
several formulae. Then the engineers come along. They don’t care about anything except the
formulae. They treat electricity as a pimp treats a whore. They simply exploit it. They build
machines—and a machine can only be used when it becomes independent of the knowledge that
led to its invention. So any fool nowadays can switch on a light or touch off the atomic bomb. 共He
pats the INSPECTOR’S shoulders.兲 And that’s what you want to arrest me for, Richard. It’s not
fair.

Friedrich Dürrenmatt 共translated by James Kirkup兲, The Physicists 共Evergreen Press, Olympia, WA, 1962兲, p. 22.
Submitted by George Goth.

29 Am. J. Phys., Vol. 70, No. 1, January 2002 Robert Ehrlich 29

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