"Physics Girl" - Her Videos Bring Easy To Learn Physics To Everyone

Physics Girl in Action - teaching physics with plenty of graphics and hip humor to anyone who wants to learn.  Her videos will be especially appealing to girls thinking about a physics career.

As I wrote in my Aug. 11 post, James Damore's  Google memo did a great disservice to women by casting their work aptitudes and skills in terms of psychological limitations derived from biology. I also noted that my  own experience has been that if a female physics student is given the opportunity to be systematic and excel in a serious challenge she will do it.  That includes individual physics projects (for science fairs) as well as team projects and advanced homework problems (say for extra course credit).

Physics itself is often perceived as a difficult subject, and many women dodge going into the field because of misperceptions - either because they believe it "too difficult" or essentially a male preserve. Both of these factored into the specialization decision of my brilliant niece Shayle, i.e. to go into clinical psychology instead of pursuing an advanced physics degree.  (This despite the fact she attained an 'A' in Physics at Advanced Level in the course of earning a Barbados Scholarship.)

It is true that many talented young women turn away from physics or engineering pursuits for similar reasons, but this need not be the case. One of the outstanding exceptions - apart from the many professional women already involved in physics and astrophysics - is "Physics Girl".   This is none other than Dianna Cowern who has made it her job to present a wide variety of short (5- 6 minute) physics tutorials with plenty of graphics and lots of hip humor.   Cowern, an MIT physics graduate, now works at the University of California San Diego's Center for Astrophysics and Space Science.

In many ways Dianna Cowern is doing for physics what former actress Danica McKellar did for girls and math, such as in her books: Kiss My Math: Showing Pre-Algebra Who's Boss,  and  Girls Get Curves: Geometry Takes Shape.

For those who want to 'dip their toes' into physics topics without being put off by math or jargon, her youtube presentations are solid gold. Indeed, they are also ideal introductions to many aspects of the subject for girls and one of Ms. Cowern's aims is to make science accessible to girls.  But truly, these short, fun learning experiences are terrific for anyone who wants to learn some physics.

Below, I've appended links  for a number of her youtube videos, with the topic headers:

1) Craziest eclipses in the solar system:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nlwvShR12VM

2) Why Is The Universe Flat?:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTUsOWtxKKA

3) Seven Science Experiments With Surface Tension:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsksFbFZeeU

4) Woman In Science Feature- "Vomit Comet"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BnLQTUnXMg8

5) Stacked Ball Drop:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UHS883_P60

6) Calculating Pi With Darts:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M34TO71SKGk

7) Are Perpetual Motion Machines Possible?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4b8ZsFszE8I

8) A crystal that splits light particles:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Ut0F4a9dQk

9) How to shrink a quarter with electricity:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d2TDXKfBaMQ

10) How to make a cloud in your mouth:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68A_Azsqqg4

The Sad State of U.S. High School Physics

The news in the most recent issue of Physics Today wasn't encouraging in the least, for those of us who'd like to see more U.S. high schoolers studying physics. First, the article (July, p. 29, 'Convincing U.S. States to Require Physics') notes that in terms of the STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) core subjects, the states by and large a doing a lousy job.

Based on data from the Science and Engineering Readiness Index (SERI), Massachusetts continues to do best, and Mississippi the worst. SERI, it should be noted, differs from many other indices in that it focuses on physics. (A map of the U.S. attached may be consulted to see how the separate states vary on the SERI index).

At stake is obtaining a degree in one area of the STEM field. According to Paul Cottle, a physicist at the Florida State University:

"Having taken physics in high school is the strongest correlation to STEM degree attainment."

However, according to the Florida Dept. of Education, 95% of the state's high school students took biology, 70% took chemistry and only 23% took quantitative physics (i.e. integrating some level of mathematics with the presentation, usually at least algebra.) Meanwhile, data obtained by the American Institute of Physics found a physics taking rate of 31% for Florida high schoolers, vs. 37% nationally. This is very strange in a state that for the last 30 years has launched everything from space stations to Space shuttles.

By contrast, in Barbados, all students are required to take at least a term of physics (this is for most of the comprehensive schools) while at Harrison College (where I taught for 5 years) every student had to take at least TWO years, and most students took 6 years. Unlike in the U.S., physics is taken in cumulative stages with each stage accumlating more material - year by year. Thus, not only is the past material not forgotten, but it's applied each year in new ways to different parts of the curriculum.

In this way, Harrison College students graduate with top achievement levels (via A-levels) and many go directly on to become juniors at MIT, Stanford, Caltech, Harvard, Oxford and other elite institutions. In other words, they put rings around their U.S. counterparts.

According to Prof. Cottle, cited again in the article:

"It's very tough to sell physics to school districts."

One wonders why. For example, why is it that a small 3rd world nation like Barbados with much lower GDP and resources than the great U.S. can manage actual lab physics courses to all students, while the U.S. can't or refuses to do so. There are a number of possible reasons and two might be: 1) Including Physics will put more pressure on teachers in an environment where schools are hostage to state aptitude tests, and 2) Not enough qualified teachers are available to teach the subject.

Maybe it's past time we stopped talking of cutting school budgets and started paying exceptional teachers in elite areas like physics more, while also teaching less nonsense (like 'creation science' or Intelligent design).