We (Harrison Prosper, Horst Wahl , Susan Blessing and Laura Reina),
physics professors in the High Energy
Physics group at Florida State University, are part of this program. We are
members of two large international collaborations of physicists that operate
(or plan to operate) huge, complicated detectors whose purpose is to help
elucidate the structure and behavior of matter at the smallest scale.
Our group in the Physics Department at FSU was selected
as one
of the twelve sites for the first year (1999) of Quarknet.
Since then we've had many meetings and several workshops with teachers from the
Tallahassee area, and we have relied on the help of our lead teachers.
Our present lead techers are
Adam Lamee of Lincoln High School in Tallahassee,
Richard Saunders of Maclay High School in Tallahassee,
and
Gerry Hart of Godby High School in Tallahassee.
By having regular meetings between school teachers and physicists working in particle physics research, and in our summer worshops, we hope to provide opportunities for teachers to learn more about modern physics, become familiar with modern methods of scientific inquiry, learn about how experiments in particle physics are conceived and implemented, how physicists go about acquiring and analyzing their data. Eventually this will lead to the formation of a network of science teachers, with periodic meetings during the academic year to discuss pedagogical and scientific issues.
We are looking for more teachers from North Florida to join us in
this endeavor.
If you feel a bit adventurous, are interested in learning new
things and meeting new people (including "crazy physicists"), come join
us!
If you are interested in participating in this program, please send us
e-mail or an informal "snailmail"
note (see mailing address on FSU_QuarkNet homepage)
with the following information: