Conference Session

Innovations in Teaching Physics or Engineering Physics

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Jennifer Franck, California Institute of Technology; Ted Yu, California Institute of Technology; Juan Pedro Ochoa-Ricoux, California Institute of Technology; James Maloney, California Institute of Technology; Angela Capece, California Institute of Technology; Luz Rivas, California Institute of Technology

Tagged Divisions

Engineering Physics & Physics

. Others learned about the multi- disciplinary nature of science and engineering, and how many subjects are related to one another, which was a major goal of the physics curriculum. Students were also asked about the highest degree they planned to pursue, and both surveys showed everyone

Conference Session

Programmatic Issues in Physics or Engineering Physics

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Baha Jassemnejad, University of Central Oklahoma; Tim A Handy, University of Central Oklahoma; Scott L Murphy, University of Central Oklahoma; Evan C Lemley, University of Central Oklahoma

Tagged Divisions

Engineering Physics & Physics

andschools. As it has been stated in a report, student mentoring, and the references therein, mentoring isa sustained one-to-one relationship between a caring adult and a child who needs support to achieveacademic, career, social, or personal goals. Unlike natural mentoring, planned mentoring, requiresmatching between mentees, students receiving mentorship, and mentors through a structured 1program with specific objectives and goals in mind.In order to address low undergraduate retention rates, a common problem faced by engineeringprograms, some universities have established various mentoring programs for incoming freshmanstudents. The common goal of these programs is to help students to cope with

Conference Session

Innovations in Teaching Physics or Engineering Physics

Collection

2009 Annual Conference & Exposition

Authors

Radian Belu, Drexel University; Alexandru Belu, Case Western Reserve University

Tagged Divisions

Engineering Physics & Physics

Mathematica can be used, by instructors and by students, to helpstudents make these connections and to use them once they are made. Benefits that accrue to upper-classstudents able to make effective use of a computer algebra systems provide a further rationale forintroducing student use of these systems into our courses for those who plan to major in physics or othertechnical fields.1. IntroductionPhysics is guided by simple principles, but for many topics the physics tends to be obscured in theprofusion of mathematics. As interactive software for computer algebra, such as Maple, MathCAD,Mathematica or MATLAB can assist educators and students to overcome the obstacle of mathematicaldifficulties or to improve the lecture presentations via power