|
George Plitnik is receiving international recognition for his course “The Science of Harry Potter.” Plitnik appeared on CBS’s The Early Show in October and has also been interviewed by the BBC. The three-credit honors seminar, new in Fall 2003 at the University, allows students to examine whether the magic in the movie is scientifically possible in reality. Due to the popularity of the course, Plitnik plans to offer a section for the general student population in Spring 2004.
Hang Deng-Luzader, Stephen Luzader, Oguz Soysal and Francis Tam attended the Appalachian Section Annual Fall Meeting of the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) October 24-25 at WVU Institute of Technology, Montgomery, WV. Stephen Luzader gave a contributed paper, “Simple Heat Engine” and Tam gave a paper, “Some Foucault Pendulum Measurements.”
Deng-Luzader was elected Representative of the Two-Year Colleges, and Tam, Section Representative to the national AAPT. Soysal was elected President-Elect of the Section. FSU will be the host for the fall meeting, October 15-16, 2004.
Francis Tam has received approval for FSU to serve as site for the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) Physics Teaching Resource Agents (PTRA) program, beginning in Summer 2004. This program will continue each summer through 2006. FSU will host middle and high school science teachers from throughout Maryland, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, and Ohio. Sessions in Summer 2004 will focus on teaching about kinematics and Newton’s second law. Tam will serve as Rural Regional Coordinator for the program at FSU.
Oguz Soysal has secured $37,000 in grant funding for FSU to serve as a site for the Maryland Summer Center for Gifted and Talented Students in July of 2004. This residential program will focus on robot design, with sessions taught by Oguz and Hilkat Soysal. During two one-week sessions, 40 gifted and talented ninth through 12th graders will learn the fundamentals and get hands-on experience in the new robotics lab at the Compton Science Center. Each group will spend five days on campus designing and building an intelligent robot with practical “real-world” application, according to Soysal. Students will present their projects during a public demonstration at the end of the week. The students will also visit ATK Tactical Systems in Rocket Center, WV and see how robots are used to perform jobs that are too dangerous for humans. FSU and the Allegany County Board of Education are partners in the project, which is funded through a grant from the Maryland State Department of Education.
Back to:
Newsletter
menu