Improving Undergraduate Physics Education (IUPE) Award

Trinity University Physics and Astronomy Department provides our students with a rigorous and inclusive classroom experience with ample opportunities for student-led research projects with faculty. Since 2019, the department has focused on encouraging students to become physicists as well as fostering a sense of belonging to a dynamic, inclusive community. These goals have been met with changes to both our curriculum and department traditions. We have recently added a degree in Applied Physics, which has attracted diverse students to our department. Through dedicated student spaces and thoughtful peer tutoring, we have encouraged a vibrant, cooperative environment for our students. Our faculty members are very research active, and our students have opportunities to work with state-of-the-art equipment on cutting edge research projects. We average better than 75% of our students participating in research projects, with about half traveling to national scientific meetings to present their work. Our majors are equally equipped with excellent scientific preparation as well as thorough training in scientific writing and oral and visual communications skills that prepare them for a variety of post-Trinity graduate school and career paths. During the 2023-24 academic year we graduated our most diverse class, with 60% female majors and 33% belonging to underrepresented minority groups.

University of California, Riverside Department of Physics and Astronomy's overall goal is to educate, and inspire students with a passion for science in general and physics in particular so they become creative thinkers and can fulfill their full potential as global citizens. Our undergraduate program provides a rigorous background in basic physics through coursework and encourages the students to participate in current research with world renowned faculty. The education will provide the students with scientifically trained mathematical, writing and analytical skills, ready to join the technologically trained workforce in a broad range of fields such as industry, education, medicine, law, engineering or science. Our undergraduates get personalized physics education through small classes that are tailored for physics majors with a view to building a learning community. The introductory class is split into groups of 2-3 students around white boards which envelope the classroom. The faculty member provides almost individual tutoring by engaging one group at a time in discussions of the lecture topic. In addition, special classes such as Physics 39 "Adventures in Physics" also incorporate professional and career development exercises such as research paper writing, scientific presentation, job search, resume writing, career counseling, research seminars etc.

University of Massachusetts Amherst Physics Department aims to provide for all students a rigorous education and inspiring professional experience through research, teaching and/or public engagement. As a flagship state university, we support students with a wide range of academic, racial, ethnic and socioeconomic backgrounds. Our faculty emphasize innovative curriculum and the opportunities for mentored research and teaching. Surveys show that a great majority of our students engage in research, and we support many others as learning assistants in the classrooms. Our curriculum begins with introductory physics taught with an active, team-based learning(TBL) approach. TBL instills a sense of cohort and trains students to share ideas, work through gaps in understanding, and support and learn from peers. Our second-year physics curriculum includes two semesters of mathematical physics synchronized with the core second-year topics. Juniors and seniors can choose among tracks that provide depth in physics, a focus in another area of STEM, or training for teaching in high schools. Skills and professional development are integrated throughout the 4-year curriculum. Year 1 includes a fall professional development course, followed by a spring experiential course on framing science questions and designing experiments to answer them. Four semesters of lab courses train students in programming, data analysis, and experimental design. Subsequent courses train in computation, writing in physics, and presentations. Improvements to our program have come as the number of majors grew by a factor of 2.5 since 2009. The increased number of students has invigorated student clubs and study groups. Growth also helps students, especially those from under-represented groups, to form social networks. We have committed to enhancing student belonging by instituting a successful peer-mentor group for incoming students, anonymously surveying student perceptions of climate, paying for conference travel, reducing barriers to joining research labs, and supporting student organizations.

Department of Physics and Biophysics at the University of San Diego provides undergraduate students with outstanding research-based instruction, preparation to enter a variety of careers or future educational paths, close academic and professional mentorship, a strong sense of community and collaboration, and opportunities to engage in cutting-edge research and share their work with large audiences. DPB is an undergraduate-only department, offering degrees in both Physics and Biophysics, both with BS and BA options as well as pathways for students to concentrate in Applied Scientific Computing or to earn a dual degree in Physics and Mechanical Engineering. Students can select either a BS or BA degree for both Physics and Biophysics, providing students the option to delve deeply into (bio)physics or to have the latitude to explore other additional disciplines. All majors are required to engage in research with faculty guidance or to participate in a comparable experiential learning project. DPB faculty offer a diverse range of research opportunities and encourage students to become involved in research at an early stage.

The University of California, Santa Cruz is a Hispanic-Serving Institution and Asian American and Native American Pacific Islander Serving Institution within the University of California system. The physics department has maintained a robust enrollment, particularly for the size of our faculty, so rather than aiming primarily at growth, our efforts over the past decade began by emphasizing the improvement of retention and 4-year graduation rates, primarily by careful study and rectification of barriers in the curriculum and course offering schedules, with excellent results so far; for example, 4-year graduation rates increased from 37% for students entering in 2013 and 2014 to an average of 62% for students entering from 2015-2018. Our attention to these issues of efficiency continues, but over the past four years we have begun a series of new initiatives to improve the undergraduate student experience from the first quarter to graduation and to address equity gaps. These include advising initiatives to increase student engagement with faculty as mentors and research advisers; a new course to serve incoming first-year students with less experience in advanced math and physics (Physics 2,The Physicist’s Toolbox); highly popular new courses for non-majors in search of engaging general-education courses more substantial than a routine survey of conceptual physics (Physics 1A and 1B, Physics for Everyone); new electives adapted to student interest and contemporary directions in physics research and applications (Physics 137, Advanced Optics Laboratory; Physics 150, Quantum Computing; and Physics 152, Physics and Machine Learning). We have also listened to our students’ interests in creating new degree tracks: a Computational Physics concentration within the Applied Physics BS (available as of fall ‘23), a Quantum Computation concentration (approved for fall ‘24), and a recommended path within Applied Physics for pre-aerospace students.