Re: CID (Conceptual, Inquiry, Discovery) vs. QPS (Quantitative Pr oblem Solving)

["RAUBER, JOEL" <JOEL_RAUBER@SDSTATE.EDU>]

Some opinionated personal bias and comments regarding Richard Hake's post:


> Unfortunately, the primary goal of most US physics
> departments is twofold:
>
> (1) to train future traditional physics researchers (i.e., to clone
> the physics faculty), and
>
> (2) to "serve as a gatekeeper, keeping the unworthy out of certain
> professions such as medicine and engineering."(1)

I'd add two more goals, one of which may be criticized as being only a
secondary goal in practice.

(3) providing some service support in introductory physics for
non-engineering/physics areas

(4) Maintaining a large enough student credit hour count to maintain FTE's
in the department.


> This issue has a long history (see, e.g., refs. 2-5). In the words of
> Ken Ford,(5) - as true today as they were in 1987:
>
> "From the second Ann Arbor Conference, November 1962 . . .(ref. 3). .
> . . came a succinct and memorable recommendation: that two kinds of
> curricula for physics majors be developed (to meet the needs of two
> kinds of students). These were named curriculum R and curriculum S.
> Curriculum R (for Research) was the then-current (and still dominant)
> undergraduate curriculum, whose principal aim is to prepare students
> for graduate study in physics. CURRICULUM S (FOR SYNTHESIS) WAS TO
> SERVE STUDENTS WHO WANTED TO STUDY PHYSICS AS BACKGROUND FOR
> SOMETHING OTHER THAN PHYSICS RESEARCH: BUSINESS, LAW, MEDICINE,
> TEACHING, SOME
> OTHER SCIENTIFIC STUDY, OR JUST INFORMED CITIZENSHIP.
>
> What has happened? Sad to say, NOTHING. Curriculum R was already
> strong and is still strong. CURRICULUM S DID NOT EXIST THEN AND IT
> DOES NOT EXIT NOW (IN FIRST APPROXIMATION)." (My CAPS.)

Midnight fears regarding curriculum R and S.

The idea of a curriculum R and S makes a lot sense upon first glance.

Two thoughts (worries):

1) A lot of departments don't have the resources to have two quality type
curriculum's, but never the less need to serve both type students.

2) Much of the justification for a physics major has traditionally been the
"a physicist can do anything" type justification.  You know the pitch, "
come major in physics, we can prepare you for all sorts of possibilities,
you can go into medicine, law, bussiness, etc with your physics degree".
This is presumably a pitch to the potential curriculum S type student.

The justification for this pitch (and what makes it arguably more defensible
than a simple madison avenue pitch) is the fact that there have been many
many physics majors graduating from *curriculum R* who have been quite
successful in these other fields.

And here's the rub: they graduated from a "curriculum R" not a "curriculum
S".  While it makes prima facie sense that if they ain't going into  a "R"
field but an "S" field, why not create a curriculum for going into an S
field; I never the less have a fear that this may throw the baby out with
the bath water, since all we really know is that curriculum R has done a
pretty good job of creating "S" graduates (or at least that what physics
departments argue).

Joel Rauber