The teaching statement

Recently, I have talked to a friend about the application process for faculty positions in the United States and Germany. While in the US it is very important to write substantial and convincing statements on teaching as well as on diversity, equity and inclusion, it is not that common in Germany and other European countries. From my experience, even if it is required, both the applicants and the search committee do not seem to take such statements very seriously. Of course, in the US it also depends on the specific university, but in general I would contend that the aforementioned documents play a much bigger role in the States. As I argue quite often on this blog, I think that the importance of teaching skills of future faculty is highly undervalued and should be at least as important as the research profile of an applicant. Obviously, it is hard to quantify a person's teaching skills, but I think that a teaching statement and a teaching demonstration are appropriate ways to better assess an applicant.

Declining student enrollment numbers in physics

Today, I had a look into the most recent statistics about physics undergraduate and graduate student enrollment numbers at German universities. Typically, these statistics are published each year in the "Physik Journal", which is a monthly magazine published by the German Physical Society (DPG, Deutsche Physikalische Gesellschaft). You can find the current statistics here.

Is there a need for teaching faculty in Germany?

In the United States and several other countries, it is common practice that introductory lectures are being held by teaching faculty, i.e., lecturers and teaching professors. In physics departments, this includes classes such as "Introduction to Experimental Physics" (classical mechanics, electricity and magnetism, thermodynamics, optics). Higher-level classes as well as electives, however, are often taught by "regular" faculty who only devote a certain fraction of their working hours to teaching while also being involved in research and service activities. By contrast, in Germany also the introductory classes are taught by the aforementioned "regular" professors, and typically no additional teaching faculty are hired by the universities. Obviously, there are advantages and disadvantages to each of these two distinct approaches. For example, hiring teaching faculty leads to additional costs for the university, but on the other hand one might argue that, on average, their higher enthusiasm for teaching and the fact that they solely focus on their classes leads to a greater success in the students' learning experience. Unlike "regular" professors who may regard teaching as an obligation, teaching faculty usually have a strong passion for teaching and do not have many other duties that would distract them from preparing their classes. 

Hiring teaching assistants for an introductory physics class

After interviewing a few candidates for teaching assistant (TA) positions within the framework of our introductory experimental physics (classical mechanics and thermodynamics) class for freshmen this week, I have had some new thoughts on teaching and learning physics in higher education, especially with regard to TAs and their significance. In the following, I will discuss some of these thoughts.

Some helpful resources on teaching in higher education

This blog is dealing with teaching physics (and materials science) in higher education. I started the blog a while ago because this topic constitutes a personal matter and I see a lot of potential in improving physics teaching and learning in the future. Not only with regard to physics, teaching in higher education is constantly evolving and transforming. This is why I believe that it is crucial to share and exchange our ideas about novel approaches, stories of success, and biggest failures in the context of teaching and learning.

Why physics classes at German universities should be held in English

While many influential physics books and articles were written in German prior to World War II, English has become the lingua franca of science. Nowadays, the majority of journal articles are published in English, physics conferences are held in English language, and a significant portion of renowned scientists are based in the United States and the United Kingdom. Consequently, English is the language used by scientists with different backgrounds when talking about research projects, teaching approaches or other topics. Due to the ever-growing importance of English as the global language, it certainly makes sense that nowadays, in countries such as Germany, kids start learning English as their first foreign language already in elementary school or even during their time in kindergarten. 

Why study physics and not engineering?

Nowadays, more and more people seem to be asking the question "Should I study physics or engineering?" 

From my experience in the United States, engineering majors such as electrical and computer engineering (ECE), mechanical engineering, chemical engineering and aerospace engineering are extremely popular with young people. As an engineering student, your future career options are relatively straightforward, since you become an expert in a specific field with a great selection of potential employers in industry. In other words, as an aerospace engineer you will most likely end up in industries in which you design and build aircraft, spacecraft, satellites, missiles or related applications. No big surprise. Certainly, this is also true for the German system as well as for the rest of the world.  

Teaching advice of the week: Get to know your students

Today, I present this week's teaching advice: Get to know your students.

A common and helpful advice on giving a presentation (for example, on scientific conferences) is to "know your audience". The same applies when teaching a class. What kind of students are attending your lecture? What is their motivation, expectation and background? Try to build a relationship with the students, ideally in the beginning of the semester. You may feel confident about the contents of the class after teaching it for several years, but you might need to adapt your teaching style every time because your audience changes every time. 

Computational physics is underrepresented

The subject "physics" can be divided into experimental and theoretical physics. In order to become excellent physicists, students attend numerous classes on these two subcategories of physics. The neverending "battle" between theoretical and experimental physicists on which group of people are the "real" physicists is being fought on (presumably) each and every university campus in this world.

But does the simple division into two categories, theory and experiment, do justice to this large and complex subject termed physics? Not really. How about computational physics?

The syllabus

The syllabus. Americans will probably know what I am talking about, but how about our readers from Germany? Do you know what a syllabus is? And why it is useful?