The crisis in physics education—and in math and science education in general—has two primary features: the severe shortage of qualified teachers and the small fraction of high‐school students choosing to take physics and other elective science and math courses. Both of these problems have contributed to the science illiteracy that is now the focus of national attention. As the American public, scientists, politicians and other citizens have become aware of the significance of the crisis, they have put forward many new ideas. State and local governments, teachers' unions, university professors and leaders of business and industry have gone beyond the stereotypical and Pavlovian responses that have often blocked change in the past.
REFERENCES
1.
More detailed information on any of the individual projects mentioned in this article may be obtained from the authors.
2.
A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform, US Department of Education, Washington, D.C. (1983).
3.
Dinah L. Moché, Physics in Your Future, available from Committee on the Status of Women in Physics, The American Physical Society, 335 East 45th Street, New York, NY 10017.
4.
Edith Ruina, Wanted: More Women in Science and Technology, available from Committee on the Status of Women in Physics (see reference 3).
5.
Regular reports on the status of science education bills in the US Senate and House of Representatives appear in The Chronicle of Higher Education.
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© 1983 American Institute of Physics.
1983
American Institute of Physics
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