Yes, I do dress up

And if you'd like to see me in a suit, tie, and uncomfortable shoes, you'll simply need to
a. get married,
b. die (must...resist..."redundancy with 'a'" comment),
c. give me some kind of high-falutin' award.

At the AAPT national meeting in Edmonton this past summer, my physics-teaching colleagues went with 'c.'

They bestowed me with a Distinguished Service Award. When I looked at the list of national, high-power physics teachers on the past awardees list, I felt a bit out of place. Don't get me wrong. My Montana-sized ego needs constant feeding, and an AAPT DSC is good eatin' for a long time. But I know Dewey Dykstra (for example), and I'm no Dewey Dykstra. Dewey Dykstra (and several others on the list) are among the stars in the constellation by which I steer my ship of curriculum.

It's a great honor and I was certainly humbled enough to dress up for the occasion. I knew if I didn't wash up for the ceremony, Mama Adair would have taken a pound of flesh out of me.

When congratulated by colleagues at the Edmonton meeting, I assured them that you get a card punched every time you attend a national meeting and with the tenth punch, you get an award. The Awards Committee, chaired by Harvey Leff, came up with their own reasons, though. I'll give you the short version here:

"Dean co-authored several conceptual physical science lab manuals and contributed to Paul Hewitt’s Conceptual Physics. He has served on the AAPT High School Examinations Development Committee and developed and evaluated questions for use in AAPT’s Physics Bowl and the Physics Olympiad. Dean has an extensive website that contains, among many other things, his unique textbook, The Book of Phyz."

Thanks to Mary Holbrow for the incriminating photo from the AAPT Edmonton Awards Ceremony.