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.

2008 STAR test results are up

Results for the California Standards Tests administered last spring have been tabulated and posted. You can find them at the STAR website.

Hints on how to work the page:
1. Leave the default CST selection in the "CST" popup menu. You'll get all the CSTs and Physics will be near or at the bottom of the subsequent report.
2. Tailor the report to your interest. If you want to see results from the whole state, don't narrow by county, etc. Simply click the "View Report" button.
3. If you wish to narrow the results to your county alone, select your county from the "County" popup menu.
4. To narrow the results to your district, select your district from the "District" popup menu.
5. To refine the search to your school, select your school from the "School" popup menu.

For a more useful report--one that will show how your students performed in specific content areas--consult your school or district administrators.

Galápagos: photos are up

http://phyz.smugmug.com/Travel

UPDATE: Galápagos TAA3 Meta Photolinks
Names, screen names, and online album links for cruisers on The Amazing Adventure 3.

Galápagos: the adventure begins

Actually the adventure began in the spring of 2007, when the James Randi Educational Foundation announced The Amazing Adventure 3: The Galápagos. They had chartered a "cruise" through Darwin's archipelago. The ship is Celebrity's Xpedition and holds fewer than 100 guests, so it's not one of those superhotels that floats seven stories high above the water. But it's large for the waters of the Galápagos. I'm nowhere near being able to afford such a cruise, but I could not miss the chance to sail with Randi and dozens of skeptics through the islands that inspired The Origin of Species and the modern notion of natural selection. So I booked passage.

The Amazing Adventure 3 begins and ends in Quito, Ecuador. So flights to and from had to be booked. I did so in September of 2007. Today I was given notification that my flight itinerary had been changed. Usually this means a flight time has been changed by five minutes. But this one involved whole new flights. With a 10-minute layover between flights 2 and 3 of the journey from Sacramento to Quito.

So much for booking a $1000 flight nearly a year in advance. The apologies flowed freely when I called OrbitzTLC. Apologies don't get you from Sacramento to Quito on the day you booked. One helpful suggestion was to fly out of Los Angeles instead of Sacramento. It's all just California when viewed from Bangalore. I wonder how many Detroitians are asked to rebook with departures from NYC. Probably not so many.

After more failure from Orbitz, I suggested they book my flights starting a day in advance (to this point they had been keen to get me in a day late). So that's what I've got now. Though I had meticulously reserved shady window seats (window seats opposite the sun) for all flights, who knows how many middle seats I'll be dealt now?

Orbitz was willing to cut me loose and fend for myself with 5 days to go before a flight booked nearly a year ago. Gutsy operation they run. While on hold, I was able to see what Travelocity had to offer. One seat left on a couple of sweet $2300 fares.

Ultimately, this snafu is American's fault. They must have cancelled my DFW-MIA flight. Hey, now that the flights had to be rebooked, I'll probably get to pay the new baggage fee that I would have been spared if I didn't need to rebook. Excellent.

As it is, I now need to book a hotel for my newly-required overnight in Dallas. Always good to get a chance to pay more out-of-pocket for the privilege of additional inconveniences.

When they screw up the return flights, the result will be missing a second of the first two days of school.

Rio AP Phyz CTF opportunity announced

AP CTF OPPORTUNITY

TUESDAY, AUGUST 5

Windows of Opportunity
1. 9am-12noon
2. 1pm-4pm
(While chores last*)

Credit Toward Final rate: 12 points per hour (1 point per 5 minutes)

Helpers are needed to help prepare Mr. Baird's room and make the Book of Phyz materials ready for the new year of PhyzAction.

*Opportunities will continue until all chores are completed. First come, first served. Supplies will be limited so come early!

CHECK BACK MONDAY 8/4 FOR ANY LAST-MINUTE CHANGES. I don't anticipate any, but better safe...

Las Vegas after dark

When TAM6 closed on Sunday, June 22, I promptly took a nap.

After that, I joined some JREF friends for dinner at The Peppermill. At midnight, I ventured out for a photoshoot. By then the temperature had dipped below the century mark, though the wind and the dry were in full force.

I loaded up my shooting vest, grabbed my travel tripod, and hit The Strip. I shot until about 3am and hardly made a dent in the huge tracts of land occupied by The Strip. But I caught a few keepers. And now have finally posted them on SmugMug.

Las Vegas Lights

Enjoy!

What every air freshener wishes it could be

The posts regarding my roadtrip to the Edmonton AAPT meeting (via Yellowstone, Glacier, Banff, Jasper, Glacier again, and the Grand Tetons) may appear to come at random. That's only because they are.

First up is the air at Glacier National Park. I drove long ways to get there (on the way up and on the way back down). So I arrived after dark both times. When I pulled into the parking lot at the Rising Sun Motor Inn in a hurry to register, I was stopped in my tracks (both times!) upon the first breath of Glacier air. The fragrance is a powerful blend of natural wildflowers. It grabs you and says, "Do you know where you are, buddy? Slow it down, take a breath, and appreciate."

I gladly obeyed. Since I couldn't take in the scenery at the moment (sun being down and all), Iooked up and enjoyed the stunning night sky: an astronomer's paradise! I then slowly made my way to the registration desk five minutes before they closed.

But yeah, the air at Glacier is what every air freshener wishes it could be. Go to Glacier and smell it for yourself!

And while you're there, don't forget to at least drive the Going-to-the-Sun Road and stop for pics where you can. Turn it up a notch with a hike to Hidden Lake if the trail is passable. It was a bit too snow-covered for my liking when I had a moment to hike it last week. The loaded shooting vest makes snow-field crossings awkward.

Stay longer and hit some of the myriad trails throughout the park. But bring your bear bells. They aren't simply a cute novelty at Glacier. The glaciers may have retreated, but the bears have not.

If you really want to crank up your experience, you can be like my rockstar niece, Zoe, who's spending time this summer at Glacier doing the heavy lifting involved in clearing and maintaining the trails, among other things.

In any case, be sure to take a meal at the Park Cafe in St. Mary.

AAPT Edmonton photo album is up!

I got some photos at the High School Share-a-thon and the Demo Show.

The "Tesla Shocks" and "Balloon Execution by Laser" sequences are particularly nice.

Enjoy!

Roadtripping to Edmonton

The journey to the American Association of Physics Teachers Summer Meeting in Edmonton began today. The meeting doesn't begin until next Saturday, but I decided to make a roadtrip of the journey so as to have stops in some of my favorite spaces on the way out and back.

Day 1 is always the trip from Sacramento to Salt Lake City, so there wasn't much to shoot. I did take a circulation break at the Salt Flats rest stop to walk up and down the ramp to the "lookout."

The Roadtrip Album is beginning here. I'm about 1/5 up to speed on using Aperture, Apple's high-end photo software. So bear with me as I try to keep things updated!

UPDATE 1: Added images from Yellowstone Day 1 (of only 2): Gibbon Falls, Virginia Cascades, Fountain Paint Pots, Clepsydra Geyser, and the Terraces of Great Fountain Geyser. Thrown in for good measure: a log, some lupines, two runoff stream snags.

The Amazing Spoon Bending video is up!

When Richard Wiseman came to TAM6, he brought spoons. A lot of spoons. Here's what he did with all those spoons in a room full of skeptics.



Curious as to what it's all about? Check out
http://spoonscience.com/