THE INTRODUCTORY-UNIVERSITY-PHYSICS-PROJECT 1987-1995 - WHAT HAS IT ACCOMPLISHED

In 1987, one of us (JSR) challenged the physics leaching community to examine the content of the typical introductory, calculus-based, unive rsity physics course, with an eye to meshing that content with the con temporary knowledge, level of understanding, and relative importance o f the various copies in the field, and to draw upon results of the man y efforts to improve that course which have been carried out over the previous 30 years. The consequence of that call to arms was the Introd uctory University Physics Project (IUPP). This Project, supported by t he National Science Foundation over die period 1987-1995, convened sev eral conferences during the years 1987-90 to study how to bring about the desirable changes it envisioned. The Project Steering Committee th en organized the conduct and evaluation of classroom trials of four al ternate course models during the academic years 1991-92 and 1992-93, a t nine different colleges or universities, This report is directed to the question, ''What has the IUPP accomplished?'' As we shall report, the accomplishments fall into two categories. (1) As a result of the P roject conferences, of frequent reports at appropriate national meetin gs, and reports of the course trials, many individual physics teachers have instituted small or large changes in the content and style of th eir courses. (2) Evaluation results from the 1991-93 trials demonstrat ed the importance and effectiveness of giving thematic coherence to a course structure (one of tile IUPP goals), and demonstrated the feasib ility of a substantial exposure to quantum physics in the introductory course. We expect textbooks based on several of the IUPP course model s to be published within the next several years. In addition to studyi ng ways to further the central goals of the Project (more contemporary physics, a less-packed list of topics, a visible theme or ''story lin e''), study of the evaluation materials from the 1991-93 trials yielde d a substantial amount of information relevant to all physics instruct ion at the introductory level. This information came in areas such as effective use of the introductory laboratory, strengths and pitfalls o f computer use in introductory courses, and the importance of helping student most usefully allocate the time they have available for physic s. (C) 1998 American Association of Physics Teachers.