‘Feminised’ physics a formula for failure, says Michelle Simmons (1 Viewer)

InteGrand

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‘Feminised’ physics a formula for failure, says Michelle Simmons

One of the nation’s leading scientists has attacked attempts to “feminise’’ the high school physics curriculum by replacing maths formulas with essays as a “disaster’’ which has left students unprepared for university.

Renowned quantum physicist Michelle Simmons used an Australia Day address in Sydney yesterday to warn against the dumbing down of high school *science and urged authorities to “set the bar high’’ for students to encourage them to excel.

Professor Simmons’s criticism of the science curriculum has been supported by teaching experts who told The Australian yesterday that university physics courses were being altered to compensate for students leaving high school with limited maths skills.

And the NSW Education Standards Authority will introduce a new science curriculum to take *effect from next year, which will reintroduce a focus on maths and reverse the introduction of *sociology and history into the discipline.

“One of the few things that horrified me when I arrived in Australia (in 1999) was to discover that, several years ago the high school physics curriculum was “feminised”, Professor Simmons told a high-profile audience at Sydney’s Conservatorium of Music.

“In other words, to make it more appealing to girls, our curriculum’s designers substituted formulae with essays! What a *disaster,’’ she said.

Professor Simmons obtained a physics PhD in her native Britain but chose to work in Australia in 1999 because it offered “a culture of academic freedom, openness to ideas, and an amazing willingness to pursue goals that are ambitious”. She gained Australian citizenship in 2007 and now heads a team considered the world leader in the “space race of the computing era” — the quest to develop a quantum computer.

Professor Simmons said she was still seeing the long-term *impact of the curriculum changes in students arriving at the University of NSW, where she leads the Centre for Quantum Computation and Communication *Technology. “From the students coming (to university) I see little evidence that (the changes have) made any difference and indeed I see many students complaining that the physics curriculum has left them ill-equipped for *university.”

Professor Simmons used the example of final-year students being asked to write essays about the environmental impact of a *nuclear power plant, rather than using maths to describe the physics of how the power was generated. “Physics is about looking at equations, it’s deriving things, it’s understanding things from a mathematical viewpoint as well as a descriptive viewpoint,” she said. “An example I’ve heard of is to describe how a nuclear power plant works and its impact on the environment, and I do really think that within that you need to have some equations which would get them to address the physical structure of how energy is transferred, so you have that critical thinking that physics normally demands.”

Professor Simmons said there was “a big cost” in trying to make learning easier for students *because “when we reduce the quality of education that anyone receives, we reduce the expectations we have of them”.

“If we want young people to be the best they can be at anything we must set the bar high and tell them we expect them to jump over it,” she said. “My strong belief is that we need to be teaching all students — both girls and boys — to have high expectations of themselves.”

She warned that characterising Australia as “the lucky country” was “a mistake because it does not acknowledge the hard work that people have done to be successful and it encourages us to shy away from difficult challenges”.

Professor Simmons’s broadside won the support of the NSW Education Standards Authority — the former Board of Studies — which said new science courses to be introduced from next year “address the exact concerns” she had expressed. A spokesman said the new physics and chemistry courses, which would be examined at HSC level from 2019, “have a greater focus on mathematical *applications as a way to describe the concepts and a strong emphasis on practical investigations”.

“There has been a reduction in the history/sociology-based content and an emphasis on practical investigations,” the spokesman said. “The philosophy underlying all science courses is to learn through practical engagement.”


He said an extensive consultation process had seen the move “overwhelmingly endorsed by *science teachers” and there would also now be a five-year review *process “ensuring syllabuses remain relevant and current”.

Australian Mathematical Sciences Institute director Geoff Prince also backed her comments. “The penetration of maths into science has been inadequate for a very long time,” he said. Physics should be “loaded with maths”.

“I don’t think physics has ever in Australia been as mathematical as it needs to be,” Professor Prince said. “We are absolutely creating a problem for maths itself when kids ask why are we studying it (maths) and they think the only outcome will be that they can become a maths teacher.

“The fact is maths has twice as many boys studying it as girls; that’s the problem we’ve got to address. And schools not offering maths with calculus is really closing the doors to studying science.”

Mark Butler, head of science at Gosford High School on the NSW central coast and a principal writer of the National Physics Curriculum, said he had been told by university advisory boards over the past 15 years that students were coming to physics courses underprepared.

“Several universities, including Newcastle University and the University of NSW, have even changed their first year courses to teach what would have previously been high school level physics,” Dr Butler said.

“They’ve had to soften it and slow down production *because the kids aren’t ready for the level of mathematics. A lot of kids come through the current HSC physics course doing quite well but not being very good at mathematics, which is quite odd.”

Dr Butler, who has taught at Gosford High for 20 years, said he was excited the NSW HSC syllabus was finally being changed to decrease the reference to sociology and history.

“Our social science courses aren’t forced to study physics so I’m not sure why physics teachers are forced to study sociology,” he said. “When I cross a bridge I’d much rather know the engineer knew the equations rather than the sociology and history of bridge building.”

He also said he’d seen a decrease in the number of girls taking the course in the first five years of the syllabus being introduced.

“The number of females taking physics went downwards after the changes to the new syllabus in 1999-2000. It actually decreased. When I talk to female physics *students, they have the same concerns as the boys about all the sociology and history in the course, they’d rather be doing science.”
[Source: http://www.theaustralian.com.au/nat...s/news-story/b26b46725b1d0a97e57585aabea20f37 ]

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Completely agree with this article. Though I'm personally an HSIE person myself, subjects should be honest about what they are, not dumbed down frauds.

History belongs in history class. Science belongs in science class.
 

sida1049

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The article makes sense.

Although the only thing I found contentious was why label the changes as being "feminised"? Making HSC Physics less analytical and more qualitative isn't just more attractive to girls, but to both sexes. It was a tongue-in-cheek comment, but exploited for the sensationalised headline.
 

Green Yoda

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better word is "dumbed" to fit it for the less capable maths students which sadly seems to be around a significant amount of the state
 

enoilgam

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I love how the newspapers recycle the same articles every year. "Sciences dumbed down", "Drug use amongst HSC students", its always the same shit. This argument has been going on for years.
 

InteGrand

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I love how the newspapers recycle the same articles every year. "Sciences dumbed down", "Drug use amongst HSC students", its always the same shit. This argument has been going on for years.
However, a few years ago, 'The president of the Board of Studies, Tom Alegounarias, said it was ''a substantial exaggeration'' to suggest HSC physics was more of a history than a science.' (Though he 'conceded there was ''more language in it and less scientific and mathematical analysis''.')

[Source: http://www.smh.com.au/national/education/less-maths-makes-hsc-physics-dumb-20140103-309gh.html ]
 

Green Yoda

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A perfect example of this is a dot point from I2I
"Process information to discuss Einstein's and Planck's differing views about whether science research is removed from social and political forces.

Like who the heck cares..


I mean 2/5 of the prescribed focus areas in the syllabus are "history" and "essay" based..
1. the history of physics
3. implications for society and the environment
 

g_ana

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Hey everyone I know this is out of the context of the thread but I was wondering if i could get a public opinion on this particular syllabus dot point which is included in my assignment. This is my draft in response to the question:

Process information to discuss Einstein’s and Planck’s differing views about whether science research is removed from social and political forces -


Through the first half of the twentieth century Germany thrived in the field of science due to leading minds of the era in particular physicists Max Plank and Albert Einstein. Planck and Einstein shared numerous similarities including their field of work and their positions in the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute (Berlin, Germany) regarded each other as friends. Although both were similar in many aspects the tide of WW1 (1914-1918) and WW2 (1939-1945) gave rise differing opinions which evidently clashed on the subject of political and social forces of the time from the two scientists. Plank who was of German nationality took a nationalistic approach towards the war and regarded Germany with passion and loyalty, evidently delineated through his actions of signing the manifesto of the ninety-three intellectuals to support the German military. Contrastingly to Planck, Einstein was a pacifist towards the violent militant behavior evoked from Germany and other countries involved in the war, due to his pacifism Einstein signed the counter manifesto which was against the participation of the German intellectuals in the German military. After the end of WW1 with Germany’s signing of the Treaty of Versailles (1919) Einstein went on with his research on the Photoelectric effect and eventually was awarded the Nobel Prize in 1921, whilst Planck was working up to his honorable role as president of the Kaiser Wilhelm institute which he was officially appointed in 1930. Not long before WW1 ended, WW2 began to creep upon the political world which was largely influenced by the appointment of Adolf Hitler for the Chancellor of Germany, turning Germany into a Nazi dictatorship. The gradual degradation of the Jewish community in Germany evoked concerned disapproval from both Einstein and Planck. Planck dropped his nationalistic behavior as his fellow Jewish scientist colleagues were in danger as their position in Germany began to dwindle from propaganda against Jews encouraged from Hitler’s rule. Planck held a consultation with Hitler in the aim of changing his policy regarding the welfare of the Jewish community but the attempt was to no avail. The tension in Germany against the Jewish greatly worried Einstein who was of Jewish background, he took enormous changes to escape the new policy established by resigning from Kaiser Wilhelm Institute and emigrating to America taking a professorship position on Theoretical physics in Princeton. By 1939 WW2 officially began with Germany invading Poland, this action and the concern of his old colleague Leo Szilard was largely the catalyst for Einstein’s decision to sign the letter written by Szilard who was unknown at the time to the United States President Roosevelt Franklin, informing his concern and suspicion of Germany creating an atomic bomb and urging the United States to develop it first. Einstein’s opinion was highly regarded in the twentieth century and Roosevelt immediately took action to reinforce the development of the atomic bomb with the establishment of the Manhattan project. The Manhattan project (1942-1946) was under the direction of general Leslie Groves and the U.S Army Corporation of Engineers, the project consisted of around 130,000 employees (Manhattan Project, June2017, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Project) throughout its activity, with leading scientists on the project being Albert Einstein and Leo Szilard. Szilard’s knowledge and research into nuclear chain reaction by splitting the uranium atom (u235) greatly contributed and enhanced the rate of Einstein’s development of the nuclear bomb. After the atomic bombs were tested in the trinity test the bombs became officially successful and were used against the Germans. By 1945 the Germans were near defeat and Szilard didn’t see the reasoning behind the continuation use of the bomb, as the enemies have been defeated his original fear surpassed but the realization of the danger the atomic bomb imposed on the future of humanity troubled him. With the help of Einstein’s highly regarded reputation Szilard for the second time wrote a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt to schedule a meeting between the two ( William Lanouette, A biography of Leo Szilard, http://www.doug-long.com/szilard.htm) to deliver information that would make the president more cautious about the dangers the atomic bomb imposes in the future and the high chance of evoking a nuclear arms race if precautions are not taken. Unfortunately before the decision could be officially reinforced President Roosevelt died (12 April, 1945) and President Trumen was re-elected. The meeting was therefore held with the new elected president who was not dismayed and disagreed with Szilard’s view. This led to the Hiroshima and Nagasaki nuclear bombing which further dismayed Einstein and Szilard from the use of atomic bombs. On July 17, 1945 an official petition against the further use of the atomic bomb was signed by Einstein and Leo Szilard including 69 other co-signers and was sent to President Truman. Evidently Einstein’s pacifistic approach towards the political forces active in the war were strained by the fear of Germany’s progressive hatred of Jews, leading to him being a major role in the creation of the atomic bomb. Einstein later stated that he regretted immensely sending the letter to Roosevelt. Similarly Planck’s differing opinion compared to Einstein’s were exposed to change do to his eventual disapproval of the injustice imposed by his nation of the Jewish people.
 

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