Thursday, May 4, 2006

Dear School Official:

We call to your attention an extraordinary professional development opportunities for your high school and middle school teachers of physics and physical science.  In cooperation with Santa Fe Community College, the Physics Teaching Resource Agents (PTRA) program of the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) is offering two residential, five-day workshop series specifically for teachers in rural schools, at Santa Fe Community College, at no cost to your schools or the participants!  The source of funds is a grant from the National Science Foundation, which has provided federal grants to sustain AAPT/PTRA initiatives since 1985.  Teachers accepted will be invited to a fall and a spring follow-up workshops as well as future summer programs.

June 19 – June 23, 2006 (Kinematics and Newton's Laws)	application form (MS Word)	application form (PDF)
June 26 – June 30, 2006 (Energy and Momentum)	application form (MS Word)	application form (PDF)

Teachers may attend either or both of the institutes.

If you are not familiar with the AAPT/PTRA program, you can visit our web site at www.aapt.org/PTRA/.  The following excerpt gives a brief description: “The AAPT/PTRA program is national in scope and maintains a cadre of 200 trained, certified, and updated workshop leaders to provide professional development opportunities for teachers of physics and physical science in their local regions.  Some 40 learning-research-based workshops have been developed to enhance content, classroom and laboratory instruction, use of technology, assessment tools, etc., in a mode of guided inquiry and in a hands-on, minds-on environment”.  If you would like more information, please contact any of the PTRA program directors at the American Association of Physics Teachers 301-209-3344 or Karim Diff at Santa Fe Community College, phone 352-395-5591 or karim.diff@sfcc.edu.

This institute will be lead by two highly regarded Florida Teachers, Jim and Jane Nelson, and well focus on strategies appropriate for preparing students for the Science FCAT.

Please arrange for copies of this letter and the accompanying Applications to be distributed to your teachers of physics and/or physical science.

Sincerely,

                              

James H. Nelson                                                       Karim Diff
Past President of AAPT                                            PTRA Rural Regional Coordinator
AAPT/PTRA Principal Investigator                           Santa Fe Community College
nelsonjh@ix.netcom.com                                           karim.diff@sfcc.edu
352-395-6646                                                          (352) 395-5591