When CSUDH physics major Jeisson Pulido was a child growing up in Las Cruces, an impoverished neighborhood in Bogotá, Colombia, he used to stare up at the stars in wonder. He never imagined that he would one day be working with the European Space Agency (ESA), helping to create a cutting-edge research satellite. “The resources in my neighborhood schools were very low,” he remembers. “I didn't receive a lot of education in math or physics, just the basics. I was never able to see myself studying in college or pursuing a science degree, because of the lack of funding in my schools. I was very good at math, but I didn't even know that subjects like astronomy or physics existed.” After ... Read More
Physics
Symmetry: Ximena Cid Builds Community by Cherishing her Roots
Source: Symmetry Magazine It took Ximena Cid three tries to pass her introductory physics class as an undergraduate student at the University of California, Berkeley. Most people would have given up after the first attempt, and certainly after the second. But “I'm really stubborn,” Cid says. She was especially stubborn about passing a class in which she was both the only woman and, as an Indigenous Chicana, the only person of color. “When people tell me I don't belong in places, or I'm not good enough, it really gets me fired up and motivated just to prove them wrong,” Cid says. Now, as an associate professor and chair of the physics department at California State ... Read More
CSUDH Offers New Master’s Degree in Systems Engineering
Adding to CSUDH's growing list of master's level programs, the new Master of Science in Systems Engineering is officially up and running. The fall 2020 semester is the first for the new cohort-based degree program, which aims to fill distinct industry needs in the South Bay. A partnership between the College of Extended and International Education (CEIE) and the College of Natural and Biological Sciences (CNBS), the M.S. in Systems Engineering becomes the first engineering degree offered at CSUDH. According to Associate Professor of Physics Antonia Boadi, who took the lead in shepherding the project through the approval process, the idea for the degree originated in a series of ... Read More
Engagement and Activism in Modern Physics Education
Source: Physics Central By Korena Di Roma Howley As a young girl growing up in Sacramento, California, Ximena Cid would sit on her roof and stare at the night sky. “I always had a love of the stars, of the universe,” she says. Today, Cid is chair of the physics department at California State University, Dominguez Hills and has pivoted from a focus in space science to one in physics education research (PER). “In grad school, I became more and more fascinated with the way people learn [and how] the ways in which we present ideas impacts how people understand them,” she says. She looks at how topics in physics might be rendered to better support students, noting that teaching in ... Read More
CSUDH Awarded $2.9 Million NSF Grant to Create a Master Teacher Fellows Program
(Carson, CA) - The National Science Foundation (NSF) has awarded the California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) Foundation a grant of more than $2.9 million to create a Master Teacher Fellows program, with the goal of developing exemplary teacher-leaders in science and mathematics for high-need K-12 schools. The Master Teacher Fellows (MTF) program is a partnership between CSUDH, Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) - Local District South, and the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. The six-year grant was awarded through the NSF's Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program. The MTF's goals are to increase participants' content knowledge and pedagogical and ... Read More
