Conference: Assembling Physics Departmental Change Agents at a Thriving Departments Symposium

The physics community has an opportunity to bring together departmental leaders during times of profound change in academia. Workforce needs in areas such as quantum information science, biological physics, materials physics, and applied physics are growing and provide an opportunity for growth. At the same time, some physics programs are under threat of closure due to dropping graduation rates and lower college enrollments. To maintain U.S. leadership in STEM, physics programs must be able to effectively attract and prepare students for a wide range of STEM-related careers. This award supports a pilot American Physical Society (APS) Thriving Departments Symposium, to be held June 11-13, 2025, at the University of Chicago for approximately 200 leaders in the physics community. The symposium will bring together departmental change leaders for community building and sharing of knowledge. Participants will learn about effective practices for recruitment and retention, which will help sustain a pipeline of domestic degree recipients that is critical for the health of the U.S. economy and national security. The Thriving Departments Symposium will create a space for departmental leaders to engage with each other and explore practices and strategies that help them respond to challenges and opportunities with robust, context-specific recommendations. The topics discussed at the symposium will initiate significant changes in undergraduate and graduate education within physics departments by helping department change leaders advance their curriculum and cultures to more accurately reflect the needs of the students they serve as well as the broader needs of the nation. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.