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All of our apparatus is designed and built by university physicists who have taught in the undergraduate lab and are well aware of the constraints of both student use and student laboratory budgets. Many of the advanced instruments give research quality data and lend themselves to open-ended upper level projects. Several of our instruments have been built in collaboration with faculty who have used our apparatus and then worked with us to make experiments they had built for their own students available to colleagues world wide. Because they were specifically designed for teaching, these instruments promote conceptual understanding while providing quantitative data that is often of research quality. Although there is "No Resident Expert Required," the experiments are challenging and satisfying for faculty as well as students. We in the physics community are not in the business of training technicians to manipulate equipment. Our mission is to educate physicists so that they will be able to create new instruments to explore new physics. No matter what you call it, Advanced Physics Lab, Upper Division Lab, Junior/Senior Lab, Modern Lab, Optics Lab or even Great Experiments in Physics, TeachSpin apparatus offers your faculty and students a wide array of exciting and challenging hands-on physics experiments.
Though several companies provide apparatus for introductory science (high school and college) laboratories, it appears that TEACHSPIN is unique in its goal of providing affordable advanced (senior level) laboratory teaching apparatus. There are several reasons for this.
TEACHSPIN, in comparison, remains committed to the educational market, being owned and operated by members of the academic community and also employing several undergraduate and graduate students.
From Jonathan:I began TEACHSPIN in 1992 only intending to build an instrument that would make it possible for every college or university, no matter what the expertise of its faculty, to teach Pulsed NMR as a standard advanced laboratory experiment. In the process of building that first instrument, I discovered a mission. TeachSpin is dedicated to creating rugged, reliable, and affordable hands-on instruments that any physicist, no matter what his or her area of expertise, can incorporate into an advanced laboratory program. In addition to designing instruments from my own repertoire, we have developed exciting collaborations that have enabled TeachSpin to offer a broader range of experiments. As of this writing, we have partnered with faculty from University of North Carolina, Charlotte, California Institute of Technology, and Calvin College. Perhaps you would be interested in a TEACHSPIN collaboration with your favorite experiment? A crucial requirement for TEACHSPIN instruments is a combination of simplicity and reliability that can put an end to the only half-joking classic distinction among the laboratory sciences: If it's slimy, it's biology; if it smells, it's chemistry; and if it doesn't work, it's physics. When students, by themselves, can get apparatus to work, they "own" their results. We believe that all physicists deserve an experimental experience that leaves them ending the old saw with "and if it is stimulating, exciting, and fun, it's physics!" Vitae Jonathan: BS, Case Institute of Technology; Ph.D., Washington University, St. Louis; Post Doc with N. Bloembergen at Harvard; Faculty, Case-Western Reserve and University at Buffalo; Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Teaching; Visiting Faculty: Princeton, Middlebury College, Stevens Institute. Author, "A Modern Introduction to Mechanics".
From Barbara:My picture is here for people who like to put a face to a voice. Until now, I have been at an advantage because so many schools include photos on their websites. Now we are even up! It has been a great delight to share my excitement about TeachSpin's hands-on instruments with so many scientists deeply committed to teaching. And it is gratifying to be part of a TEACHSPIN team dedicated to building equipment that makes both teachers and students look forward to lab. I hope I'll be having an opportunity to help you put our instruments through their paces at an AAPT or APS meeting in the near future. Vitae Barbara: BA, Swarthmore College; MAT, Yale University; Physics Teacher, Columbia and Livingston High Schools in NJ, Buffalo Seminary, NY; President New Jersey Section AAPT, Physics Teaching Resource Agent, Presidential Award for Excellence 1994, addition of -Reichert courtesy 1991 AAPT Summer Meeting, Vancouver, BC.
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