Physics 2020 — General Physics 2
Fall 2005 Information
Physics 2020 follows physics 2010 as an algebra-based
introduction to the physical principles and phenomena that govern the world
around us, including natural phenomena, such as lightning, and even more so the
technology that plays an increasing role in our everyday lives. Physics 2020 specifically focuses on
the many manifestations of electromagnetism. It begins by separate looks at the
properties and the laws that govern electricity on the one hand and magnetism
on the other. This material
includes a presentation of the fundamental principles of electric circuits and
circuits that incorporate magnetic phenomena. It provides a look at the
transmission of electrical power supplied to the home and the role of
electrical phenomenon, both healthy and hazardous, with respect to the human
body. Electric and magnetic phenomena are seen to meld more generally into
electromagnetic phenomena, in particular electromagnetic waves. Such waves cover everything from radio,
to wireless communications, to visible light and to x-rays. Of particular interest is the
interaction of light with matter.
After covering the fundamental interactions of light with transparent
media, the material introduces devices that manipulate light such as lenses and
mirrors, and common optical instruments such as cameras, the human eye and
telescopes. The technique of
ray-tracing is introduced as a means to understand how such optical instruments
work. The course moves on to
optical phenomenon specifically due to the wave nature of light, where one can
understand how the wave nature of light, for example, limits the performance of
an optical microscope. Finally,
the course will take a brief look at the theory of quantum mechanics and how it
affects oneÕs view of the physical world.
We end with the specific manifestation of quantum mechanics that returns
specifically to electromagnetic phenomena though an introduction to lasers.
The course includes both classroom and laboratory components. Prof.Õs Dana Z. Anderson and Noah Finkelstein will jointly instruct the class. Primarily, though not exclusively, Prof. Anderson will responsible for the lecture periods, homework assignments and exams, while Prof. Finkelstein is primarily responsible for the laboratory sections and working with the teaching assistants.
Lecture:
MWF 11:00 – 11:50
Physics 2010.
Please see the instructor if you have not met the prerequisite.
Prof. Dana Z. Anderson
Room: JILA Tower, Room A406a
Email: dana@jila.colorado.edu
Voice: (303) 492-5202
Prof. Noah Finkelstein
Room: Gamow Tower, Duane Phys Room F1023
Email: noah.finkelstein@colorado.edu
Voice: (303) 735-6082
Assistant to Prof. Anderson
Ms. Erica Mady (303) 492-1128; mady@jilau1.colorado.edu
Instructor Office Hours
Prof. Anderson:
T: 1:00 PM – 1:50 PM (JILA tower, Room A406b)
W: 3:00 PM – 3:50 PM (JILA tower, Room A406b)
Prof. Finkelstein
T: 1:00 PM – 1:50 PM (Gamow Tower, Duane Phys Room F1023)
TH: 1:00 PM – 1:50 PM (Gamow Tower, Duane Phys Room F1023)
TAÕs
Paul Kunz (kunzp@colorado.edu)
Office: Duance Physics C123
T: 11:00 AM -12:00 PM (Physics Help Room)
TH: 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM (Physics Help Room)
Paul Martens (martens@colorado.edu
Office: Duane Physics Gamow Tower F415
F: 1:00 PM – 3:00 PM (Physics Help Room)
James McCollough (mccoulou@colorado.edu)
Office: Duane Physics C123
Lauren Kost (kostl@colorado.edu)
Office: Duane Physics C123
W: 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM (Physics Help Room)
Th: 10:00 AM – 11:00 AM (Physics Help Room)
F: 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM (Physics Help Room)
Web Site
http://www.colorado.edu/physics/phys2130
This URL should link to:
http//dza.colorado.edu/~class/phys2130
Text
Physics, by D.C.
Giancoli, Sixth Edition, Volume
2, or bound Vol 1 & 2. Published
by Pearson Education Inc., NJ.
REMOTE RESPONSE DEVICES
Individual remote response devices
are required to respond to in-class knowledge questions. These ÒclickersÓ are available at the
bookstore. Each individual clicker
must be registered at http://capa.colorado.edu/cgi-bin/RegisterAFS
Students who attend class are expected to arrive on time (on
the hour) and leave after the instructor has completed the lecture, which will
usually be about 10 minutes before the hour. Late arrivals and early departures tend to disrupt the class
in G-1B20.
In order to promote the greatest information transfer during the lecture period you, as the student, are expected to read and carry out any other assigned material before class and be prepared to participate in class discussions. Reading assignments are provided in the course calandar.
Newspaper reading, listening to music, doing homework, etc. disrupt
the general tenor and spirit of the interactive classroom. Such activities are therefore
prohibited. A student found
violating this policy will receive an absent mark for the lecture period, and
may be asked to leave.
In general, students and faculty each have responsibility
for maintaining an appropriate learning environment. Students who fail to
adhere to such behavioral standards may be subject to discipline. Faculty have
the professional responsibility to treat all students with understanding,
dignity and respect, to guide classroom discussion and to set reasonable limits
on the manner in which they and their students express opinions. Professional courtesy and sensitivity
are especially important with respect to individuals and topics dealing with
differences of race, culture, religion, politics, sexual orientation, gender
variance, and nationalities. Class
rosters are provided to the instructor with the student's legal name. The
instructor(s) will gladly honor your request to address you by an alternate
name or gender pronoun. Please advise the instructor of this preference early
in the semester so that he may make appropriate changes to my records. See polices at:
http://www.colorado.edu/policies/classbehavior.html
and at
http://www.colorado.edu/studentaffairs/judicialaffairs/code.html#student_code
Please refer to the laboratory
information guide.
There will be three in-term exams and a final exam. The in-term exams will be administered on Tuesday evenings, September 20th, October 18th, and November 15th in Duane Physics G1B30 (note that this is not the classroom. The final exam will be cumulative and will be held on Monday December 12th, at 1:30 PM – 4:00 PM in G1B30.
The exams will be closed-book. The instructor will either provide a formula and constants sheet, or a single formula sheet will be permitted — details will be provided prior to the exams. CALCULATORS ARE NOT ALLOWED (including those on palmtop computers, PDAÕs, PIMÕs etc). Music players, cell phones and other communication technology may also not be brought to the exam.
Problem sets will be assigned weekly, generally on Friday except when it falls on a holiday. Each week you will receive an assignment that consists of two parts. The CAPA portion of the assignment consists of multiple-choice answers that are submitted by computer. A more complete description of CAPA appears in the following paragraph. The CAPA assignments are due the second Saturday after they are assigned by 2:00 AM (in other words, a week an several hours after the homework is assigned. A long-answer homework is due the second Monday after the homework is assigned in lecture. This portion of the homework is handed in at the beginning of class by five minutes past the hour in the alphabetically organized boxes in the back of the lecture hall.
CAPA is an internet-based homework system which stands for
ÒComputer Assisted Personalized ApproachÓ. In the CAPA system, students receive
a personalized homework assignment (every student's assignment is slightly
different) with a CAPA ID number. The CAPA ID changes each week. The number is
printed on your personal CAPA assignment or is available using the link to
PIN-getter from the CAPA login page. You are told immediately whether the
answers are right or wrong and, if wrong, you can try again, with no penalty,
up to a maximum number of tries set by the instructor. As mentioned above there
will be one new CAPA assignment each week and it will be due by Saturday at
2:00 AM. Conscientious students generally score 90-100% on CAPA assignments.
All students enrolled or waitlisted before the first day of class will be
automatically enrolled in CAPA. Students
who enrolled or waitlisted in PHYS 2020 after this date must enroll in CAPA
using the online CAPA enrollment.
Class attendance is required and is taken using the remote response devices (ÒclickersÓ). There will be frequent in-class questions with responses recorded by clickers.
Each day questions on reading material, to assess your current view, to assess your modified view, and to stimulate discussion
We accommodate all forms of personal circumstances that lead
to missed classes and late assignments by the following policy: We drop the
lowest four lecture participation scores
(due to absence or otherwise), we drop the lowest two CAPA assignment scores, and we drop the lowest two long answer assignment scores. Thus you may miss up to four lectures
and two of each type of assignment without impact to your grade. This accommodates all personal reasons
for delays, absences, missed assignment deadlines and so forth due to, for
example, illness, travel, athletic travel, religious activities, or just plain
bad hair day.
As a consequence, late
assignments are not accepted, and missed absences cannot be made up. For assignments, this holds whether
they are 5 days late or 5 minutes late.
This policy is non-negotiable with the exception of extraordinary circumstances that are beyond the studentÕs control
such as a family death or similar emergency, extended illness (however, a
cancelled airline flight, for example, does not fall into this ÒextraordinaryÓ
category). Usually the student
will be required to provide an independent letter (such as from a Doctor) that
substantiates the circumstances and verifies the studentÕs inability to meet the
course expectations over the time period in question.
Completing less than eight labs will result in a failing
grade for the course, irrespective of your performance on all other aspects.
Please refer to the Laboratory
guide for additional information regarding your laboratory/recitation
session.
The various scores are weighed into a final letter grade
calculation according to the weighting value shown in the following table:
|
Item |
Date |
Value (%) |
|
In-term Exam I |
09/20/05 |
10 |
|
In-term Exam II |
10/18/05 |
10 |
|
In-term exam III |
11/15/05 |
10 |
|
Final Exam |
12/12/05 |
15 |
|
Laboratory |
Weekly |
15 |
|
CAPA assignments |
Weekly |
15 |
|
Long Answer/Recitation |
Weekly |
15 |
|
Participation |
Daily |
10 |
|
Total |
— |
100 |
Grades are ÒcurvedÓ and it is useful to understand how curving is done at various stages in order to derive a final letter grade, and how curving, along with the student score distributions, can affect your grade at any given stage.
Each item in the above has a numerical score for each student. These scores are fit to a ÒNormalÓ (Gaussian) distribution giving a mean and a standard deviation. This distribution is then ÒcurvedÓ by a straightforward formula to give a mean of approximately 75 and a standard deviation of about 13. At that point a letter grade is generated for that score according to a standard formula that leads to approximately 10% AÕs, 20% BÕs, 40% CÕs, 20% DÕs and 10% FÕs. Note that this process of curving mitigates the problem of excessively hard or excessively easy exams, for example. However, also note that your letter grade can go either up or down due to the curving process. In the latter case, you will be disappointed to see what looked like a ÒBÓ score turn out to be ÒC+Ó, but of course you will be happy if the opposite occurs. But the fact is, the curving process indicates how you have performed with respect to the rest of the class. Another, sometimes upsetting, outcome of curving arises when the spread of scores is very small. If everyone receives a 95 out of 100 on an exam, that will translate to a 75% = C when the scores are curved. ThatÕs annoying but inevitable with curving. On the other hand, your grade would be raised to a C by curving if everyone receives 50%=F on an exam.
At the end of the semester all of the scores for the various
items are weighted according to the value in the above table and summed together,
giving a total score for each student.
The scores that are weighted are the curved scores, not the raw scores for each item. The use of the curved scores rather
than the raw ones is required in order to make the weighting meaningful. The student total weighted scores are
now curved again to obtain a
normal distribution.
This last curving is done in such a way so as to set the median class score to approximately define the C/C+ letter grade boundary. Typically this sets the class average letter grade to approximately C+.
When you receive your final grade, you should see that it is
more or less consistent with your individual (curved) grades on the exams,
assignments, and so on (taking the weighting into account). If there seems to be a discrepancy, by
all means speak with the instructor as the possibility of errors is real.
Barring errors, the instructor is not in a position to
negotiate grades as it is unfair to the remainder of the class to raise one
individualÕs grade without reconsideration of all the grades. An exception involves extraordinary
circumstances beyond the studentÕs control (as in Section 7.1). Such circumstances may well lead to a
consideration for a grade of incomplete, IP or IF.
The course web page will provide key information during the semester. It gives the homework assignments, their due dates and solutions for the long-answer problems, sometimes lecture notes, exam solutions, as well as up-to-date contact information for the instructor and the TAs. Schedule changes will be reflected in modifications to the appropriate web information. Students are also encouraged to check the web site often.
All students of the University of Colorado at Boulder are
responsible for knowing and adhering to the academic integrity policy of this
institution. Violations of this policy may include: cheating, plagiarism, aid
of academic dishonesty, fabrication, lying, bribery, and threatening behavior. All incidents of academic misconduct
shall be reported to the Honor Code Council (honor@colorado.edu;
303-725-2273). Students who are found to be in violation of the academic
integrity policy will be subject to both academic sanctions from the faculty
member and non-academic sanctions (including but not limited to university
probation, suspension, or expulsion). Other information on the Honor Code can
be found at:
http://www.colorado.edu/policies/honor.html
and at
http://www.colorado.edu/academics/honorcode/
If you qualify for accommodations because of a disability,
please submit to the instructor a letter from Disability Services within the
first two weeks of class so that your needs may be addressed. Disability
Services determines accommodations based on documented disabilities. Contact: 303-492-8671, Willard 322,
and/or www.Colorado.EDU/disabilityservices
Campus policy regarding religious observances requires that
faculty make every effort to reasonably and fairly deal with all students who,
because of religious obligations, have conflicts with scheduled exams,
assignments or required attendance. The schedule of exams may be found in the
course calendar. Please notify the
instructor of a Religious conflict with the exam schedule in a letter submitted
within the first two weeks of class. See full details at http://www.colorado.edu/policies/fac_relig.html
The University of Colorado at Boulder policy on Discrimination
and Harassment (http://www.colorado.edu/policies/discrimination.html,
the University of Colorado policy on Sexual Harassment and the University of
Colorado policy on Amorous Relationships applies to all students, staff and
faculty. Any student, staff or
faculty member who believes s/he has been the subject of discrimination or
harassment based upon race, color, national origin, sex, age, disability,
religion, sexual orientation, or veteran status should contact the Office of
Discrimination and Harassment (ODH) at 303-492-2127 or the Office of Judicial
Affairs at 303-492-5550.
Information about the ODH and the campus resources available to assist
individuals regarding discrimination or harassment can be obtained at http://www.colorado.edu/odh