Semi Weekly Message to the Physics Community, Wednesday, Sept. 9, 2020

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Dear Physics Community,

This marks the end of the first week of classes in our new virtualized reality — the summer is now officially behind us. It was long and arduous at times, but hopefully, everyone got a bit of sun. In the midst of everything, a number of organizations in the Department embarked on new initiatives, instituted policy and procedural changes, and began a variety of other efforts to benefit students. This report, by the SPS and PGSC presidents, summarizes the tremendous amount of work done on almost every front this summer to improve the way students move through the Department.

Peter, Stella, and Anjali

Above the Fold

  • Op-Ed by Kerston Perez in Inside Higher Education
  • New department-wide Piazza forum, Communic.8.  You may post semi-anonymously (poster’s name known to instructors only).  the instructors (Jesse Thaler, Matt Hodel, Kaylee de Soto, and Peter Fisher) will review how the site is working any may move to fully anonymous posting in mid-October…
  • New positions: Prof Lindley Winslow has agreed to serve as Undergraduate Coordinator and Prof. Claude Canizares will serve as Graduate Student Advocate.  Announcement here.

Physics

New news

    • Physics Values Committee restructuring. The Physics Values Committee underwent a major restructuring this summer to best respond to community needs, and has uploaded its new charter on its website.
    • Metrics of student success survey — faculty and graduate students, please fill out this survey from the PGSC’s admissions advisory council, GAGA, about metrics of student success
    • GWIP and UWIP rebranding. GWIP, along with UWIP, is working with LGBTQ+ services to make the organization more inclusive of all gender marginalized physics students. Outward-facing changes include a name change from “Women” to “Womxn”, new logos, and updated web resources, in addition to more internal efforts. GWIP and UWIP are planning to host joint inclusivity training events during the fall 2020 semester.

In case you missed it

  • 8.391 and 8.398 in-person policy
  • Opportunity for undergrad and grad students to be a mentor for core undergrad courses (~$840 stipend available)
  • Want to learn more about opportunities in our Department or at MIT? The Physics Values Committee website has nice lists of resources you can access and ways to get involved.

Upcoming events (if you want to link to the Departmental Calendar, see Christina’s instructions at the end of this message)

  • Monday, September 7 – Labor Day (read: three-day weekend! Woo!)
  • Tuesday, September 8 – first PhysREFS office hour. Here’s the full schedule of PhysREFS office hours for the semester​
  • Also Tuesday, September 8! At 5:30pm, SPS is holding elections for the 2020-21 year. If you can’t make it at that time and want to run for a position, fill out this form to nominate yourself.
  • Thursday, Sept. 10, 12-1:30 pm, Physics Lunch talk, Salvatore Vitale “Astrophysical implications of the binary black hole merger GW190521”, see Ryan’s note for zoom link
  • Thursday, September 24, 4:00 p.m. — “Is Grad School Right For You?” physics department panel
  • November 5-8 — The National Society of Black Physicists Conference is coming up soon! Our department is organizing a small group of students and/or faculty to represent us. If you are interested in learning more, please contact Olumakinde Ogunnaike at ogunnaik@mit.edu.

Community outreach opportunity from graduate student Francesco Sciortino

  • ​Recently many of us have felt rising pressure to become more active and address social justice, educational access and diversity issues. If you’re on the same boat, now is the time to change gear! In this document, you can find information about 3 opportunities to volunteer with organizations based near MIT: the Cambridge Community Learning Center, the Science Club For Girls and Enroot. Together, these 3 groups support underserved adult learners, girls learning about STEM, and young immigrants in Cambridge. This semester, the majority of these volunteering opportunities will be remote (via Zoom). We are in contact with representatives of each of these organizations and they have told us that they are in huge need of volunteers to address old and new challenges during the next months. If you’re interested, please look through this document and/or email Francesco at sciortino@psfc.mit.edu!

Accessing the Physics Community Calendar: In cooperation with Christina Andujar and myself, an MIT Physics Community Calendar was created for use in Microsoft Outlook.

If you want to your Physics event on the calendar please email Christina Andujar (candujar@mit.edu) and myself (higginsr@mit.edu) with all of the information for the talk itself as well as how to access it (e.g. a zoom link).

When you set up this calendar, you will be able to view and open the individual appointments on this calendar to find the zoom details and eventually the DropBox link will be added with the video if the talk was recorded. Our hope is to have all events posted to this calendar during our time working remotely to help you have a place where the zoom links can live and login information can be accessed.

Windows Users:
Steps to access the calendar for those who use Microsoft Outlook:
1.     Go to the calendar in Outlook
2.     Click on “Open Calendar” and then “Open Shared Calendar…”
3.     In the text box type: PHYSICS: Community Calendar
4.     When you press “OK” the calendar should appear on your end.

Apple Users:
Steps to access the calendar for those who use Microsoft Outlook:
1.     Go to the calendar in Outlook
2.     Click on “View” then “Go to” and then “Calendar” and then “Open Shared Calendar…”
3.     In the text box type: PHYSICS: Community Calendar
4.     When you press “OK” the calendar should appear on your end.