Lillian C. McDermott
2
History
3/15/10
By April 2010 I had devoted many hours to producing this history.
In the
intervening two years, the audience whom I hoped to reach expanded beyond physicists
who were already engaged in PER.
I wanted to encourage other faculty in physics and in
other sciences to undertake research on student understanding in their respective
disciplines.
As work on the project progressed, I recognized that the monograph also
provides a glimpse into the life and experience of one of the relatively few female
academic physicists in the latter part of the 20
th
century.
Although not part of my original
plan, contributing to the history of women scientists in academic life became another
motivation.
Later, I found still another incentive.
Perhaps, by example, I might be able to
encourage others (especially young women) who may want to pursue careers in physics or
another science to develop the courage, imagination, and persistence to forge new paths in
directions that may differ from their initial research.
I know how difficult it can be to establish a group like ours in a traditional science
department, especially at a research university.
The challenge of gaining acceptance in the
broader academic community may be even greater.
I hope that insights derived from our
experience will be helpful to faculty who might like to establish (or strengthen) a similar
effort in a physics (or other science) department.
Lillian C. McDermott
3
History
3/15/10
A Personal History of Physics Education Research
and the Physics Education Group at the University of Washington
I.
Introduction
The roots of the story of how I first became engaged in research in physics
education can be traced to the time when my husband, Mark, became an Assistant
Professor of Physics at the University of Washington (UW).
(Appendix A suggests an
even earlier origin.)
During 1960–1962, he was an Instructor at Columbia University, but
his main task was research in experimental atomic physics.
I was teaching at City College
of New York (CCNY).
The State of Washington had a strict anti-nepotism law that would
preclude my employment at UW, but I was optimistic that my Ph.D. from Columbia and
my experience at CCNY would enable me to work somewhere else as a physicist.
2
In September 1962 Mark and I moved to Seattle with Bruce, our three-year old
son.
Melanie was born just after our first Christmas in Seattle and Connie arrived in June
1964.
In December I applied for a teaching position at Seattle University.
There were
two possibilities: one full-time and the other half-time.
I was asked which of the two I
wanted.
I remember that the priest (Father John Fitterer) who interviewed me commented
that a part-time job would probably be better for a woman with three children.
Since his
advice seemed reasonable, that was the choice I made.
In the short term, that was a
mistake.
In the long term, however, it turned out to be the right decision.
I began teaching two introductory physics courses at Seattle University in January
1965.
I would leave for home at about 12:30 p.m., but I gradually became aware that
some full-time faculty (all male) were often departing at about 2:30.
When I learned that
they were paid on a much higher salary scale, I started to question the wisdom of my
decision.
A few years later, another disadvantage of a part-time position became evident.
During the time that I worked at Seattle University, I was sometimes asked to
teach an introductory algebra- or calculus-based physics course at UW.
Usually this
happened through a last-minute telephone call from the Department Chair (Ronald
2
Until passage of Title IX of the Civil Rights Act in 1972, anti-nepotism laws barred relatives (mostly
women) from faculty positions at the same university.
See M. W. Rossiter,
Women Scientists in
America, Before Affirmative Action, 1940-1972
(Johns Hopkins University Press, Baltimore, 1995).
