Review Assessment Report

We have faculty that are passionate about student success and have crafted a strong physics curriculum that emphasizes problem solving and analysis. The Physics AS degree attracts a small number of majors each year. We have created a full suite of online physics courses, providing flexible options for students. Two of our faculty participate in a college-wide effort to aid students majoring in a STEM field by teaching foundational courses within the STEM Core curriculum and the Summer Bridge program. They provide an overview of engineering in physics through presentations and hands-on activities to help students prepare for the upcoming academic year. Participation in this program has led to at least five student internships at Intel, Sandia, and Los Alamos. Our faculty recruit students for opportunities such as the INVITE workshop at Notre Dame in April 2022. Two physics/engineering students learned about bridge design at this workshop aimed to increase the participation of women and minorities in STEM.

The curricula for the engineering and physics degrees at CNM are closely aligned, yet we continue to have fewer declared physics majors than engineering, and fewer than 10 physics graduates per year. That said, given the number of declared physics majors that we have, our physics degree program is about as successful as our engineering in translating majors into graduates. For example, over the past three years, engineering produced 116 graduates, which is 4.7% of their total declared majors. Over those same three years, physics produced 9 graduates, which is 4.1% of our total declared majors. It is unclear whether 10 degrees per year is an attainable goal: among all bachelor's degrees awarded in the US for the class of 2018, 0.3% were awarded in physics ("Results from the 2018 Survey of Enrollments and Degrees", Statistical Research Center of the American Institute of Physics, Aug 2020). At UNM, the number of physics degrees conferred per year has decreased every year from 18 in 2017 to 6 in 2022.

In Fall 2022, twenty-one PHYS 1320 students were assessed on applying the first and second laws of thermodynamics to interpret heat, work, and internal energy, describing relationships between physical quantities, and conducting dimensional analysis. We require a 50% on the final exam to pass PHYS 1320, so we chose a minimum score of 5 out of 10 to pass this assessment. Eighty-six percent of the students passed the assessment, and the average score among all students was 7.4 out of 10 (74%). While we are happy with the results of this assessment, unfortunately, this represents only 1 of 2 sections of PHYS 1320 taught in Fall 2022. The instructor of the other section failed to turn in their results and then left the employ of CNM, so we need to rerun this assessment. Given that we are transitioning to Universal Themes, we are not sure exactly when we will run this assessment again.