Leon Lederman to Discuss Pre-College Science Education

Troy, N.Y. — Leon Lederman, Nobel Prize-winner and internationally renowned particle physicist, will offer some radical ideas for improving pre-college science education when he delivers the annual Robert Resnick Lecture Wednesday, Nov. 20 from 4 to 5 p.m. in room 3303 of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute’s Russell Sage Laboratory.

The talk, titled “A Vision of 21st Century Science Education,” is free and open to the public.

“It is well known that U.S. high schools teach the disciplinary sciences as independent, disconnected courses, and use a sequence installed in 1893,” said Lederman. “Our curricula are a mile wide and an inch thick, and reflect neither the scientific revolutions of the 20th century nor the new demands that society makes of the 21st century high school graduate.” During his lecture, Lederman will “propose radical changes [to U.S. curricula] that are designed to produce a science-literate general public, and argue the urgent need for such an educational revolution.”

Lederman currently serves as director emeritus of Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory (Fermilab), resident scholar for the Illinois Mathematics and Science Academy, and Pritzker Professor of Science at the Illinois Institute of Technology. He is a member of the National Academy of Sciences.

Previously, Lederman served as director of the Fermilab and held various faculty positions at Columbia University. Perhaps most notably, he was the director of Nevis Laboratories, Columbia’s center for experimental research in high-energy physics.

He has received numerous awards, including the National Medal of Science, the Elliot Cresson Medal of the Franklin Institute, the Wolf Prize in Physics, the Nobel Prize in Physics, and the Enrico Fermi Prize.

The lecture series is named in honor of Robert Resnick, professor emeritus of physics and the Edward P. Hamilton Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Science Education at Rensselaer. Resnick, who wrote the premier text series for undergraduate physics, authored or co-authored seven textbooks still used throughout the world.