Report by Group 2

1. Report by Group2 Research and Education

2. Marcis AuzinshUniversity of Latvia [Latvia (LV)] – mauzins@latnet.lv Jan Naudts (Secretary)University of Antwerpen [Belgium (BE)] – jan.naudts@ua.ac.be Giovanni Vittorio Pallottino (Chair)University of Rome La Sapienza [Italy (IT)] – giovanni.vittorio.pallottino@roma1.infn.it Marek Trippenbach University of Warsaw [Poland (PL)] - Marek.Trippenbach@fuw.edu.pl Laura Tugulea (Coach) University of Bucharest [Romania (RU)] – ltugulea@gmail.com Vaggelis VitoratosUniversity of Patras [Greece (GR)] – vitorato@pelops.physics.upatras.gr Members of Working Group 2

3. WG2 investigates the interaction between research and education in physics. Nature of the interaction The education process is traditionally aimed at preparing the students for a career in research institutions and the research done by university lecturers influence their teaching. The students receive an imprinting for a research orientation. Mission of WG2

4. The professional activity of most of our graduates is outside of the academia, with a wide and increasing variety of destinations. Some of them not specifically related with what we mean by physical research. There is little mismatch, however, as we recognize that the research oriented education appears very valuable also for non the traditional work destinations, concerning the labor market in general. But something can and should be done to improve. Any mismatch?

5. 1) Establishment of a Wiki site Survey of existing possibilities for summer research trainings for physics students Presentation of this information in a Wiki site created and managed by prof. Jan Naudts, in cooperation with IAPS (International Association of Physics Students) The site is open to the physics students for consultation URL of the site: http://www.wn.ua.ac.be/trainingwiki More on that in the report of Jan Naudts right after this presentation Activities of WG2 during the year 2007

6. 2) Internal inquiry on two sets of questions A. How do students choose their research topics? B. Contacts between universities and local industries, and their satisfaction/dissatisfaction with our graduates Internal inquiry means that we addressed a short questionnaire to our colleagues of the STEPS/EUPEN collaboration in order to get qualified data and opinions We received 14 responses from 11 countries: (AU, BE, DE, FR, GB, GR, IT, NL, PL, RU), many with additional information and very useful remarks WG2 gratefully acknowledges the useful contributions of prof. John Dore Activities of WG2 during the year 2007

7. A. Questions on how students choose their research topics (transition from undergraduate (first cycle, bachelor) to graduate (second cycle, master) and choice of master thesis) A1. What mostly influences the students choice? A2. How do they obtain the required information? A3. What proportion of the first level graduates continue in the same institution? A4. How does prior knowledge and training contribute towards acceptance? A5. Which partners (industries, research labs, ...) are involved in the research training during the second cycle? B. Questions about the link of university and graduates with local industries B1. There is in your department a contact with the local industries (more generally, with the local labor market)? B2. Are the local industries actually interested in the physics graduates of your university? B3. How much they are satisfied with the competences and skills of the graduates? B4. Which competences do they expect from the graduates? B5. Which competences and skills do they find missing or weak? B6. Please mention one or more non traditional jobs in which some of your graduates are involved. The WG2 questionnaire 2007

8. A1. What mostly influences the students choice? On about equal footing: Personal curiosity and interest toward specific issues, mainly in new “hot fields” Attendance of specialized courses and personality of the teachers Employment opportunities, i.e. the perspective of future finding of a well paid job The results of an inquiry on that subject at the University of Groningen (from 175 students) indicate the following as most relevant (in a scale 0-10): Intrinsic interest for the field of research of the research group (7.3) Good contacts with (or fascination by) staff members of the particular research group (5.6) Good or seemingly good other future perspectives (4.0) Good contacts with students in the research group: 3.8 Answers on how students choose their research topics 1

9. A2. How do they obtain the required information? Here we obtained a variety of answers, ranging from formally organized sessions were the activities of the research groups are presented to the students (such as orientation days), to the consultation of list of research projects prepared by the Department, the websites of the research groups, informal talks with teachers and older students, … A3. What proportion of the first level graduates continue in the same institution? The proportion of the first level graduates continuing in the same institution is very different in the various universities. It ranges, in fact, from 5-10% in a few universities, to larger values in others, but mostly it is 90-100%. In some places, graduate students go elsewhere just because some areas (e.g. elementary particles or cosmology) are not covered. Answers on how students choose their research topics 2

10. A4. How does prior knowledge and training contribute towards acceptance? As for the admission to the graduate courses, the answers indicate that all or practically all of the first cycle graduates are admitted (in some countries all of the graduates are to be accepted, according to local laws). As a result, in general, prior knowledge and training contribute little to acceptance for the second level. In a few universities, however, there are admission exams on specialized topics for each Master program offered. Answers on how students choose their research topics 3

11. A5. Which partners (industries, research labs, ...) are involved in the research training during the second cycle? Most of the answers report a strong involvement of partners external to the universities, such as national or international research institutions, with which there are collaborations already established with the departments. But only a fraction of the respondents reports involvement of industrial partners; that in few places are instutionalized. For example in Lille “there is a short training period (2 months) in the industry during the 1st year and a long one (2 semesters half-time) in one of our research laboratories during the 2nd year”. In Groningen the second cycle of the Applied Physics curriculum requires an internship in an industrial laboratory. Answers on how students choose their research topics 4

12. B1. There is in your department a contact with the local industries (more generally, with the local labor market)? Five respondents report a permanent contact with industry in institutional form. Most of the other have only occasional contacts or no contacts at all. But there are indications of a general trend toward the establishment of permanent contacts, in some cases driven by the central authorities of the university. B2. Are the local industries actually interested in the physics graduates of your university? Here the majority of the answers reports a strong Yes. Others say that the interest of the industry only comes after they become aware of the existence and competence of Physics graduates. This is an interesting point to be furtherly elaborated. Answers on the links university/industries 1

13. B3. How much they are satisfied with the competences and skills of the graduates? Here again the majority of the answers reports a strong Yes. Which agrees with the other information available, including the inquiry from the university of Padova, presented in the 2006 Forum, and the more recent report from the Dutch Physical Society. B4. Which competences do they expect from the graduates? Mostly: problem solving and analytical thinking, mathematical skills, experimental skills, informatics knowledge. In addition prof. Titulaer reports that “Physicists are considered to be more innovative than engineers and better in handling “vaguely stated” problems than mathematicians or computer scientists. They have the reputation of being rather good at learning unfamiliar fields and handling longer term projects (rather high frustration tolerance)”. Answers on the links university/industries 2

14. B5. Which competences and skills do they find missing or weak? The main weaknesses reported are the following: business oriented skills, project management, working against deadlines. Which could be expected. Another competence often considered weak concerns the communication, oral and written. All of this, again, is in agreement with other inquiries. For example the report from the Dutch Physical Society, based on the responses from 118 employers, says that the competences they found that physics graduates are not sufficiently prepared for professional life (and the course programmes should pay more attention to) are the following, in order of decreasing importance: communicative competence, working in a planned fashion and project management, consultancy competences, commercial insight, ... Answers on the links university/industries 3

15. B6. Please mention one or more non traditional jobs in which some of your graduates are involved The list of the jobs mentioned by the respondents is extraordinarily rich and varied, sometimes unexpected. In addition to secondary school teaching and the standard research, development and professional activities in the information and communication area, in the medical sector and in general in the industry, new jobs are emerging in the financial sector such as in banks, stock exchanges, insurance companies. Some of the new activities reported are well related to the formation of a physicists, such as astronaut, technology consultant and broker, patent attorney, specialist about accidents, scientific investigators in the police corps, technology officer in the military, civil servants in the energy field, air traffic controller, television meteorologist, … Other activities are less related but still somehow connected, such as rock musician, publisher, manager of the work organization, graphical artist, Hollywood executive, … Examples of successful Physics alumni from the University of Strathclyde can be found at http://phys.strath.ac.uk/public/alumni/index.php Answers on the links university/industries 4

16. A. Choice of the research topics from the students The scenario is rather clear, maybe we could anticipate most of it. Examples of good practice on this matter have been reported, and it will certainly be useful if they can diffuse across universities and national borders. A few conclusions 1

17. B. Link with industries. The main conclusion is that the research imprinting received by our graduates means openness and versatility, which in addition to the basic culture in physics and mathematics, turns out to be advantageous in a large variety of fields. From the answers emerges however a situation which is rather inhomogeneous. Some universities clearly recognize that taking care of the future jobs of their graduates, outside of the traditional channels, is a constitutive part or their mission; as regards both the education of the physicists and the establishment of permanent institutional relations with the world of labor. Other universities think differently, or do not think at all, on that matter. This is due to change, of course, because in all of our countries the evaluation of the performance of the universities is gaining momentum and thus the orientation of the formation is to be checked in terms of the response of the labor market. In particular, the opinions of stakeholders such as the employers and the alumni are now required as strongly relevant. A few conclusions 2

18. A few final considerations The universities should act to improve the formation of the physicists in some specific directions, such as the communication skills, oral and written, and the attitude to work against deadlines. Both very important, too, as regards any serious research activity. The academy should make the industries, more generally the labor market, more and better aware of the skills and competences of the physics graduates. Perhaps this job could go through a clear definition of a general profile of the physicist. Which might be one of the next activities of WG2 of STEPS/EUPEN. Overall, our departments should recognize that their mission, in addition to perform high level research, is to contribute to the society by producing high quality graduates, able to foster and promote innovation in all the fields of society, according to the Lisbon strategy of EU. Final considerations