The UC Davis physics department is one of a few departments in the country that has a physics education research (PER) group. PER PhD students have the same basic requirements as all other physics PhD students including the same physics core classes, the same written preliminary exam, and a oral qualifying exam. For more information on the department's general requirements go here.

During the second year, PER students may take a varity of classes depending on their interests and needs. A typical student will take a number of courses in the Education Department and/or the statistics department depending on their interests and abilities. (Go here for the current UC Davis Education Department course list.)

After a student has passed the written preliminary examination, they will start preparing for their oral qualifying examination. Each student's qualifying exam is a talk organized by the student on their own particular research. The qualifying exam is usually taken in their third year of study.

UC Davis PER Graduate students are currently studying: graduate instructor training, graduate instructor-student classroom dynamics, undergraduate physics epistemologies, reformed graduate student education, reformed physics curiculum for undergraduate pysics majors, gender difference in undergraduate physics, and reformed "block curriculum" (math, chemistry, biology and physics) for freshman undergraduates. Research is not limited to these areas.

Please contact David Webb If you are interested in joining the PER group at UC Davis.