AGM – Saturday, 2010 May 08

By sgagan on May 11, 2010

Annual General Meeting 2010 took place in Langara College on May 8, 2010
On May 8, 2010, the British Columbia Section of the AAPT held its annual general meeting. The meeting was organized by BCAPT Executive Board under the leadership of the BCAPT President – Dan Phelps. The Department of Physics and Astronomy at Langara College hosted the Conference under the leadership of Don Hunter, Terry Coates, and the Department Chair – Robin Macqueen. It was a great opportunity for us to visit a beautiful campus of Langara College on a wonderful spring day. More than 35 physics educators from the Lower Mainland attended the meeting. The event was dedicated to exploring Quantum Computing. Two invited presentations by UBC Department of Physics and Astronomy faculty member, Dr. Tzu-Chieh Wei, and by the research scientist from the Vancouver company D-Wave Systems Inc., Dr. Mohammad Amin, helped the attendees to find out what is happening in the world of quantum computing. The talks were very well received and followed by a number of questions. This was a very special meeting for our section as we had a great reason to celebrate: Our own “Curmudgeon in Residence” (see photos below), Professor Emeritus of Physics from Simon Fraser University, Dr. Leigh Palmer has his 75th birthday. We all celebrated Leigh’s birthday by having a very special cake presented to Leigh by another star of our section – Mr. Peter Hopkinson. Both Leigh and Peter have been with the BC APT since its inception in 1984 (Leigh Palmer was one among the key physics teachers who helped establish our section) and Peter who has been an active section member for many years has also been a section representative. Leigh Palmer’s contributions to the section are numerous and even during his birthday celebration he agreed to present a very exciting talk titled “Birefrigence, sereopsis, and ‘Avatar’ – physics at the movies”. At the end of the talk he gave gifts to the audience – 3-D glasses. Leigh’s way of presenting is always engaging and interesting. With his many years of experience of teaching physics and doing physics research (his area of expertise is Low Temperature experimental physics), Leigh’s knowledge is unlimited, like his enthusiasm for physics and passion for physics teaching. He always contributes to the BC-APT listserve and is ready to help every new and experienced teacher.

During the Conference we held an Annual General Meeting and voted for the new BC APT Executive Board. The list of the New Executive Board members is listed on the BCAPT and AAPT web sites.

Peter Hopkinson congratulates Leigh Palmer with his 75th Birthday

Peter Hopkinson congratulates Leigh Palmer with his 75th Birthday

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