High School Graduation Mathematics Requirements

Algebra I = CA, FL, GA, IN, MS, NC, ND, NH, NM, OK, SD
Geometry = AL, IL, KY, MD
Algebra II = AR, MI, DE, LA, TN, VA
The remaining states = zippo

http://www.mathcurriculumcenter.org/PDFS/HSreport.pdf

College Required Reading Lists

The National Association of Scholars released a report on the books that colleges are requiring their incoming freshmen to read.  Leaving aside the usual liberal bias debate, their incontrovertible conclusion is that the list is pitched at an intellectual level well below what should be expected of college freshmen and it is hard to find anything on the list that poses even a modest intellectual challenge to the average reader.

Here's the list ... see for yourself ...

1. A Good Fall Jin, Ha
2. A Home on the Field: How One Championship Soccer Team Inspires Hope for the Revival of Small Town America Cuadros, Paul
3. A Hope in the Unseen: An American Odyssey from the Inner City to the Ivy League Suskind, Ron
4. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier Beah, Ishmael
5. A Pearl in the Storm: How I Found My Heart in the Middle of the Ocean McClure, Tori Murden
6. A Thousand Splendid Suns Hosseini, Khaled
7. A Whole New Mind: Moving from the Information Age to the Conceptual Age Pink, Daniel
8. A.D.: New Orleans After the Deluge Neufeld, Josh
9. Acts of Faith: The Story of an American Muslim, the Struggle for the Soul of a Generation Patel, Eboo
10. Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic De Graaf, John and David Wann and Thomas H. Naylor
11. An Ordinary Man Rusesabagina, Paul
12. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle Kingsolver, Barbara
13. Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress Sijie, Dai
14. Blink: the Power of Thinking Without Thinking Gladwell, Malcolm
15. Blonde Roots Evaristo, Bernardine
16. Blue Hole Back Home Lake, Joy Jordan
17. Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It Royte, Elizabeth
18. Brooklyn: A Novel Tóibín, Colm
19. Brother, I'm Dying Danticat, Edwige
20. Catfish and Mandala: A Two-Wheeled Voyage Through the Landscape and Memory of Vietnam Pham, Andrew X.
21. China Road: A Journey into the Future of a Rising Power Gifford, Rob
22. China's Son: Growing Up in the Cultural Revolution Chen, Da
23. Cion Mda, Zakes
24. Confessions of a Radical Industrialist: Profits, People, Purpose--Doing Business by Respecting the Earth Anderson, Ray C.
25. Copenhagen Frayn, Michael
26. Cosmopolitanism: Ethics in a World of Strangers Appiah, Kwame Anthony
27. Creating a World Without Poverty: Social Business and the Future of Capitalism Yunus, Muhammad
28. Crossing into America: the New Literature of Immigration Mendoza, Louis and Subramanian Shankar, eds.
29. Cry, the Beloved Country Paton, Alan
30. Day of the Locust West, Nathanael
31. Dead Man Walking: An Eyewitness Account Of The Death Penalty In The United States Prejean, Helen
32. Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future McKibben, Bill
33. Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Dick, Philip K.
34. Dreams from My Father Obama, Barack
35. Ecology of a Cracker Childhood Ray, Janisse
36. Einstein's Dreams Lightman, Alan
37. Enrique's Journey Nazario, Sonia
38. Escape from Slavery: The True Story of My Ten Years in Captivity and My Journey to Freedom in America Bok, Francis
39. Everything Matters Currie, Ron Jr.
40. Farewell, My Subaru: An Epic Adventure in Local Living Fine, Doug
41. Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal Schlosser, Eric
42. Field Notes from a Catastrophe: Man, Nature, and Climate Change Kolbert, Elizabeth
43. Flight Alexie, Sherman
44. Frankenstein Shelley, Mary
45. Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything Levitt, Steven D. and Stephen J. Dubner
46. Freedom Writers Diary Gruwell, Erin
47. Friday Night Lights Bissinger, H.G.
48. Funny in Farsi: A Memoir of Growing Up Iranian in America Dumas, Firoozeh
49. Gone Tomorrow: The Hidden Life of Garbage Rogers, Heather
50. Half of a Yellow Sun Adichie, Chimamanda Ngozi
51. Half the Sky Kristof, Nicholas D. and Sheryl WuDunn
52. Here, Bullet Turner, Brian
53. Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet Ford, Jamie
54. Hunger Chang, Lan Samantha
55. In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto Pollan, Michael
56. Into the Wild Krakauer, John
57. Ishmael: An Adventure of the Mind and Spirit Quinn, Daniel
58. It's Kind of a Funny Story Vizzini, Ned
59. Letters to a Young Brother: MANifest Your Destiny Harper, Hill
60. Light and Darkness Anthology Anthology
61. Listening is an Act of Love: A Celebration of American Life from the StoryCorps Project Isay, Dave
62. Make the Impossible Possible: One Man's Crusade to Inspire Others to Dream Bigger and Achieve the Extraordinary Strickland, Bill
63. Man, Controller of the Universe Rivera, Diego
64. Maus Spiegelman, Art
65. Me Talk Pretty One Day Sedaris, David
66. Miracle in the Andes Parrado, Nando
67. Mountains Beyond Mountains Kidder, Tracy
68. Mudbound Jordan, Hillary
69. Muskingum College (History Series) Giffen, Heather, William Kerrigan and R. Worbs
70. My Own Country: A Doctor's Story Verghese, Abraham
71. Nickel and Dimed: On Not Getting By in America Ehrenreich, Barbara
72. No Impact Man Beavan, Colin
73. Not for Sale: The Return of the Global Slave Trade--and How We Can Fight It Batstone, David
74. Outcasts United: A Refugee Team, an American Town St. John, Warren
75. Outliers: The Story of Success Gladwell, Malcolm
76. Peace Like a River Enger, Leif
77. Persepolis Satrapi, Marjane
78. Picking Cotton: Our Memoir of Injustice and Redemption Thompson-Cannino, Jennifer and Ronald Cotton and Erin Torneo
79. Plenty Enough Suck to Go Around Wagner, Cheryl
80. Plenty: Eating Locally on the 100-Mile Diet Mackinnon, James & Alisa Smith
81. Regeneration Barker, Pat
82. Reinventing Knowledge: From Alexandria to the Internet McNeely, Ian F. with Lisa Wolverton
83. Rescue Warriors: The U.S. Coast Guard, America’s Forgotten Heroes Helvarg, David
84. RFK In the Land of Apartheid Shore, Larry
85. Rock, Paper, Scissors: Game Theory in Everyday Life Fisher, Len
86. Rooftops of Tehran Seraji, Mahbod
87. Scratch Beginnings: Me, $25, And The Search For The American Dream Shephard, Adam
88. Searching for God Knows What Miller, Donald
89. Secret Daughter, a Mixed-Race Daughter and the Mother Who Gave Her Away Cross, June
90. Song Yet Sung McBride, James
91. Soul of a Citizen: Living with Conviction in a Cynical Time Loeb, Paul Rogat
92. Sounds of the River Chen, Da
93. Stones Into Schools: Promoting Peace with Books, Not Bombs, in Afghanistan and Pakistan Mortenson, Greg
94. Strange as This Weather Has Been Pancake, Ann
95. Strength in What Remains Kidder, Tracy
96. Telex from Cuba Kushner, Rachel
97. The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian Alexie, Sherman
98. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Twain, Mark
99. The Alchemist Coelho, Paulo
100. The Bean Trees Kingsolver, Barbara
101. The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2009 Eggers, Dave
102. The Bitter Sea: Coming of Age in a China Before Mao Li, Charles
103. The Blue Sweater Novogratz, Jacqueline
104. The Botany of Desire: A Plant's-Eye View of the World Pollan, Michael
105. The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind Kamkwamba, William and Bryan Mealer
106. The Brief History of the Dead Brockmeier, Kevin
107. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao Diaz, Junot
108. The Cathedral Within Shore, Bill
109. The Chris Farley Show: A Biography in Three Acts Farley, Tom Jr. and Tanner Colby
110. The Color of Water: A Black Man’s Tribute to His White Mother McBride, James
111. The Colors of the Mountain Chen, Da
112. The Communist Manifesto Marx, Karl
113. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time Haddon, Mark
114. The Devil's Highway Urrea, Luis Alberto
115. The Dew Breaker Danticat, Edwige
116. The DNA Age Harmon, Amy
117. The End of the Spear Saint, Steve
118. The Family Bible Delbridge, Melissa
119. The Geography of Bliss Weiner, Eric
120. The Glass Castle Walls, Jeannette
121. The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society Shaffer, Mary Ann and Annie Barrows
122. The Heart is a Lonely Hunter McCullers, Carson
123. The House on Mango Street Cisneros, Sandra
124. The Housekeeper and the Professor: A Novel Ogawa, Yoko
125. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks Skloot, Rebecca
126. The Kite Runner Hosseini, Khaled
127. The Last Lecture Pausch, Randy & Jeffrey Zaslow
128. The Latehomecomer: A Hmong Family Memoir Yang, Kao Kalia
129. The Learners Kidd, Chip
130. The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil Zimbardo, Phillip
131. The Maltese Falcon Hammett, Dashiell
132. The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals Pollan, Michael
133. The Open Road: The Global Journey of the Fourteenth Dalai Lama Iyer, Pico
134. The Pact: Three Young Men Make a Promise and Fulfill a Dream Davis, Sampson and George Jenkins and Rameck Hunt
135. The Perks of Being a Wallflower Chbosky, Stephen
136. The Poe Shadow Pearl, Matthew
137. The Reluctant Fundamentalist Hamid, Mohsin
138. The Road of Lost Innocence Mam, Somaly
139. The Short Bus: A Journey Beyond Normal Mooney, Jonathan
140. The Soloist Lopez, Steve
141. The Sparrow Russell, Mary Doria
142. The Spirit Catches You and You Fall Down: a Hmong Child, Her American Doctors, and the Collision of Two Cultures Fadiman, Anne
143. The Things They Carried O'Brien, Tim
144. The Translator: A Tribesman’s Memoir of Darfur Hari, Daoud
145. The Wal-Mart Effect: How the World’s Most Powerful Company Really Works – and How It’s Transforming the American Economy Fishman, Charles
146. The White Tiger Adiga, Aravind
147. The World Without Us Weisman, Alan
148. The Young and the Digital: What the Migration to Social Network Sites, Games, and Anytime, Anywhere Media Means for Our Future Watkins, S. Craig
149. These Shining Lives Marnich, Melanie
150. This I Believe II: More Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women Allison, Jay and Dan Gediman
151. This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women Allison, Jay and Dan Gediman
152. Three Cups of Tea Mortenson, Greg and David Oliver Relin
153. Tracking Desire: A Journey After Swallow-Tailed Kites Cerulean, Susan
154. True Enough: Learning to Live in a Post-Fact Society Manjoo, Farhad
155. Under a Papery Roof: A Memoir About Life in Post-Revolutionary Iran and Exile Sanati, Panteha
156. Walden Thoreau, Henry David
157. What is the What Eggers, Dave
158. When the Emperor Was Divine Otsuka, Julie
159. Where Men Win Glory: The Odyssey of Pat Tillman Krakauer, John
160. Where We Stand: Class Matters hooks, bell
161. Who Controls the Internet? Illusions of a Borderless World Goldsmith, Jack and Tim Wu
162. Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? Tatum, Beverly Daniel
163. Will This Be on the Test? Anthology
164. Wish You Well Baldacci, David
165. Work Hard. Be Nice.: How Two Inspired Teachers Created the Most Promising Schools in America Mathews, Jay
166. You Are Not a Gadget: A Manifesto Lanier, Jaron
167. Your Inner Fish: A Journey into the 3.5-Billion-Year History of the Human Body Shubin, Neil
168. Zeitoun Eggers, Dave
169. 1491: New Revelations of the Americas Before Columbus
170. 1 Dead in Attic: After Katrina Rose, Chris

Save Are Teachers

Perhaps your teachers are not worth saving. Also, perhaps you should understand the issues before you protest.

Tough guys don't do math. Tough guys fry chicken for a living.

RIP Jaime Escalante, now you have a ticket to see the show.
Thank you!

Claudia: You're worried that we'll screw up royally tomorrow, aren't you?
Jaime Escalante: Tomorrow's another day. I'm worried you're gonna screw up the rest of your lives.

Jaime Escalante: Do you want me to do it for you?
Pancho: Yes.
Jaime Escalante: You're supposed to say no.

Jaime Escalante: You know the times tables?
Thug: I know the ones, the twos...the threes (shows him The Finger)
Jaime Escalante: (whispering) Ahhh The Fingerman ehh? I am The Fingerman too; you know what I can do? I can multiply by nine. Three times nine? (starts counting with his fingers) one... two... three, what do you got? (shows fingers) twenty seven; six times nine, one... two... three... four... five... six, what do you got? (shows fingers again) fifty four; how about something more difficult? How about eight times nine? one... two... three... four... five... six... seven... eight, what do you got? (shows fingers a third time) seventy two.

Widespread Cheating on Georgia's CRCT

This article provides a list of all the schools that were flagged because more than 25% of classrooms had answer sheets with wrong-to-right changes in excess of three standard deviations above the norm. Forty-three Atlanta Public Schools are on the list.

Exceeding three standard deviations is expected to happen only in 0.15% of the cases, so the state has clearly set an extremely conservative rule in order to avoid unfairly tainting any school's reputation. The odds of hitting this rule without there being cheating in at least some of that 25% of classrooms is literally infinitesimal (so small as to be unmeasurable).

And even more astounding, there are schools on the list where 80%+ of classrooms exceeded this amount. ALL FOUR of these were within the Atlanta Public Schools system.

* Frank L Stanton Elementary, 83.3%

* Peyton Forest Elementary, 86.1%

* Gideons Elementary, 88.4%

* Parks Middle, 89.5%

With school rates this insanely high it strains credibility that these were individual teachers acting alone, and with 58% of all elementary schools in Atlanta Public Schools implicated it strains credibility that these were individual principals acting alone. Numbers like this can only point to the top of the system's administration. Either the superintendent Beverly Hall was in on it or she is a blithering idiot of monumental proportions. Either way, she has to go. Now!

Talk about bad judgement

Selling candy didn't raise much money last year, so a Goldsboro middle school tried selling grades. However, the fundraiser came to an abrupt halt today after a story in The News & Observer raised concerns about the practice of selling grades. Wayne County school administrators stopped the fundraiser, issuing a statement this morning. "Yesterday afternoon, the district administration met with [Rosewood Middle School principal] Mrs. Shepherd and directed the the following actions be taken: (1) the fundraiser will be immediately stopped; (2) no extra grade credit will be issued that may have resulted from donations; and (3) beginning November 12, all donations will be returned." A $20 donation to Rosewood Middle School would have gotten a student 20 test points - 10 extra points on two tests of the student's choosing. That could raise a B to an A, or a failing grade to a D.

Is our teachers learning?

The Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education is releasing the results Tuesday. They say that only 27% of the more than 600 candidates who took the state elementary school teacher’s licensing exam passed. Education Commissioner Mitchell Chester was not surprised by the results. He told the Boston Globe that these results indicate that many students are not receiving an adequate math education. Tom Scott, executive director of the Massachusetts Association of School Superintendents, says "The high failure rate puts a shining light on a deficiency in teacher-prep programs."

Zeros Aren't Permitted

What can I possibly say? Just read for yourselves.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_ENUS308&q=zeros+aren%27t+permitted&btnG=Search

Two Education Pieces in Today's AJC

I was a curious student early in high school, anxious to learn more about the world. But I had to hold back to wait for slower learners. All children should have the option of getting a good education. But an education that is watered down so it can be taught to all kids produces graduates with a minimal education. I’m not curious anymore. Will I now be just another drone who graduates from UGA with honors because I am a good test taker? Will this skill be beneficial to this country’s future? If so, I will do well.

Today’s students are a “lost generation," unfortunately lost in the hard glare of technology, blinded by the promise of cyber salvation on a distracted globe. What I used to take for granted — an engaged core of students who could think, read and write—has morphed into an assembly line of packaged minds fresh off the factory farm of iPod, “American Idol” and Facebook, a vast herd of electronic sheep stuffed with fast facts and establishment filler.

Obama's College Proposal

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2009/02/25/obama

On grading...

“Shouldn’t effort count for something?” We all know students who attend every class and turn in every assignment yet still do poorly, sometimes because they don’t test well or because they didn’t have the prerequisites to succeed in the course. Such students may not deserve to fail, but should they earn an A for their effort? And what about the students who are so far ahead of their peers that they can goof off in class, blow off homework and yet ace the midterm and final. Do they merit an A? Shouldn’t a student earn credit for showing up on time, for being respectful of the teacher and peers and for trying, even when the results fall short?

I once taught a cocky 20-year-old who’d been suspended from his prestigious university and ended up in my evening class at a community college in Florida, where the average student was about 60. The young man had already taken a similar course at his former school, so he was disgruntled to be repeating the same material and sitting next to classmates wearing orthotics. His displeasure showed. I gave him the A, but it hurt. On the other side of the grading equation, I’ve taught diligent students who respected their classmates, arrived early, stayed late, but flubbed the tests, usually because they entered college without the necessary fundamentals.

The author somehow misses the obviousness of an idea that she actually includes in her text. Shouldn't grades represent what you know? How did we get away from the idea that a grade represents what you have mastered of the subject matter at hand, nothing more and nothing less?

Sweating the small stuff

The Weekly Standard recently reviewed this book; a great read for anybody interested in seeing what actually works. The book also explains why we see more of what doesn't work instead of what does work...

The three legs of the education establishment tripod--teacher unions, education schools, and the district bureaucracy--are all unlikely to embrace key elements that make paternalistic schools work. Requiring teachers to work longer days and years would violate union contracts. So would allowing principals to handpick teachers (who may or may not be certified), evaluate and pay instructors based on their effectiveness, and fire those who are not successful in the classroom. Frequent testing, teacher-directed instruction, and flunking students who fail to meet academic standards are all unpopular at schools of education. District bureaucrats, meanwhile, are loath to grant individual schools the freedom to do things differently.

Is college too much to ask?

Charles Murray (of The Bell Curve fame): While half of our high school graduates march off to four-year colleges each year, only about 10% meet the intellectual benchmark suggested by College Board data - at least an 1180 on the SAT math and verbal tests - to master traditional college-level work. Murray contends that it’s cruel to steer kids to college when most lack the intellectual chops to handle it and will flounder. America holds a romanticized view of education, he says, and propagates a fairy tale, unsubstantiated by the hard truths of inborn abilities, that students are limited only by their ambition and will. Murray claims that the most schools can do is cause children who are intellectually below average - by definition about half of all kids - to be a little less below average. Even the best teachers under the best conditions cannot overcome the limits set by a child’s own cognitive abilities. “The 9-year-old who has trouble sounding out simple words and his classmate who is reading ‘A Tale of Two Cities’ for fun sit in the same classroom day after miserable day, the one so frustrated by tasks he cannot do and the other so bored that both are near tears.”

In countering Murray, Anthony Carnevale (director of Georgetown's Center on Education and the Workforce) attacked his major premise, “that there is something in each of us that is innate and fixed, that doesn’t change over time. … It is true that cognitive ability affects people’s prospect in life, but it’s also true that people’s prospects affect cognitive ability.” In looking at high-scoring first-graders across incomes, Carnevale says 75% of the more affluent kids will still test high in fifth grade, compared to only 45% of the poorer students. That gap is not created by some inherent deficit in the children, he says, but to the quality of the educational opportunities afforded the two groups.

http://www.ajc.com/search/content/opinion/stories/2008/12/15/learned.html

Carnevale (like most researchers looking at similar results) completely miss the point. They are confusing cause and effect. The largest factor influencing the facts that the affluent parents are affluent and the poor parents are poor is the cognitive ability of the parents, which IS hereditary. Therefore, the primary reason that financially disadvantaged students underperform is NOT financial; that is simply a side effect of the fact that they are below average on the cognitive ability scale.

WSJ Editorial on Alternative Certification

Like all unions, teachers unions have a vested interest in restricting the labor supply to reduce job competition. Traditional state certification rules help to limit the supply of "certified" teachers. But a new study suggests that such requirements also hinder student learning. Harvard researchers Paul Peterson and Daniel Nadler compared states that have genuine alternative certification with those that have it in name only. And they found that between 2003 and 2007 students in states with a real alternative pathway to teaching gained more on the National Assessment of Educational Progress (a federal standardized test) than did students in other states.

Obama's Education Transition Advisor

Linda Darling-Hammond, a Stanford University education professor and one of Obama’s advisors, will head the Education Department transition team that is tasked with drafting policy for the incoming administration. Darling-Hammond is a self-described advocate of “progressive” education, the methods of which she believes are “grounded in a deep sense of curricular intentions, arise from compelling questions, and include rigorous intellectual challenges such as critical thinking and problem solving across disciplines.” The best progressive educators “engage in a dialectic between the subject and the student” and in so doing, the student “is constantly moved to a broader and more thoughtful place in the curriculum.”

What can your humble servant possibly add to that towering monument of edu-speak?

88% of DC 8th-graders can't read

Well, not really, although that is the sensationalist headline that CNN used. If you actually watch the news clip the actual statistic is that only 12% of eighth graders are proficient at the eighth grade level per NAEP exams (and only 8% in math). Isn't that bad enough without a misleading headline?

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2008/09/07/bolduan.fixing.dc.schools.cnn

Fake Diploma Mill Degrees

http://spotlight.encarta.msn.com/Features/

One fact from the article jumped out at me.

"The number of fake doctorates sold each year is in the range of 50,000 to 60,000," states John Bear, author of "Bear's Guide to Earning Degrees by Distance Learning." "The number of real Ph.D.s awarded is around 40,000."

Bear goes on to say "In America right now, more than half of all the Ph.D.s are fake." but that is not correct. I assume he meant more than half of all PhDs issued each year are fake.

Wall Street Looks Abroad

Senior executives at some of the largest U.S. corporations say stringent immigration policies are hurting New York's ability to compete with other financial centers. Investment bank officials say visa issues have forced them to move jobs to other countries. "New York's ability to compete with London, which has much more open immigration, or with the emerging financial capitals in Asia and the Middle East, depends on mobility of talent," said Kathryn Wylde, president of Partnership for New York City.

Source: NYT

Now even Wall Street claims it can't find talent, another chink in our educational armor.

Georgia Tech employee stole $350,000 in grant funds

Discussion of Physics Education Major

Same idea, for the physics ed major now...

Requirement: A minimum of 25 hours, selected from the following list:
AST 3033 Recent Advances in Astronomy and Cosmology
ISC 3121 Science, Technology, and Society
PHY 2048C General Physics A
PHY 2049C General Physics B
PHY 3101 Intermediate Modern Physics
PHY 3221 Intermediate Mechanics
MAP 2302 Differential Equations or MAP 3305 Engineering Mathematics
PHY 3424 Optics
PHY 3802L Intermediate Laboratory
PHY 4040C Physics of the 20th Century
PHY 4323 Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism
PHZ 3113 Mathematical Physics

Of course, this looks quite reasonable on paper. The somewhat low 25 credit requirement is due to the fact that the major wants to accommodate introductory chemistry and biology sequences. But the first problem is that General Physics eats up 10 of the 25 credits. Then physics ed majors stay away from classes that physics majors take, so you end up with the following very unreasonable collection of courses:

PHY 2048C-2049C General Physics A&B (10)
PHY 3424 Optics (3)
AST 3033 Recent Advances in Astronomy and Cosmology (3)
ISC 3121 Science, Technology, and Society (3)
PHY 3101 Intermediate Modern Physics (3)
PHY 3802L Intermediate Laboratory (3)

Here's how I would toughen this up...

1) Given how often biology, chemistry and physics teachers end up teaching each others' classes, I agree that the 25 credit limit is appropriate and will work within its confines

However...

2) Physics majors have to take General Physics as a lower division prerequisite; I see no reason why physics ed majors could not do the same.

3) Drop the AST and ISC courses. No question. There's simply no room for this. Drop the Physics of the 20th Century course too; it doesn't count for physics majors - too fluffy.

4) This removes the elective nature of the existing list. Modern Physics, Intermediate Mechanics, Differential Equations / Engineering Mathematics, Intermediate Electricity & Magnetism, Mathematical Physics and Optics should all be required. But since this is just six courses, I have actually opened up space for two electives.

So we end up with the following eminently reasonable collection of courses:

PHY 2048C-2049C General Physics A&B (prerequisite)
PHY 3424 Optics (3)
PHY 3101 Intermediate Modern Physics (3)
PHY 3221 Intermediate Mechanics (3)
MAP 2302 Differential Equations or MAP 3305 Engineering Mathematics (3)
PHY 4323 Intermediate Electricity and Magnetism (3)
PHZ 3113 Mathematical Physics (3)
Two electives selected from courses that satisfy physics major requirements (6)

And I've even saved a credit. My proposed program requires 24 credits instead of 25.