Seattle Pacific University site leader Stamatis Vokos and students do a force-and-motion experiment.

 

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Seattle Pacific University Biographies

Lezlie Dewater, 2006-2009

My husband and I have been living in the suburbs of Seattle for nearly 30 years. We have been in the process of remodeling our home for nearly that same length of time. We are among the dwindling numbers of folks in our area who were actually born in Western Washington. We love the close proximity to lots of water and mountains. We have three grown daughters and two grandsons.

I have spent much of my teaching career in elementary schools in the Seattle Public Schools in spite of the fact that I was a French major planning to teach high school. Instead I started as a 2nd grade teacher and then changed positions numerous times to take assignments as an elementary science specialist, an intermediate classroom teacher, a science specialist, a science resource teacher, and an assistant science supervisor. More recently I spent 7 years with the Physics Education Group at the University of Washington where I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to co-instruct the three quarter physics course for pre-service secondary math and science teachers, to be part of the instructional staff for their 6-week summer institute in physics and physical science, and to help with the weekly tutorials for the calculus-based introductory physics course.

I returned to Seattle Public Schools to teach 5th grade in 2004/2005. It was amazing to get back in touch with the mind of 10 year olds and the demands of an elementary classroom teacher. This job never seems to get any easier, but is extremely rewarding. I would have stayed put in the elementary classroom, but Stamatis Vokos at Seattle Pacific University made me an offer I just could not refuse. At SPU this year, I was able to work with prospective elementary teachers in both a content course and a methods course. It was great to be working with the School of Education while being part of the Physics Department This ever-changing, ever-evolving career in teaching has taken me on many journeys. This coming year as a TIR at SPU promises to hold a few more surprises and challenges as well.

Sherm Williamson, 2007-2008

After teaching in the Physics (science) classroom for 34 years, I retired from the classroom but not from teaching Physics.  Once you have truly taught Physics, I feel that you can never stop.  After graduating from the University of Washington with a degree in Chemistry and minors in Math and Physics and beginning to teach in 1972, I had a defining teaching experience with Arnold Aarons and Jim Minstrell at an NSF summer course.  Based on this summer of study, I found that experiences need to be provided for students that create an understanding of Physics that they can explain to others. I also learned that teachers can learn so much from listening carefully to what students say and that their thinking should direct the steps in their learning.  This student centered education has been my focus ever since. 

My wife and I have both had the privilege of teaching in our local community of Bothell, Washington for our entire careers and have even worked in the schools that our two sons went through. Teaching students and families with which we had such close long-term relationships, only increased the intensity of the teaching experience for us.  Being a teaching family totally defined our lives until we retired.

Teaching students within my classroom was only one of three parts that I saw to improve Physics education for students.  Based on what was being taught as the standard Physics curriculum in the early 70’s, what was being taught needed to be changed and those who taught it needed help.  During my classroom career I worked to change what was taught and to whom it was taught.  I was able to change the direction for my building and eventually my district in developing a conceptual Physics first concept for all students.  Because of the need for qualified Physics teachers that such an extensive program demanded, I was then able to develop in-service and teacher development models to bring in more qualified Physics teachers to expand the program. 
In my later years of teaching and now in retirement, I have had the opportunity to work at Facet Innovations with Jim Minstrell on the development of Diagnoser, a web based formative assessment program for teaching Physics.  This has given me the opportunity to meet and work with many leaders in the field of research on Physics education and share with them the realities of Physics classrooms.  The result of the combination of classroom and research exposure has made me want to work more and more with new teachers and future teachers to help prepare them better.  Working now at Seattle Pacific University as a VMT (visiting master teacher) is providing that opportunity as well as still allowing me the pleasures of retirement travel and leisure.

B Lippitt
2008-2009

B is an extremely experienced science teacher having taught grades 2 through 12 since entering the teaching profession in 1974. For twenty of these years, B enjoyed being a Physics teacher, most of which was at Franklin High School in Seattle. Since retiring from teaching, B has been a staff member in the Center for Inquiry Science which is a division of the Seattle based Institute for Systems Biology. B completed his B.S. and Masters work at Duke University in Durham, N.C.