Life as a Physicist

Remember I posted about all those textbooks I head to read? I just looked at that picture in that post. If only the stack of textbooks had remained that small! Well, we have finally figured out what textbook to use for our next year’s introductory course. That was a lot of work. The committee was 9 people (imagine having to coordinate that!). It came down to Young vs Tipler. Tipler had a slight edge in the end.

This is big money for the publishers. I think we run about 1000 students a quarter through the course. My guess is between 1000 and 2000 of those textbooks are purchased every year. I’ve been on this committee before - but some things happened this year that I’d not seen before. For example - I got gifts. A starbucks card and some weird-o little wire sculpture. A friend of mine, who was the chair of another textbook selection committee was offered a nice lunch (he declined). I’m not sure of the ethics involved here — but it feels like it is getting close to the line!

Now, the only thing left is to get rid of all these textbooks!