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White House Unveils Partnership To Boost Quantum Science Education (reuters.com) 67

Posted by msmash from the moving-forward dept.
The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy said on Wednesday the Trump administration is launching a national education partnership to expand access to K-12 quantum information science (QIS) education with major companies and research institutions. From a report: The public-private initiative with the National Science Foundation includes Amazon's Amazon Web Services, Boeing, Alphabet's Google, IBM Corp, Lockheed Martin, Microsoft, the University of Illinois and University of Chicago. The National Science Foundation is also awarding $1 million to QIS education. The initiative is designed in part to help introduce students to quantum information themes before college.
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White House Unveils Partnership To Boost Quantum Science Education More

White House Unveils Partnership To Boost Quantum Science Education

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  • hilarious (Score:5, Insightful)

    by iggymanz ( 596061 ) on Wednesday August 05, 2020 @10:35AM (#60369189)

    How about instead focus on the building blocks in K-12, there are many math and physics concepts needed to understand quantum theory let alone quantum information theory.

    • Re:hilarious (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jellomizer ( 103300 ) on Wednesday August 05, 2020 @11:05AM (#60369293)

      A long time ago, my High School (grades 9-12) had about 600 students in total. (we had a low dropout rate)
      For students who decided to focus on math and science. Nearly all of them had Taken Algebra I, II (as they were required for graduation), about 400 student taken Geominitry (Required for a Regents Diploma (It just looks better to college, or so they said)) About 200 students had taken Pre-Calc, Only 100 students had taken Calculus. We had about 5 Students who taken College Classes in Calc II, and One student by his sophomore year had completed all the required Math courses for an Undergrad in math (At the time I would have really hated him, if he wasn't a nice guy) .

      For the students who took Calculus in High School took it again college (if their major required it), Because they often felt that they didn't really grasp the topic the first time, other who took in for the first time in college, will often take it again the next semester for the same reason.

      Quantum Physics and Science is really an advanced field of study. Not really apt for K-12 Education, other than some preliminary exposure to it. And I feel schools should still focus on getting basics of Science and Math down so they are prepped for college and further learning, vs thinking a High School Diploma will get them a job doing anything in Quantum Science.

      • Not hilarious and not so advanced ... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by dogsbreath ( 730413 ) on Wednesday August 05, 2020 @12:11PM (#60369507)

        Depends on how it is taught. Quantum mechanics concepts are no different than gravity or magnetism, both of which are in the mainstream curriculum or at least where I live outside of the US of A. Grade 12 chemistry is probably more difficult.

        The highest math required is simple addition and subtraction along with very basic algebra. Advanced calculus is not required, although an open mind an ability to reason logically are definite assets.

        Entanglement experiments are well within the capability of a high school science lab if funding is provided for specialized items. Current cost to demo Bell's inequality is about USD 15000 per set up and could easily be pushed down.

        The result would be a generation of students who regard quantum mechanics as no more weird than satellites orbiting Earth or compasses that point North/South. IMHO this would be a better result than continued widespread belief that quantum mechanics concepts are some kind of spooky voodoo.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Tablizer ( 95088 )

          better result than continued widespread belief that quantum mechanics concepts are some kind of spooky voodoo.

          They are spooky voodoo. Even the experts are baffled. When the best fitting-models are multi-verses, you gotta scratch your head. However, it is spooky voodooo that does have some observable patterns, and that's why science can study it to some degree.

          • Re: (Score:1)

            by Tablizer ( 95088 )

            Correction, should be "best-fitting models".

          • Gravity is pretty much just as strange yet we don't regard it as magic.

            Relativity is totally weird but not magic.

            The main reason most of us are accepting of such things is that it is ubiquitously observed, measured, discussed, and taught.

            Being "baffled", that is: not having a complete understanding, is not a basis for considering observable phenomena to be voodoo or spooky.

            • Re: (Score:1)

              by Tablizer ( 95088 )

              The others are just forces that pull, push, or distort the shape of things. Quantum has a crazy probabilistic "nonsense" to it.

      • Part of the reason quantum physics is so weird is because it doesn't follow the rules which govern our everyday macroscopic reality. Relativity has the same problem, where how things behave near the speed of light are just so weird and outside of our everyday realm of experience (aka Newtonian physics), that it takes a while to wrap your heard around it.

        So I do think there's some benefit to introducing these concepts earlier in school. Younger children who haven't yet formed a model in their heads for

        • However I think the elementary level can also teach wrong assumptions.

          Eg. On Slashdot when ever they talk about Quantum Entanglement for Secure Communication, there is always someone who thinks the actual data will be sent faster than light from one computer to the next. While it is more of a case it is a perfectly in sync random number generator, who people who actually know quantum physics will say to me, that I still don't know what I am talking about.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by lgw ( 121541 )

        There's lots of stuff a high school physics class can do to teach the basics of quantum mechanics without much math at all. Jst some simple experiments that show that people aren't just making up nonsense with this QM stuff. That it's the universe that's crazy, not the scientists.

        For example, with 3 polarizing filters you can really surprise people. Hardly an expensive or elaborate setup. Hold two filters aligned. The light gets through. Hold them at 90 degrees. Solid black. Now stick a filter betwe

    • At this point I'd prefer they focus their scientific efforts on understanding basic statistics and epidemiology rather than quantum mechanics.

      • That's pretty advanced for the American public. How about teaching high schoolers to use those toys where you fit different shaped blocks through holes.

        Then maybe you'd have a society where people could understand that air molecules can fit through a mask and virii cannot.

        • Then maybe you'd have a society where people could understand that air molecules can fit through a mask and virii cannot.

          I see you've failed to grasp basic concepts in biology/biochemistry, statistics, physics, and English with that statement. Congratulations.

    • Exactly! Let's teach kids about quantum entanglement before they understand what an equation is.

  • If the president can actually define quantum accurately without looking it up.

    • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

      by Tablizer ( 95088 )

      That something can be in two states at the same time is normal to him.

      • But when you open his skull, is his brain dead or alive?

        I said Schroedinger, not scrotum.

    • Why bother he will only label your sources with the correct information as Fake News. A book written 50 years ago seem to have the precognition that he will be President of the united states and would have to be published just to make him look bad.

    • If the president can actually define quantum accurately without looking it up.

      If the president can actually define quantum accurately even with someone whispering the answer in his ear in real-time. FTFY

    • Of course he can; he's the best at quantum.

    • Maybe educated, maybe not, but you can't tell until you look inside the box.

  • When I was in school in 1-8 we only started learning on the basics of atomic theory and didn't get a full physics lesson until junior year in HS. Quantum theory is stuff that you can pepper in around other science in that time but this seems rather pointless now. We have far more important things to teach kids in this timeframe. How to read and interpret statistics properly, basic critical thinking and logic (this is overlooked I feel and could definitely fill an entire semester, philosophy of knowledge and the methods around it), kids should probably be taught basic financial information as well, how interest rates work, how the economy operates etc. Lot's of practical things before we get into quantum science.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by DarkOx ( 621550 )

      I agree. You can't really understand QM at any level until you have some statistics and math skills. We have people in this country running around insisting that math is racist, and skills beyond algebra II are not relevant.

      This is really irreconcilable with the notion that anyone needs to know anything about QM or even how to spell it. Virtually every 99.9% of the population encounters and deals with is fully explained or adequately approximated by models at more macro than quantum level. Having the skill

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion

      • There is a third state, what I call the USB state, where you have to try three times to get the right answer

        • It doesn't matter how many times you flip it over and try.

          You still have to turn over the machine, look at the stupid thing for the quantum wave to collapse and only then can you successfully connect your USB device.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      When I was in school in 1-8 we only started learning on the basics of atomic theory and didn't get a full physics lesson until junior year in HS.

      Sorry to be the one to break it to you, but you never got a "full physics lesson". As you go further and further in studying physics you get to a point where they basically say "everything we've ever taught you about physics is wrong, we just made it up because it's a pretty model that's easier for the dumb masses to understand, here is the real picture". A

      • Thanks Mr. Iamverysmart for elucidating nothing at all. What i obviously meant was there was no full year of physics until i got to junior year. Freshman HS = Biology, Sophmore HS = Chemistry, Junior HS = Physics. Sorry if 17 year old's were not tackling string and M theories and getting into the philosophical understanding of how we might all be in a simulation and our brains cannot comprehend those things. To some people understanding the math behind a lever is still useful.

  • Let me sum up the conservative science curriculum real quick:

    Creationism is an alternate scientific explanation for the creation of the universe;
    The Earth is 6000 years old;
    Human beings co-existed with the dinosaurs;
    Climate change is a liberal hoax by an international conglomerate of evil scientists to suck all your tax money;
    Evolution is a liberal hoax blah blah blah you know the drill;
    Coronaviruses just go away by themselves;
    Alternate facts exist.

    Need I say more ?

  • Kindergarteners inherently know quantum mechanics (Score:5, Funny)

    by Aristos Mazer ( 181252 ) on Wednesday August 05, 2020 @11:26AM (#60369395)

    I used to teach in elementary school. All kindergarteners have the ability to be in multiple places at once. They can move simultaneously as a particle, bouncing off of things and breaking whatever isn't nailed down, and as a wave, sweeping a far greater range of destruction than can be accounted for by the size of the particle. And any dirt or disease that gets on one is immediately communicated to all the others through entanglement.
     
    We don't need to teach them anything. What we need is to keep them from forgetting it as they get older.

  • in your press conferences and then somehow make up for it by paying for schools.

    science is not just a bunch of classes. it's a philosophy and a way of looking at the world.

    if you say things like numbers don't matter, facts don't matter, constantly are attacking and punishing people for stating bare assed facts because they contradict politics, promote psuedoscience and lies, then it doesn't really matter how much money you pour into the schools.

    you have already damaged science beyond anything you can repair

  • You need to learn college level physics, first. This is not well thought out, like most of the things unveiled by the Trump administration.

  • The US ranks dead last among "modern" countries with a literacy rate of 86 (https://www.worldatlas.com/articles/the-highest-literacy-rates-in-the-world.html). It doesn't really make any sense to teach quantum mechanics to students that cannot read or write.
    • Quick question, are you counting immigrants who don't even speak English as illiterate in your statistic? I'd like to think you understand the numbers you are quoting.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by DogDude ( 805747 )
        Probably so, yes.

        My point is that we still have a very poor public education system that is not teaching people the basics properly. I don't think that adding in quantum physics is a great idea.
  • Don't forget to include courses on functional analysis and linear operators theory, which are the foundational stones of everything quantum.

  • When I went to college, quantum computing was a junior/senior level seminar for CS and science majors.

  • He gets to put that doctorate to good use.

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