Photonics Fundamentals for Secondary Schools

Course Description

This hybrid and dual credit course was created by the Developing Photonics Education in Iowa's Rural Secondary Schools project at Indian Hills Community College. This course and supporting materials were created to "increase the number of photonics technicians in the U.S. via the high school to community college pipeline. Supporting work is available to view separately and includes outreach and professional development materials for teachers.

The course introduces students to "the basics of how light travels and several behaviors of light when light interacts with materials, such as: refraction, scattering, absorption, reflection, and transmission." The course also "introduces  [...] student[s] [on] how to handle and clean optics, laser safety, how optics manipulate light, how light behaves as a particle and a wave, and the basics of how a laser operates."

Course Contents

Course contents include a textbook with modules, labs, study guides, and tests. The 361-page Fundamentals of Light and Lasers textbook was created by OP-TEC and is from their optics and photonics series. This book includes six modules (chapters) "... that are designed for use by students and instructors involved in the preparation of technicians in the areas of optics, electro-optics, lasers, and photonics.

The book contents include modules on the following topics: the nature and properties of light, optical handling and positioning, light sources and laser safety, basic geometrical optics, basic geometrical optics, basic physical optics, and the principle of lasers. Course contents include six learning units (LU) that correspond to each module in the book. Each LU includes a lab exercise, presentation slides and a transcript, a study guide, and a test.

Labs include references, the main objective, equipment needed, and the lab procedure. Some of the labs include discussion questions.

Below is a list of folders contained within the .zip attachment. The size of each folder and number of files is included in parenthesis. 

DPE Objective 1 - Photonics Fundamentals course (63 files, 35 MB)

• Fundamentals of Lights and Lasers, Modules 1-6 (1 Course_1_Fundamentals_of_Light_and_Lasers_3rd_Edition_2018.pdf 15.4 MB)
• LU1 Nature & Properties of Light (12 files, 4..1 MB)
• LU2 Optical Handling & Positioning (9 files, 4.5 MB)
• LU3 Light Sources & Laser Safety (10 files, 3.4 MB)
• LU4 Basic Geometrical Optics (11 files, 3.2 MB)
• LU5 Basic Physical Optics (10 files, 2.9 MB)
• LU6 Principles of Lasers (9 files, 1.8 MB)