2026 Teacher Quantum Days at OU

When:

Wednesday, May 27, and Thursday, May 28, 2026. 10am-4.30pm (registration is now closed).

Where:

OU (University of Oklahoma), Norman Campus, Lin Hall.

Who:

STEM high school teachers from the State of Oklahoma.

The workshop is designed to encourage and support high school teachers interested in bringing quantum concepts into the high school classroom. A key goal is to equip high school teachers with practical ideas and ready-to-use materials that can be taken back to the high school students.

We will provide visitor parking passes for the two-day workshop as well as a $400 stipend. Snacks and lunches will be provided.

What participants will experience:

Take-back lesson plan and take-back-to-school kit: Develop classroom-ready exercises and usable lesson plans.

Hands-on concepts: Explore foundational quantum ideas with guided activities.

Real experiments: See quantum experiments and connect quantum ideas to practical settings.

Lab tours: Visit modern state-of-the-art research spaces dedicated to precision measurements and quantum sensing.

Learn about quantum workforce needs and opportunities as well as the quantum economy.

Registration link:

Please follow this link to go to the registration form (the form is short and it should only take a few minutes to fill it out). In case of questions, please reach out to Grant Biedermann (biedermann@ou.edu) or Doerte Blume (doerte.blume-1@ou.edu). To allow for an engaging hands-on workshop, the number of participants will be capped at 24. The registration will close once the workshop capacity has been reached. Please note, registration is now closed.

Workshop program:

Wednesday, May 27 (Day 1):

9.15-10.30am: A member of the organizing team will be stationed in the (temporary) parking space, behind Lin Hall. Driving South on Elm Street, take a left (head East) at the corner of Elm Street and Parsons Street. Follow the road and hang a left to get to a small parking lot behind Lin Hall (building 43) and next to Kaufmann Hall (building 45). The member of the organizing team will provide participants for one parking pass each for Wednesday and Thursday. You want to scratch out the day, month, and year, display the parking pass in your car, and park in a parking lot where the parking pass is valid (the organizers are not responsible for parking tickets).

Please note: Due to construction, access to Elm Street is not currently possible from Lindsey Street. 

10.00-10.30am: Arrival and check-in over tea, coffee, and snacks.

10.30-10.50am: Welcome and introduction. The following link will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of the welcome slides.

10.50am-noon: Exploring quantum concepts through the game “Tangled: Separable versus entangled states.” The following links will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of board game; pdf of game sheet; docx of game sheet; pdf of supporting slides; and pptx of supporting slides.

noon-12.30pm: Discussion of quantum concepts covered in “Tangled.” The following link will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of the discussion slides.

12.30-1.30pm: Lunch (catered).

1.30-2.40pm: Double-slit experiment. Part I.

2.40-3.00pm: Coffee break.

3-4.30pm: Double-slit experiment. Part II. Links to worksheet for Group 1, Group 2, Group 3, Group 4, and Group 5. Each of the groups will work on a lesson plan (your group number is taped to the table that you are sitting at).

4.30pm: Adjourn for the day.

Thursday, May 28 (Day 2):

10.00-11.10am: Presentation and discussion on “Quantum workforce and quantum economy.” The following link will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of supporting slides.

11.10-11.30am: Coffee break.

11.30am-12.30pm: Mach-Zehnder interferometer experiment. The following link will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of supporting slides, pptx of supporting slides, and docx of accompanying worksheet. Links to excel worksheet for Group 1, Group 2, Group 3, Group 4, and Group 5. Each of the groups will work on an excel spreadsheet (your group number is taped to the table that you are sitting at).

12.30-1.15pm: Lunch (catered).

1.15-1.30pm: Wrapping up Mach-Zehnder interferometer experiment; getting ready for the lab tours. The following link will become alive for registered participants on Wednesday morning: pdf of lab tour-related questionnaire.

1.30-2.30pm: Lab tours. Part I.

2.30-2.50pm: Coffee break.

2.50-3.50pm: Lab tours. Part II.

3.50-4.20pm: Reflection on lab tours and rotation sensor exercise.

4.20-4.30pm: Closing of the workshop, including opportunity to provide feedback. Link to the post-workshop survey (the link will become alive at the end of the workshop).

Additional workshop materials:

“Tangled:” https://www.aps.org/learning-resources/tangled (and references on that website).

Double-slit movie (electrons): https://physicsworld.com/a/feynmans-double-slit-experiment-gets-a-makeover/

Squeezed light in LIGO interferometer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IbHjTuipGbQ&t=84s

PhET Interactive Simulations website: Wave Interference, Quantum Coin Toss, Quantum Measurement.

Link to American Journal Physics article on double-slit experiment: “Video recording true single-photon double-slit interference” by R. S. Aspden, M. J. Padgett, and G. C. Spalding, Am. J. Phys. 84, 671 (2016). This is an open access publication (freely available to all) and the website contains a beautiful video.

Funding provided by Dean’s Student Recruitment and Bridge Fund, Dodge Endowment, Homer L. Dodge Department of Physics and Astronomy, The University of Oklahoma.