by Andrea Kiraly (Eötvös Loránd University, Hungary)

The international conference “Teaching Physics Innovatively” (TPI-15) was organized in August 2015 at Eötvös University (ELTE) in Budapest, and focused on how to teach physics innovatively in secondary education. The conference included  plenary presentations, paper sessions and a panel discussion about recent challenges in physics education. The conference was attended by more than 100 participants from 18 countries, and focused on the encounter of teachers and scientists, mediators and promoters of Physics, to support the joint building of bridges between researchers and society. The conference was organized in association with the PARRISE project and placed special emphasis on the pedagogical interpretation of socially relevant issues in science education.

We are happy to announce that the proceedings of this conference (publisher: Graduate School for Physics, ELTE University, Budapest, editors: A. Király and T. Tél) are available now as an e-book, and can be downloaded from the ELTE PARRISE website (http://parrise.elte.hu/tpi-15/proceedings.php)

The conference proceedings cover a wide variety of thematic areas, such as:

• Inquiry Based Science Education

• Science centres and other informal learning opportunities

• Environmental issues

• Our cosmic environment

• Socially sensitive issues

• Multimedia and ICT

• Physics experiments and methodological innovations

• Contemporary physics

• Nuclear issues and

• Roundtable discussions about socially sensitive issues in physics education.

A written version of the roundtable discussion on socially sensitive issues in physics education was a special highlight in the conference proceedings, along with a description of the visit of the conference participants to the only nuclear power plant in the country at Paks Nuclear Power Plant. Other interesting features, related to socially sensitive issues, include a report about the scientific programme at the summer camp “Bátor Tábor”, a camp organized for seriously ill or handicapped school kids, and an article discussing the physics of colour blindness or colour deficiency, and the difficulties these imply for students and teachers.

Among the environment related contributions, one can find papers on: light pollution measurements for secondary school as project work; the investigation of energy consumption at a Budapest high school; and on the experimental examination of photocells and photosynthesis. The contributions describing the role of science centres, science events and full day experimental programmes to the motivation of students and to promoting physics, are also of special interest.

One can access the individual papers and presentations on the ELTE PARRISE webpage (http://parrise.elte.hu/tpi-15/slides.php). A “forum” was also associated to each paper. The final version of the Conference Proceedings will be available soon as a printed book.