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ence with acoustics, it stifles creativity in the classroom. Undergraduate acoustics survey textbooks do exist at differing levels of sophistication. For instance, Raichel’s The Science and Applications of Sound 2 is a popular text for col- lege juniors, seniors, and beginning graduate students, while Rossing et al.’s The Science of Sound 3 is less mathematically intense and thus more appropriate for students below the junior level. However, it is striking to note what the typical survey text includes and excludes. For instance, virtually all of the survey textbooks put a discussion (and derivation) of the wave equation near the start of the book. This makes sense from a purely logical view of acoustics, as it allows a course to start with a discussion of one of the most important characteristics of sound—its propagation as a wave. However, from the perspective of student engagement (and therefore learning) it is an unfortunate choice. The wave equation is mathematically difficult, quite abstract, and hard to directly relate to applications. Thus, by putting this material in the very beginning of a course it is difficult to capture and capti- vate students. The alternative of introducing concrete appli- cations (such as how loudspeakers work) using only qualita- tive discussions of sound propagation has some clear advan- tages from the perspective of student interest, and could be
used to motivate a discussion of the wave equation later.
It is also interesting to note that although the topic of hearing is included in most survey textbooks on acoustics, few if any mention speech in the same manner. This is very unfortunate because students are much more accustomed to and interested in the subfields of acoustics that connect with them personally. Thus, speech and hearing both are great topics for engaging students and developing some comfort with major concepts. Speech is also one of the larger techni- cal areas within acoustics, so ignoring it in survey textbooks
distorts the field.
Similarly, survey textbooks tend to include a chapter on
architectural acoustics but neglect musical acoustics. (Rossing et al.’s book is a notable exception here.) While both architectural acoustics and musical acoustics are very inter- esting to students, the typical preoccupation of students with music suggests that to neglect musical acoustics is to miss a golden opportunity to capture students where they live. The music industry, in all of its many aspects, also represents an enormous market in terms of the money dedicated to it annually worldwide. While admittedly not all of this market is related directly to acoustics, enough of the market is acoustics-related that it is desirable to include musical acoustics in introductory courses to demonstrate the vibran- cy of acoustics and to provide students with a leg-up on employment should they wish to head in the direction of the music industry.
An observation about the resources associated with acoustics textbooks is also in order. Academic publishing is an important and profitable sector of the book publishing market. As a result, publishers work hard to get their newest text into classrooms and to keep it there as long as possible. Routinely, publishers now create Web sites for textbooks of popular classes and urge authors to load their text with impres- sive graphics, associated software (provided with the book on
30 Acoustics Today, April 2007
a CD or DVD), example problems worked out in the text, and vignettes that describe important applications of the concepts. While many students and faculty might argue that the price increases for texts do not justify this transition in publishing style, it is certainly true that new popular textbooks are far more than the material contained between the covers.
The resource-rich, highly Web-linked and technically- supported textbook relies on convincing a publisher that the market is sufficiently large to justify the enormous invest- ment required for its creation. No acoustics textbook has hit the market with the new resource-rich model (although the prices of the texts have certainly gone up as though they had), presumably because the market niche is too small. As a result, acoustics textbooks simply are not as flashy and appealing as modern textbooks in subjects that compete for the attention of students. Further, since this is a purely financial consider- ation by the book publishers, it is difficult to see how an author or even a large group of professionals in acoustics might impact the decision.
Social relevance and applications
A significant amount of research has been done on what motivates students in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) courses. The literature shows it is par- ticularly important to demonstrate the social relevance of the topic and its interesting applications if one wishes to attract
4,5
that enable people to improve their quality of life.
While the literature on the impact of applications to stu- dent engagement and learning does not deal specifically with acoustics classes, it seems logical that the results should hold for them. Fortunately, acoustics is a profession that is ripe with wonderful applications and with exciting issues of social relevance. However, development of application examples for a course requires significant work and there is little indica- tion that our acoustics classes (at any level) are exploiting the hot topics and applications in our profession. For this reason we mention several acoustic applications and social issues here that ought to appeal to a broad range of students and excite them about the possibilities in the field. This is done in full recognition that merely listing them here is not enough. Lesson plans and supplemental material for each application
need to be developed.
The obsession of today’s students with music has been
mentioned already in this article. More broadly, students today grew up with MTV and similar video music stations. They were using computers at a very early age, playing with various computer games in their youth, and were among the first to engage routinely in on-line chats and instant messag- ing. In short, the students in college today grew up multi- tasking and being actively engaged in the entertainment
Further, while the impact on the majority males is less pronounced, the use of interesting applications and the focus on social relevance also helps attract and retain their interest. This research is having a significant impact on STEM education, albeit at a slower rate of change than many of us had hoped to see. As an example, engineering classes are moving from a focus on cars and aircraft, to applications such as prosthetic devices
women and underrepresented minorities.