Stamatis Vokos

Dr. Vokos is Professor of Physics at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo (Cal Poly), where he co-directs the STEM Teacher and Researcher Program. Although his Ph.D. and postdoc work were in theoretical particle physics, he realized that physics education research was his true calling. After ten years at the University of Washington and fourteen years at Seattle Pacific University, Stamatis joined Cal Poly in 2016. He is currently involved in efforts to improve student learning in physics and engineering courses and investigates impacts of placing prospective STEM teachers in summer research experiences at US national labs. He is also the Cal Poly PI on a multi-institutional curriculum development project involving dozens of US-based faculty and more than 200 faculty at five Egyptian universities, which is creating an international model for project-based teacher education. 

Stamatis is the father of three wonderful daughters and two equally wonderful sons-in-law, the husband of an amazing American partner who loves Greece as much as he does, and the pappous of a grandson who fills his heart with both pure joy and with wonder about how the human race ever managed to survive toddlerhood.

When he is asked what he teaches at university, Stamatis responds, "Students."  Physics is the vehicle through which this connection happens. Stamatis has taught physics to Palestinian teachers, to teachers in Qatar, to Buddhist monks in India and Bhutan, and to students in the US, Europe, Asia, and Africa. (Can Australia be too far behind?)

A Fellow of the American Physical Society and a Board member of the Groupe International de Recherche sur L' Enseignemnet de la Physique, Stamatis is currently co-designing with amazing colleagues an international summer school for PhD students who conduct physics education research.