Coe physics department makes national name for itself

CEDAR RAPIDS - Recent Coe College physics graduate Ben Franta scoped out some major graduate programs.

The 22-year-old Elkader native will study at Oxford University for his master's degree and Harvard for his doctoral degree, to give an idea of his list.

On his graduate program visits, Coe usually stood out - in a good way. An MIT admissions official noted seeing many Coe physics students among applicants.

“On one visit it was two from Yale, two from Harvard and me from Coe,” Franta recalls. “Our research experience here is more than other graduates tend to have.”

The small liberal arts college is nationally known for its physics program, which over the past few decades has grown into something of a student research powerhouse.

Coe's cozy Cedar Rapids campus is home to about 1,300 students - 40 of them physics majors. That doesn't seem like a huge number, but consider that, nationally, only about 5,000 bachelor's degrees are conferred in physics each year.

Iowa's research universities - Iowa State University, the University of Iowa and the University of Northern Iowa - have from 60 to 98 undergrad physics majors, despite being 10 to 20 times larger than Coe.

“Our students' ability to do research, write papers, present at conferences makes them pretty sought after,” Coe professor Steve Feller said. “Much of the reason is because they had these rare opportunities.”

Feller and professor Mario Affatigato have expertise in glass, a noted Coe specialty. The third full-time professor in Coe's physics department, James Cottingham, specializes in acoustic research.

While Coe has only undergraduates, the physics students conduct what is considered graduate-level research, say faculty and students. They regularly co-author research articles published in science journals, attend conferences around the country with Coe faculty and travel to other research institutions and abroad to work in labs.

Corning Inc., the New York glass manufacturer, holds a slot in its summer internship program for a Coe student each year. The Coe Stookey Fellowship is named for a 1936 Coe grad who invented CorningWare.

This year about 25 Coe students stayed on campus during the summer to conduct research with Feller and Affatigato. That number has grown over recent years.

“We have spent a lot of time and effort building it,” Affatigato said, “and now we have a track record with the (National Science Foundation).”

Coe's physics department has garnered more than $2 million in external grants over the past two decades - $550,000 this summer alone from the National Science Foundation. Coe is one of only five small colleges to host a Research Experience for Undergraduates site for the foundation. Seven students from across the country come to Coe for 10 weeks to conduct physics and chemistry research.

The foundation money also helps Coe purchase state-of-the-art equipment that students and faculty use.

“Even as a first-year student, I got lucky enough to be involved with a published article. It's coming out soon,” Coe freshman Jason Maldonis said. Maldonis, an 18-year-old from Beloit, Wis., came to campus early to conduct summer research.

“I was really impressed,” he said.