Bringing together best practices and best acceptance with real resources: AP Physics 1 and 2

The road to the new AP Physics 1 and 2 courses has been long, but the journey has been worthwhile. The courses are constructed to be a careful balance of best practices in physics education and what can be sustained with the resources available to provide the best experience in learning physics to the most students. Experts in content and learning science worked together through several layers of committees to develop a model that was then refined through focus group processes with state-level curriculum experts who had to see how to fit the courses into their students' schedules, high school faculty who had to deliver the courses within their resources, and higher education faculty who had to make decisions on acceptance. The best practices course was amazingly robust to the considerations of each of these audiences. In this interactive talk, I will outline the process and answer questions.