The department provides a number of research and teaching opportunities for students. Students interested in doing research can take PHYS 499H (or PHYS 459) for credit, join (usually for pay) one of the departmental research groups, or participate in special programs for undergraduates at Argonne and Fermilab. Students interested in teaching can take PHYS 495 for credit, or get paid jobs as tutors or teaching lab assistants.
PHYS 499H allows students to conduct independent research projects. Some recent projects have been directly related to a faculty member's own research (such as computer modeling of electron diffraction patterns), while others have been of the student's own choosing (such as measurements of the orbits of Jupiter's moons). Students interested in this course need the prior approval of a faculty member to sponsor them. The student and the professor decide on a research topic and work out an appropriate set of goals.
Students can also become involved with faculty research programs. The faculty often appreciate the effort of undergraduate students and regularly have funds available to employ students. An interested student can ask the department Chair which faculty members might want student participation of this sort. Students may also apply to work with faculty through NIU's Undergraduate Research Apprenticeship Program (URAP).
Over the past twenty years the high energy physics group has employed more than 80 undergraduates, with at least one student receiving a URAP award each semester. The students have worked on building charged particle detectors, designing and testing electronics, and analyzing data collected from various Fermilab experiments. Due to NIU's close proximity to Fermilab, such work can be done both part-time during the academic year and full-time during the summer.
Students also have the opportunity to apply for a Science and Engineering Research Semester at the nearby Argonne National Laboratory, where they will participate in ongoing research projects with Argonne scientific staff members or NIU faculty with joint appointments at Argonne. For example, students at Argonne ould work on measuring structure and properties of novel materials, perhaps using techniques like Atomic Force Microscopy. Some of this work is transferable for academic credit at NIU.
The Physics Department hires several junior and senior physics majors each year as laboratory aides and as tutors. These opportunities are especially appropriate for students planning on entering the teaching profession. Laboratory aides help in the teaching laboratories, while tutors work with students individually or in small groups. In addition to the valuable experience gained, students are paid as hourly employees of the department.