Actions to Improve Physics Education in Serbia and Montenegro and to Celebrate the World Year of Physics

Physicists in Serbia and Montenegro (SRM), both men and women, are not satisfied with the status of physics in SRM. The number of students who choose to study physics is decreasing. The percentage of physics graduates who are leaving the country is still very large (Figure 1). The presence and the role of physicists in industry, medicine, health care, economy, environmental protection, and the media is not satisfactory. Funding for research and especially for research infrastructure has increased since 2000; but, because of a long period of conflicts and isolation, many years will pass before we see significant results and effects. Women in SRM are concerned primarily with how to improve the overall status of physics in SRM. In SRM women physicists are not the minority. Many guests from European and other countries have noticed that the distribution of men and women physicists is inverse compared with Western countries, a fact that was recognized at the Fifth General Conference of the Balkan Physical Union, which took place in Serbia in 2003. Women physicists participate in the activities of the Belgrade Women’s Studies Center, such as conferences, international exchanges, and statistical and comparative analysis. An study of the status of women in science and media was done at this Center [1,2]. Here we present the work of women in SRM since the First IUPAP International Conference on Women in Physics to improve physics education and to participate in WYP2005.