Quantum physics is generally part of college physics curricula but is not always studied as part of secondary education or college physics taken by students in adjacent disciplines like engineering. Moreover, the subject matter is often challenging, even for instructors. In the context of the “quantum revolution” underway this is concerning for the training of a quantum-literate workforce.
In fulfillment of the Center for Innovation, Teaching and Learning (CITL) at Illinois' requirements for the Dr. Sandra J. Finley's Teacher Scholar Certificate, I conducted the following physics education literature review. Here, I show that approaching the teaching of quantum physics from a quantum information and computation perspective, including introducing quantum cryptography at a beginner-friendly level may be a solution to improving quantum curricula and preparing students for quantum(-adjacent) jobs.
I want to thank the CITL staff for their support in obtaining this certificate, which was awarded to me on May 5th. Their feedback on my work was very constructive and humbling, as I did not expect that much engagement with this niche topic.
Introduction
Quantum physics, also called quantum mechanics, is the study of the very smallest parts of matter. Particles including, but not limited to, electrons (charge carriers) and photons (light particles) exhibit behaviors that are unlike those of larger physical objects, known as classical objects. The latter category includes objects like beams and balls, whose behavior is often the first physics encountered by students in their studies.
Quantum physics, while taught as a separate subject, is more precisely a framework that can be applied to a variety of subfields of physics. For example, solid state physics, which studies solid material including metals and crystals, must consider the quantum mechanical behavior of the component parts of these structures. This includes semiconductors which are at the heart of modern technology.
Another specific discipline that expanded to account for quantum mechanical effects is information theory, which studies how data can be stored and communicated. That same data can be encrypted and used in calculations. The field of quantum information and computation, including quantum cryptography, thus arose over the last fifty years. It is primarily concerned with examining and applying the potential of using quantum systems for communication and computation.
The teaching of quantum physics in theory can draw on quantum information to inform it, or provide useful applications and content with which students can engage. Historically, however, this is not the case.
Instruction in quantum mechanics often follows the history of quantum mechanical discoveries, starting with examining experiments that illustrate the wave-particle duality of light and quantized atomic energy levels. While teaching quantum mechanics from a historical perspective does make clear to students the early developments of the field, physics education research shows that current curricula – or at least the teaching strategies used in teaching it – leave students with misconceptions and the impression that understanding of quantum mechanics is beyond their grasp.
The discoveries of the more recent discoveries of quantum information science could offer an improvement to the teaching of physics. Research has shown that approaching the teaching of quantum physics from the mathematical foundations of quantum information science, also known as the “spin-first” approach can result in higher student understanding and sustained interest in the subject.
In the following few pages, I will illustrate some of these research results, elaborate on their conclusions, and propose some additional strategies for how quantum information, computation, and cryptography can be integrated with the teaching of quantum physics at the introductory level.
Literature Overview
Early research into the teaching of quantum physics focused on identifying misconceptions that persisted in students’ understanding due to curricula which did not include quantum physics interpretations and instructors who frequently avoided the latter subject. Baily and Finkelstein (2015) synthesize and extend prior work on teaching quantum mechanical interpretations in modern physics with a new curriculum that makes room for teaching the philosophy of quantum mechanical phenomena. By implementing the new curriculum, they demonstrate the efficacy of their advocated methods in clarifying student understanding while maintaining interest in the subject. Henriksen et al. (2014) took a similar approach in addressing the same issues in secondary schools by developing multimedia modules that underscore important ideas with animations and illustrated experiments.
The increased interest worldwide in quantum technologies through the late 2010s, specifically in computing infrastructures, spurred research into what is necessary in terms of quantum education in general in order to train the workforce needed for the growing industry. Fox et al. (2020) surveys industry stakeholders to discover the educational profile of the people required to work in quantum computing and Bungum and Selsto (2022) present a quantum curriculum implemented in an information technology master’s program.
More recent research leverages core quantum information concepts at the forefront of new quantum curricula. Pospiech (2021) specifically advocates for teaching quantum physics with focus on cryptography and presents a teaching-learning proposal that was conducted with teacher students. Oikonomou et al. (2025) goes further, presenting seminal quantum protocols like quantum key distribution (QKD) for integration into the teaching of quantum physics.
Efficacy of Traditional Quantum Curricula
In most countries, traditionally quantum physics forms only a negligible part of the secondary school (advanced) and introductory undergraduate physics curriculum and is limited to studying the early discoveries of quantum physics historically speaking. This includes the photoelectric effect, the related understanding of electron energy levels as quantized and the wave-particle duality of light (Stadermann et al., 2019). Most formations that study concepts beyond these include them in upper-level physics classes often designated as “Quantum Physics” courses.
Even at this level quantum courses are clearly failing at least in part to convey a conceptual understanding of the physics behind the historical experiments discussed (Krijtenburg-Leweirssa et al. 2017). This is even more well-studied at the undergraduate level, where existing lesson content and teaching strategies fail to transmit a proper conceptual understanding of the weirdness of quantum mechanics to students (Baily & Finkelstein, 2015).
One strategy is to improve the teaching material itself. Motivated by a desire to clarify misconceptions and emphasize that “quantum physics breaks with some basic assumptions such as continuity, determism and locality” Henriksen et al. designed new web-based teaching modules (referred to as ReleQuant) for the final year of Norwegian upper secondary curriculum. The curriculum was adapted slightly to include discussions of entangled photons (and general relative), which the authors note as rare given that these ideas do not appear in (most of) the curricula of comparable countries (Henriksen et al., 2014).
As a solution to the lack of appropriate lab work for students to engage in, the authors develop computer-aided animations and interactive simulations that are designed to help students bridge between different representations of the same physics, including text, images, diagrams and formulas. These lessons appear as the web-accessible teaching module and are designed to be used in tandem with teacher-student interactions in the classroom and within the platform themselves. The authors report positive feedback from early implementations of the curriculum (Henriksen et al., 2014).
The aforementioned novel curriculum still relies on teacher-student interactions, which are the main focus of the Baily and Finkelstein’s 2015 critique of the then-current state of the art of quantum physics teaching at the early undergraduate level. The authors first conduct a survey of the teaching philosophies of several instructors. They introduce the so-called realist, agnostic, and wave-matter perspectives and explain that know perspective is required of instructors in the current teaching material. The former two perspectives emphasize a classical understanding and a practical focus on simply the outcomes of experiments (similar to the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics) but show that this allows for students to either learn incorrect understandings or build their own (often incorrect) understanding. The wave-matter perspective is more effective in correcting students’ misconceptions, which is often classical (Baily & Finkelstein, 2015).
Importantly, the authors conclude that a new curriculum is required that addresses the problem head-on and avoids the “hidden curriculum,” in which students develop opinions about subjects that are only implicitly addressed. The new curriculum ensures that the “physical interpretation of quantum physics [is] a topic unto itself […, helps] students acquire the language and resources […] to articulate their own […] beliefs […, and provides] experimental evidence that […] confronts their […] expectations” (Baily & Finkelstein, 2015).
A significant change to the new curriculum, which yields improved outcomes for student understanding tested with pre- and post-course surveys, is a move to a so-called “spin-first” curriculum. Proposed in the early 2000s, this curriculum starts the quantum physics curriculum by discussing the probabilistic states of single quantum particles, like the dual spins of electrons (Baily & Finkelstein, 2015).
Rethinking the Goal of Teaching in the Quantum Age
Before redesigning quantum curricula, it is important to take a step back to consider the motivations behind the redesign, beyond the aforementioned goal of preventing misconceptions from persisting. We can look to the workforce requirement of the budding (and perhaps already blooming) quantum revolution to specify which students are in need of what training.
This is exactly the approach of Fox et al., who survey quantum industry stakeholders and determine the background of their hires. They identify five main types of technical careers sponsored by companies: engineer, experimental scientist, theorist, technician, application researcher. Noteworthy here is also that most job positions of each type were still labeled as “engineer” (Fox et al, 2020).
While this does seem to suggest a certain amount of diversity in the kinds of people needed to successfully advance the industry, qualified applicants for these jobs fell largely into two categories: those who hold a PhD in physics and bachelor engineering students (Fox et al., 2020). The former group can be expected to be introduced to a quantum curriculum in sufficient depth at some point in their career. It is the latter category that would benefit the most from improved curricula at the undergraduate level.
There is some indication that current physics curricula are not meeting the needs of a developing quantum workforce. Bitzenbauer shows that while the overall examination of its teaching is increasing, quantum education is most often associated with upper division undergraduate studies and adjacent fields like chemistry, where it is needed but misses the aforementioned dominant background of the desired quantum workers, many of them with an engineering background (Bitzenbauer, 2021).
Much work in recent years, however, shows an acknowledgement of the requirement of new training programs to focus much more on the intersection of quantum physics and engineering. One example is the building of completely new quantum engineering curricula (see Asfaw et al., 2022).
Another alternative is integrating the studies of quantum physics into already established programs. The development of a master’s course on quantum physics for information technology students offers an initial example of such an action. The course developers identified eight topics that they considered essential to teach to the cohort: wave functions, wave function dynamics, quantization, entanglement, specific quantum algorithms, universal gates, quantum optimization solutions, NISQ (noisy intermediate scale quantum computing) (Bungum & Selsto, 2022).
Integrating Quantum Information, Communication and Cryptography
Notably, part of the aforementioned quantum information technology curriculum is a large emphasis on topics from quantum information, computation, and cryptography (Bungum & Selsto, 2022).
A major benefit to teaching quantum physics with an emphasis on quantum information is that this curriculum is inherently “spin-first” (see Baily & Finkelstein, 2015), since the two states of quantum particles are used to encode information, analogous to the “0” and “1” states of classical computing.
Another result is that this type of curriculum allows for mathematics to be seen as less of a challenge for students, and more of a tool to understanding. While this result may be seen as unique to information technology students in the literature (Bungum & Selsto, 2022), the lack of existing curricula that leverage quantum information for teaching quantum physics means that it remains to be seen if the effect can be reproduced for other students.
Teaching proposals along these lines underscore the counterintuitive nature of such a curriculum for the current context of teaching quantum physics. Data shows that only small amount of teacher students considered quantum computing and quantum cryptography suitable for teaching (Pospiech, 2021).
There seem to be many benefits to such initiatives, however. Cryptography allows students to explore the “fundamental notions of quantum physics: non-determinism, superposition and uncertainty” and as discussed above, the problems help with the commonly used Dirac notation and mathematical structures used in quantum physics. One introductory teaching lesson might start with a discussion of classical encryption using the seminal one-type-pad encryption method as a starting point for a discussion about the ability of quantum particles to be measured in one of two states (Pospiech, 2021).
Oikonomou et al. believe that even secondary students may be able to grasp even more complex ideas from quantum cryptography. One example is the simplified quantum key distribution from Charles Bennett in 1992, which again builds off the classical one-time pad. In order to teach the matrices that act as operators for quantum operations, boxes that transform balls in color and number can be used to colorfully illustrate their effects without requiring prerequisite linear algebra (Oikonomou et al., 2025).
Additional Considerations for Implementation
A benefit to integrating quantum information and cryptography concepts in the teaching of quantum physics is the wealth of pedagogical literature that examines the subject. Notably, the seminal textbook Quantum Computation and Quantum Information of by authors Michael Nielsen & Isaac Chuang (affectionately referred to as “Mike & Ike”) is widely hailed as an excellent introduction to the field. The one downside is that it is better addressed to senior undergraduate and graduate students and likely to overwhelm the target student population who would benefit from an improved introduction to quantum physics in general.
Other teaching resources exist beyond textbooks, however, and these (including the techniques presented in the references discussed above) may be rather easily integrated into curricula. A strong model may be the lessons presented in various introductory programs, academic “summer schools,” for example.
Thus the best implementation in an introductory undergraduate classroom seems to be the approach of Oikonomou et al. which avoids linear algebra altogether. A discussion of probabilistic behavior of such (quantum systems) then naturally may lead into a discussion first of the representation of a state in Dirac notation. This is then a natural lead-in to more math-y concepts like the Schrödinger equation, which usually appears at the beginning of an introduction to quantum mechanics.
Conclusion
While best practices are not always one-size-fits-all and the best standard for teaching quantum physics may still be in development, it is clear that the present state of the art is still lacking in conveying the true mystery of the field to students in a manner that both inspires students and avoids misconceptions moving forward.
Quantum information concepts, especially lessons in cryptography, may present a solution to this issue. As teaching these ideas necessitates a spin-first approach to teaching quantum mechanics in most cases, the mathematical foundations are simpler while not obscuring the non-deterministic nature intrinsic to quantum systems. The emerging technology of quantum computers including quantum algorithms is at the same time a powerful connection to students seeking real-world connections. This makes the entire study less abstract and hopefully can also inspire more students to continue in this discipline specifically, growing the next generation of quantum scientists.
References
Asfaw, A., Blais, A., Brown, K. R., Candelaria, J., Cantwell, C., Carr, L. D., Combes, J., Debroy, D. M., Donohue, J. M., Economou, S. E., Edwards, E., Fox, M. F. J., Girvin, S. M., Ho, A., Hurst, H. M., Jacob, Z., Johnson, B. R., Johnston-Halperin, E., Joynt, R., … Singh, C. (2022). Building a Quantum Engineering Undergraduate Program. IEEE Transactions on Education, 65(2), 220–242. https://doi.org/10.1109/te.2022.3144943
Baily, C., & Finkelstein, N. D. (2015). Teaching quantum interpretations: Revisiting the goals and practices of introductory quantum physics courses. Physical Review Special Topics - Physics Education Research, 11(2). https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevstper.11.020124
Bitzenbauer, P. (2021). Quantum Physics Education Research over the Last Two Decades: A Bibliometric Analysis. Education Sciences, 11(11), 699. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci11110699
Bungum, B., & Selstø, S. (2022). What do quantum computing students need to know about quantum physics? European Journal of Physics, 43(5), 055706. https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6404/ac7e8a
Fox, M. F. J., Zwickl, B. M., & Lewandowski, H. J. (2020). Preparing for the quantum revolution: What is the role of higher education? Physical Review Physics Education Research, 16(2). https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevphyseducres.16.020131
Henriksen, E. K., Bungum, B., Angell, C., Tellefsen, C. W., Frågåt, T., & Bøe, M. V. (2014). Relativity, quantum physics and philosophy in the upper secondary curriculum: challenges, opportunities and proposed approaches. Physics Education, 49(6), 678–684. https://doi.org/10.1088/0031-9120/49/6/678
Krijtenburg-Lewerissa, K., Pol, H. J., Brinkman, A., & van Joolingen, W. R. (2017). Insights into teaching quantum mechanics in secondary and lower undergraduate education. Physical Review Physics Education Research, 13(1). https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevphyseducres.13.010109
Oikonomou, A. V., Savvas, I. K., & Iatrellis, O. (2025). Enhancing Quantum Literacy in Secondary Education Through Quantum Computing and Quantum Key Distribution. Education Sciences, 15(9), 1167. https://doi.org/10.3390/educsci15091167
Pospiech, G. (2021). Quantum Cryptography as an Approach for Teaching Quantum Physics. In Challenges in Physics Education (pp. 19–31). Springer International Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-78720-2_2
Stadermann, H. K. E., van den Berg, E., & Goedhart, M. J. (2019). Analysis of secondary school quantum physics curricula of 15 different countries: Different perspectives on a challenging topic. Physical Review Physics Education Research, 15(1). https://doi.org/10.1103/physrevphyseducres.15.010130