MANHATTAN — The Kansas State University physics department has received a $1.5 million grant to improve an online professional development tool for physics teachers.

The Mercury reports that the National Science Foundation awarded the grant to associate professor of physics Eleanor Sayre. Sayre is working on a research project that investigates how an online tool called PhysPort affects teaching practices in physics classes.

The project is in collaboration with the American Association of Physics Teachers. The university and the association created PhysPort to help physics teachers with expert recommendations, teaching method guides, assessment resources and online workshops.

It’s the third science foundation grant the university has received to develop the tool.

A report says more than 24,000 individual users utilized PhysPort’s resources in 2016.