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Department of Chemistry August 2022 Newsletter

Editor's Notes

Greetings Chemistry!

The Fall 2022 semester is now underway and the increased presence of students, faculty and staff on campus is more apparent than ever! This month we hosted several in-person events for the first time in two years since before the Covid pandemic. It was great to see many familiar and new faces come to the Chemistry Town Hall where department initiatives, introductions, and upcoming projects were presented. The Career Network and Recruitment Fair took place mid-month and was a successful event that hosted a great number of students and industry recruiters meeting to discuss research and future job opportunities. Department staff attended the annual staff summer picnic at Sunset Park, and Department Head Phil Bevilacqua joined in for an intense corn hole tournament. And the Nittany Chemical Society hosted an ice cream social on the Chemistry Building patio where many students and faculty celebrated the end of the first week of classes.

incoming Fall 2022 graduate students

The Graduate Program has welcomed an incoming class of 68 graduate students, our largest new class of students to date, representing over 14 countries. The Undergraduate Program has welcomed 46 first year students and 17 transfer students to the department. We are excited to see what all our new and current students, both graduate and undergraduate, accomplish this semester!

This edition of the newsletter includes a message from the Department Head, an alum interview, department happenings, a message from the GSA, Jackie Bortiatynski's Teaching Corner, and more. If you wish to have a story shared in a future newsletter, please contact me at chemcommunications@psu.edu.

Kathryn Harlow, Communications Coordinator

A Message From The Department Head

I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends

Dear Chemistry Colleagues,

I’ve been attending a number of conferences lately, having just returned from the ACS meeting in Chicago, and I guess that’s got me thinking a lot about giving talks. Last time I wrote about my pet peeve where the speaker says, “Today, I hope to convince you that my model is right.” Today, I’m writing about another thing that bothers me in talks--one I’ve been guilty of--and that is putting down your competitors. When I was an assistant professor, I gave a talk about our new mechanism on RNA catalysis and I made a comment on how our competitors had gotten a certain aspect incorrect. One of my long-time colleagues, Dan Herschlag, was in the audience and came up to me after. He congratulated me on our work and then said, “I noticed your negative comment about the competing lab. You don’t need to do that. He is a good colleague who has made important contributions.” It’s funny how certain things stick with you. This was over 20 years ago and I can still remember it like it was yesterday. Dan was totally correct, and I’ve tried not to do this again, in my professional career or in my personal life for that matter. Isaac Newton once said, “If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” It’s really important to remember and believe this.

A few years later, I had a professional and personal relationship break down with a scientist friend whom I had known for a long time, all over a conflict on an enzyme mechanism. It had gotten to the point where we avoided talking to each other at meetings. This built up to where it was really bothering me. The next time I saw her at a meeting, I went up to her and said hello, and we started talking about friends, family, and eventually science. She congratulated my group on the mechanism and wished us well. When I look back on these two experiences years later, I regret that they created such unnecessary anxiety in my professional and personal life.

Barack Obama, after he was elected president, went to his rival in the primary election, Hillary Clinton, and asked her to be his Secretary of State. Obama later talked about reading a book on Abraham Lincoln by the great author Doris Kearns Goodwin entitled “Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln.” Indeed, Lincoln convinced several of his rivals to join his political cabinet. He famously said “I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.” These moves by Lincoln and Obama resonate with me. There is no room for any of us to put down another in an effort to make our science or ourselves “look better”. This extends to all of the relationships in our department too; between faculty, students, and staff. Moreover, although I once struggled with it, it turns out that it really isn’t difficult to befriend our competitors. So I challenge each of us to praise the work of those who came before, even if their story isn’t perfect. Who knows, next time around we may find ourselves on the receiving end of a correction, where I’m sure we would welcome support and empathy.

Best Regards,

Phil Bevilacqua

Colleen Kelley

Alumni Interview Series

Colleen Kelley tells us about her time as a Penn State Chemistry Ph.D. student and how her career in academia led her to pursue a new creative outlet through comic books that teach young students about chemistry!

News From Around The Department

Events

Chemistry students and faculty participate in the Career Network and Recruitment Fair 2022

Faculty Awards

Amie Boal receives the SBIC Early Career Award.

Faculty Awards

Squire Booker honored with two awards from American Society for Biochemistry and Molecular Biology

Research

Chemistry graduate student, Mica Pitcher, helps to lead research on bio-based materials used to salvage rare earth elements.

Research

Revealed missing step in lipid formation could enable detection of past climate.

Faculty Updates

We welcome Dr. Jason Cross and Dr. Katheryn Penrod as our newest Undergrad Associate Teaching Faculty.

Dr. Cross will be teaching Organic Chemistry courses such as Chem 202 and Chem 203. His research interest is primarily on Luminescent Lanthanide Complexes. Learn more about Dr. Cross on his faculty profile.

Dr. Penrod will serve as the Assistant Laboratory Director of Physical Chemistry. She will work closely with Dr. Milosavljevic on overseeing and developing CHEM457 and CHEM459W. Her research interests are pedagogical, with emphasis on student engagement in physical chemistry courses. Her personal research background is focused in computational and quantum chemistry. Learn more about Dr. Penrod on her faculty profile.

left: Cross, right: Penrod

A Message from the Graduate Student Association (GSA)

On behalf of Vice-President Kara Pytko:

Happy fall semester, everyone! The GSA is excited for another semester of social gatherings, outreach opportunities, and professional development events! In August, we welcomed our incoming class of graduate students and helped students choose classes at orientation, had a Welcome Picnic for the FA22 class, visited Milton Hershey School to guide three classrooms of 40 high school students through a 90-minute demonstration developed by Anwesha Ghosh (Bevilacqua lab), participated in the Career Network and Recruitment Fair, held nominations for new graduate student ombudsmen, held an Intellectual Property seminar, had our very first celebratory Town Hall, hosted a happy hour at Doggie’s Pub, engaged in lab group discussions regarding Title IX (using a wonderful video created by Dominique Donaho), booked parking passes for tailgate season (Lot 11 near Arboretum), initiated our annual T-Shirt Contest (see email for details and send submissions to kgp5097@psu.edu by September 9th), and more! We also announced that we will be allowing graduate students to attend our meetings and contribute to the betterment of the department, so stay tuned for more information on that!

graduate students participate at a recent outreach event

To find out more about our tailgates, follow us on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook! We will be posting our exact location each game day on Facebook.

Follow us on Instagram (psuchemgsa), Twitter (PSU_ChemGSA @ChemGSA_PSU), Facebook (PSU Chemistry GSA) and LinkedIn (Penn State Chemistry Alumni) for more updates.

GSA Executive Board 2022-2023: Ryan Szukalo, President | Kara Pytko, Vice President | Theresa Buckley, Secretary | Maddy Helm, Treasurer | Mary Kate Caucci, Professional Development Chair | Haley Young, Outreach Chair | Olivia Peduzzi, External Liaison

top (left to right): Haley Young, Theresa Buckley, Maddy Helm, Olivia Peduzzi bottom (left to right): Mary Kate Caucci, Ryan Szukalo, Kara Pytko

The Teaching Corner with Jackie

When the Learning Assistant (LA) Program began, I was a member of a small group of Eberly faculty who started teaching the pedagogy course to introduce these new members of our instructional teams to evidence-based active learning strategies. We combed through the literature to find papers we could share with our LAs. One of the papers we chose to share for a few years was co-authored by Michelle Smith, and it focused on peer discussion and how it helps to improve learning when coupled with clicker questions. Then there were other papers she co-authored that continued to appear in my regular searches of the literature; this included a paper with Carl Wieman on a new active learning protocol called COPUS, and the 2014 Freeman et. al. paper, “Active learning increases student performance in science, engineering, and mathematics,” which is the most cited paper to support introduction of active learning in STEM classrooms. Not everyone may recognize Michelle Smith’s name if you are not regularly reading the literature on evidence-based practice in STEM teaching, but many of the workshops led by CESE have cited her work.

I am sharing this background on her because Michelle Smith is coming to Penn State in September to give two seminars. One of her seminars is hosted by the Department of Biology and the other is hosted by CESE. She will be talking about her most recent research that focuses on how college instructors help students with the transition between high school and college STEM courses. I hope you will be able to join us for one of her talks while she is here. She is the Senior Associate Dean for Undergraduate Education, College of Arts and Sciences, and Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University. The titles and locations of her two talks are listed below. If you are also interested in meeting Dr. Smith during her visit, please email me because CESE has opportunities for you to participate in some group discussions with her during her visit.

Tuesday September 27th, 11:30-12:30 pm, W203 Millennium Science Complex, Title: "Using Instructor Collaboration to Enhance Student Experiences Aligned with Vision and Change"

Wednesday September 28th, 1-2 pm, 301A Chemistry Building (sponsored by CESE), Title: “Exploring the transition between high school and college STEM courses: What are students' perspectives and how do faculty approach instruction?”

Take care and I hope to see you at one of her talks.

Jackie

Jackie Bortiatynski is a teaching professor for the Department of Chemistry at Penn State. She also serves as Director of the Center for Excellence in Science Education (CESE). Visit CESE for more information.
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Kathryn Harlow
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