Left to right in front are former Southwestern College students Monique Patrón, Chona dela Cruz, Héctor Eduardo Mendoza Solano and Manuel Alingog on our trip to the 2008 Posters on the Hill event held on Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, sponsored by the Council on Undergraduate Research, where the students presented results of their research. [Yours truly is in the back.]
My interests as a chemical educator are wide and varied, ranging from teaching chemistry to undergraduates and also engaging them in research activities, developing programs and curriculum, providing professional development activities for my fellow educators and engaging youth in hands-on science activities in an effort to increase their interest in education and careers in science.
Several of these endeavors have been funded through the generous support of the National Science Foundation (NSF).
Ph.D., Physical Chemistry, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Postdoctoral Research, University of California, San Diego
Awards
Award for Incorporating Sustainability into Chemistry Education, American Chemical Society Committee on Environmental Improvement, 2012.
Stanley C. Israel Award for Advancing Diversity in the Chemical Sciences, American Chemical Society Western Region, 2007.
NSF grants to support some of my activities include the following.
“Project iLASER - Celebrating the International Year of Chemistry 2011,” NSF Chemistry and Informal Science Education programs, $150,000, 2011 (NSF grant no. CHE 1118663).
“Project TUESTYC: A Workshop and Mentoring Program for Two-Year College Faculty,” NSF TUES program, $200,000, 2011 (NSF grant no. DUE 1129271).
“Chemistry Coalitions, Workshops and Communities of Scholars,” NSF TUES program, 2010. The Principal Investigator is Jerry Smith at Georgia State University, and I am the Principal Investigator of a subaward to fund the workshops at SWC. (NSF grant no. DUE 1022895).
“Broadening Participation in CCLI: a Workshop and Mentoring Program for Two-Year College Faculty,” NSF TUES program, $199,041, 2010 (NSF grant no. DUE 1029031).
“A CCLI Proposal Preparation Workshop for Two-Year College Chemistry Faculty,” NSF CCLI program, $49,999, 2009 (NSF grant no. DUE 0924269).
“Bridging Community College Chemistry Faculty into the National Educational Community,” NSF CCLI program, $200,000, 2007 (NSF grant no. DUE 0737166).
“Establishing a Program in Chemical Technology at Southwestern College,” NSF ATE program, $211,615, 2001 (NSF grant no. DUE 0101729).
“Instrumentation to Enhance the Chemistry Curriculum at Southwestern College,” NSF ILI program, $73,426, 1998 (NSF grant no. DUE 9850951).
Accounts of some of these activities have been reported in the media and scientific literature.
