A publication of
The Illinois-Iowa Section of
The American Chemical Society
 

If you have items to be included in the next newsletter, submit the items by August 15 to the Secretary.
For the latest information about upcoming events, visit our website at http://membership.acs.org/I/ILIA/

Abstract

This month's meeting will include a tour of the Bent River Brewery.

UPCOMING MEETINGS

The next meeting will be held Wednesday, September 7th at Muscatine Community College The food will be catered in and Alton Banks, tour speaker, will be the presenter.

KISER SCHOLARSHIP

• Twenty-one applications for the Kiser Scholarship are currently being reviewed by the committee consisting of R. Craddick, N. Smith, A. Serianz, G. Bailey, and J. Torres y Torres.
• A recommendation will be presented to the Executive Committee on 04/26.
• The scholarship will be presented during the school's award ceremony.

CHEMISTRY OLYMPIAD

The national exam was held at Muscatine Community College, April 16, 2005.

NATIONAL CHEMISTRY WEEK

A report of the activities of National Chemistry Week 2004 and the updates on activities planned for NCW 2005 are on our website: http://membership.acs.org/I/ILIA/. The theme for 2005 is "Joy of Toys." The NCW committee has met and several exciting ideas are being considered.

NATIONAL COUNCILORS MEETING (Highlights):

Spring ACS Meeting - San Diego, CA March 14 - 17, 2005

1. President - Elect candidates for 2006: Catherine T. Hunt and John W. Kozarich, and George E. Heinz (by petition).
2. Attendees: 15,385.
3. Current ACS President, Dr. William F. Carroll, Jr. will try to visit as many ACS sections as possible. Please contact him
4. 2006 dues set at $127 based upon consumer price index - passed.
5. Establish a Committee on Ethics. Nine members for initial five-year trial period - passed.
6. Financial reserves increasing nicely.
7. Project Seed continued.
8. Voted to honor San Diego hosts for meeting.
9. Society to evaluate Houston and Denver for future meeting sites.
10. 2004 membership (as of 12/31/04) was 158,127, which is -1.0 % over year 2003. There were 14,000 new members joining in 2004.
11. "Local Section Innovative Project Grants Program" - Deadlines 4/1/05 and 8/1/05. See www.chemistry.org/localsections for more detail.

NOTE FROM LISA FIELDS

Dear chemistry colleagues,

I have not been involved in ACS events lately and I wanted to update you on my situation. I am sad to say I will not be able to be a part of the IL-IA ACS section in the future. This is because I'm moving out of the section area! My good news is that I will be soon re-joining the field of chemistry education, as a high school chemistry teacher in Kansas.

My family and I are moving to Valley Center, KS (just north of Wichita) at the end of April. In June I will begin coursework in an alternative teacher licensure program at Wichita State University. For those of you who don't know, I have a PhD in chemistry and teaching experience at the college level, but no education courses or certification/licensure for high school. Wichita State has an excellent and well-received program called Transition to Teaching which will allow me to start teaching (and start earning a regular teacher's salary) beginning this fall, after only 3 education courses. It is a 2-year program with coursework in the summer and supervision/meetings during the school year. If you would like to learn more about this type of program, visit these web sites:

http://www.wichita.edu/education/alternativecertification

http://www.ed.gov/admins/tchrqual/recruit/altroutes/index.html

I am looking forward to this change. I enjoyed college teaching but I think I might like teaching at the high school level even more. Time and experience will tell! We are relocating to the Wichita area as that is where my husband and I grew up, and we have many relatives nearby, including aging parents. The Wichita area is similar in size to the QCA, and there are about 20 high schools within commuting distance.

As yet, I do not have a teaching job for the fall. I am in the process of finding a job and am confident that I will have one before school starts in August. If you wish to stay in contact, you can reach me at this hotmail address: lmbfields@hotmail.com.

I want to say thank you so much for your support in working with me on various ACS projects in the past. This is a wonderful section, and I will be very sorry to leave it behind. I can remember going to my very first IL-IA section meeting. It was in Feb. 1995 at GPC, just a couple of weeks after I moved to Iowa from Syracuse, NY. Everyone was very welcoming, and I especially remember the hospitality of the late Don Kiser at that particular meeting. There are so many caring people who have worked hard to bring about success in section activities - the Chemistry Olympiad, the National Chemistry Week events. the Kiser Scholarship, the interesting monthly meetings, TOY and POY awards, etc. I hope to see you all sometime in the future at an ACS meeting or event, or read about you winning another local section award in C&EN!

Best wishes,

Lisa Fields

BI-MONTHLY NEWSLETTER FROM THE OFFICE OF LOCAL SECTION ACTIVITIES

Deb McLaughlin of the Office of Local Section Activities has put together a newsletter. Topics include call for papers, Regional and National meeting activities, Education programs, This Month in Chemical History, thoughts to ponder, etc. If anyone is interested in the entire newsletter from the Office of Local Section Activities, it can be accessed at http://chemistry.org/localsections/editors.html

Contact us: