Chem Club
The SCU Chem Club had another activity-packed year in 2015. We are happy to report that we also managed to snag our 23rd consecutive Chapter award from the American Chemical Society (Commendable Chapter Award) for 2014-2015!
In 2014-2015 we continued our tradition of participating in community service events. In Winter term we developed a new set of hands-on science demonstrations illustrating the interaction of UV radiation with matter and presented this to local high school students at the second annual SCCAP Science Night at the Locatelli Center. In the Spring we helped the local ACS section host regional testing for the National Chemistry Olympiad and had a “rainbow” glasses, and using chromatography to prepare tie-dye hankies. It’s always a lot of fun for club members to participate in this event.
We appreciate the chance to interact with about 35 very bright local high school students who were competing for a chance to represent the USA at the International Chemistry Olympiad in Azerbaijan (one of the students WAS selected to be a member of that four-4 student team!!); we are always proud to be able to facilitate this worthy activity.
In Fall we once again trekked to the Martin Luther King Library in San Jose for a morning of hand-on science demonstrations with kids and their parents. The National Chemistry Week theme this year was “Chemistry colors your world” so of course we had fun helping kids making many batches of colored slime! Other activities included using color-changing UV-sensitive beads to detect UV radiation, viewing ambient light through spectroscopes and serve the community and also to meet Student Members from other Chapter such as the SJSU Chapter!
We also participated in research-related activities in 2014-research. We also hosted two ACS Webinar “Program-In-A-Box” events including a webinar on “Chemistry on the 2015, meeting with numerous seminar speakers (and hosting lots and lots of munchies for the seminars!) and continued to organize a research panel in the Spring. In this event, experienced upper division students talked to lower division students about their experiences with regard to finding a research lab and in conducting undergraduate Silver Screen” and a second webinar on “Tales of Lab Safety: How to Avoid Rookie Accidents”. In the Spring we attended the annual Northern California Undergraduate Research Symposium; club members gave oral and poster presentations of research ranging from physical chemistry to organic chemistry to biochemical education research in a spectacular setting on the lovely UCSC campus.
It wouldn’t be Chem Club if we didn’t host lots of food-related activities! This year we trusted our tried-and-true activities such as the Thanksgiving “TRP for Turkey” sandwich party, a Pi day social, a Sweetest Day social, ice cream socials, and the usual Pizza parties. We also had a Valentines party where we made valentines for the faculty and staff (especially LOURDES!!!!!!!); we distributed them on Valentine’s Day as a way of saying thanks to all of these amazing people year long.