Chemical Education Today
Editorial
The Magical Touch of a Perceptive Individual This Journal has been built by the efforts of a broad range of people. Its editor receives much of the kudos, but no editor should or would claim credit for all or even most of the Journal’s success. Many others play crucial, but less obvious, roles. Jim DeRose was one of those individuals— one who had a profound influence on the fact that this Journal is coming to you today. I am sorry to have to say “Jim was”. He died on November 29, 2003. The entire JCE community mourns his loss, but more importantly all of us should celebrate and emulate the “magical touch of a perceptive individual” (1), something that Jim exemplified. Jim DeRose’s contributions to this Journal alone would place him at the forefront of chemical education. In the 1970s advertising revenues were falling and publication costs were rising. Those managing the Journal’s business affairs suggested that the Journal might have to cease publication. In 1974 the Board of Publication talked Jim DeRose into becoming Publications Coordinator because the Board needed someone who exhibited integrity, sense, industry, and tenacity. Within a short time Jim put the Journal on a sound financial footing that remains to this day. “James V. DeRose literally saved the Journal of Chemical Education from financial ruin when he took over as Publications Coordinator in one of its darkest days.” (2). In addition, in the early 1980s Jim was a driving force behind the expansion of Journal content to include many more articles written by and useful to high school chemistry teachers. He worked very closely with Mickey Sarquis, the first editor of the modern Secondary School Chemistry section, to define content and recruit high school teacher–authors. There is much more to tell about this extraordinary individual. He began his career as a high school teacher in Easton, Maryland in 1940 and subsequently taught at Chester and Marple Newtown High Schools in Pennsylvania. He was a superlative, innovative teacher who won many awards including, in 1970, the ACS’s highest award for a high school teacher, the Conant Award. At Marple Newtown Jim developed an independent study program for high school chemistry students because he thought that the activity of prime importance for students was “learning how to learn whatever they need to learn” (3). That he was well ahead of his time is also evident in a 1971 JCE article that sets forth criteria for evaluating the success of his and his colleagues’ teaching (4). Two decades after taking his course a student wrote, “It was really a tripartite course in chemistry, how to learn on your own, and how to treat others. The kindness and respect with which you conducted self-paced chemistry have made a lasting impression on me.” Jim was also a joiner and leader. In the 1960s he was a member of the Executive Committee of the National Science Teachers Association, and he was the organization’s president in 1965–66. He was on the Board of Directors of the Chemical Bond Approach (CBA) curriculum project and made major contributions to CBA materials. He traveled to India, the Philippines, and China to lead teacher www.JCE.DivCHED.org
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workshops, and he Jim DeRose rightly believed was elected a Fellow of the American that a high school teacher Association for the Advancement of could contribute as much or Science in 1966. In the 1970s he served more than a college teacher. on the Executive Committee of the ACS Division of Chemical Education, a AAAS Commission on Science Education, the U.S. National Commission for UNESCO, a delegation of high school teachers to the Third International Conference on Chemical Education in Dublin, and the Advisory Board for ACS’s Chemistry magazine. In the 1980s Jim DeRose advised the ChemCom project, Project SERAPHIM, and the Institute for Chemical Education. He actively chaired the steering committee for a new ACS publication for high school students, ChemMatters, from 1982 to 1988. He was the founding chair of the ACS DivCHED High School Chemistry Committee and in that capacity was responsible for inaugurating High School Days at ACS National Meetings (5). Jim DeRose was a high school chemistry teacher first and foremost—someone who consciously chose high school teaching above any other profession. He was clearly qualified to teach college courses and did so as a director of summer institutes and as a supervisor of practice teachers, but college was not where his heart was. He rightly believed that a high school teacher could contribute as much or more than a college teacher, and his record of accomplishment more than proves that he was correct. Chemical education has benefitted enormously from Jim DeRose’s quiet, selfless, courteous, yet firm influence. This Journal might not exist, there might be no High School Days at ACS meetings, offerings from the ACS Education and International Activities Division might be quite different, and literally thousands of students might be much less interested in chemistry. My predecessor as editor of this Journal, Joe Lagowski, summed up Jim DeRose’s contributions this way, “There are lots of smart people in the world, but few are wise. Thanks for your wisdom.” Jim was wise enough to make students’ best interest the center of all of his activities. We would do well to emulate him. Literature Cited 1. Neidig, H. A. Abstract 158, ACS National Meeting, Chicago, Illinois, August 1993. 2. Parry, Robert W. Abstract 160, ACS National Meeting, Chicago, Illinois, August 1993. 3. DeRose, James V. J. Chem. Educ. 1970, 47, 553–560; 1980, 57, 70–71. 4. DeRose, James V. J. Chem. Educ. 1971, 48, 676–678. 5. DeRose, James V. J. Chem. Educ. 1979, 56, 612–613.
Vol. 81 No. 3 March 2004
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Journal of Chemical Education
295
