From Introductory Chemistry at the Community College Level to Post

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Chapter 9

From Introductory Chemistry at the Community College Level to Post-Undergraduate Success: Strategies at Queensborough Community College that Secure the Success of Ethnically Diverse STEM Students Paris Svoronos* Department of Chemistry, Queensborough Community College, 222-05 56 Avenue, Bayside, New York 11364, United States *E-mail: [email protected]

Queensborough Community College of the City University of New York (QCC-CUNY) has evolved into a prime time institution that converts initially unguided highly diverse students into competitive post-undergraduate scientists through the implementation of several strategies. Starting with a rigid in-house Honors Program, such strategies include, but are not limited to, paid and unpaid internships and faculty supervised research opportunities that lead to student oral and poster presentations at American Chemical Society conferences and publications while they are still at Queensborough. Instrumentation and grant acquisition have greatly helped this success which has subsequently led to national awards including the ACS Scholars and Jack Kent Cooke scholarships as well as a significant number of annual paid summer NSF-REU opportunities.

Introduction Queensborough Community College is one of the seven community colleges that are part of the City University of New York. Its Fall 2015 total enrollment © 2017 American Chemical Society Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


was 15,493 students but only 13,692 pursuing one of the 50 different associate degree and certificate programs. The college’s student body is similar to the ethnic diversity of Queens, the most of all five boroughs that comprise New York City with a roughly a quarter each African American (25%), White (16%), Hispanic (30%) and Asian American (28%). Students come from 132 countries and speak more than 45 languages other than English as home. More than 60% of the full time faculty have doctorates and 22% have terminal degrees in fields such as nursing, engineering or visual arts. The curricula with the highest enrollments were Liberal Arts and Sciences (A.A.), Business Administration (A.S.), Criminal Justics (A.S.), Health Sciences (A.S.) and Liberal Arts and Sciences (Mathematics and Science, A.S.)

Queensborough before 2000 Until 2000 Queensborough Community College (QCC) was basically a post-high school open-admission institution whose mission was to transfer its students to CUNY senior colleges after completing any remediation in addition to the standard courses taken by freshmen and sophomores. There were almost three dozen articulations, certificates and other programs but the possibility of internships, research opportunities and extracurricular academic involvement that would strengthen the student’s resume were not instituted. The number of STEM students was low and stagnant until 2000 when the Central Office of CUNY approved a new college president, Dr. Eduardo Marti, whose credentials included a doctorate in Biochemistry. It was at that time when the new administration started encouraging the jump start of our students’ success while at Queensborough and before their transfer to a senior college.

The Queensborough Community College Honors Program Since 1981 several attempts have been made to create a college Honors Program. Finally in 2000 and with the support of the Office of Academic Affairs the program started with two students in Introductory Chemistry and quickly expanded to the creation of several Honors sections and contract undertakings. The current nature of the Honors Program at Queensborough provides an enriched classroom environment and an overall intellectual experience to interested and high achieving and ambitious students. In a usually much smaller class setting Honors designated sections allow a greater interaction between the professor and the scholars. As a result the students expand their knowledge in areas related to that particular labelled Honors Section which is evidenced either by end-of-the semester oral power point presentations and extended lab reports or long, elaborate term papers. This experience distinguishes these students among their peers and solidifies their resume when seeking internships and scholarships upon transfer to a senior college. Another Honors Program-related opportunity is the Honors Contract which is a signed agreement between the interested student, the professor of a course he/she is taking and the department chair and requires an 96 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.

extra detailed project which is in addition to the regular course workload. Honors credit is given only if the contract conditions are fulfilled and approved by the professor and cannot be contested. Students who are interested in joining the Honors Program or taking Honors classes and contract agreements must meet any of the following criteria: •


•

•

Students may take Honors courses or request an Honors Contract if they have completed a minimum of 9 college credits with a minimum GPA of 3.0. Students who wish to take Honors classes but whose GPA is below 3.0 may do so with a recommendation from an individual faculty member or a department chair, as long as they have demonstrated a significant strength in the discipline for which honors enrollment is requested. Incoming students with a strong high school background may take an Honors class, with special permission from a faculty member, department chair or the director of the Honors program. Incoming students should present their credentials to the director of the Honors Program.

All Honors work must be completed in addition to regular course requirements and must be completed in accordance with Honors standards and CUNY’s Policy of Academic Integrity. Attendance at an Honors Library Workshop is mandatory for all students pursuing an Honors Contract (unless done so previously in a prior semester) in order to receive Honors credit. All students must receive a grade of Bor better in an Honors course, in a course for which they have an Honors Contract or in a course for which they attend a series of Honors Specific Workshops, in order to receive Honors credit. Students who meet these requirements will receive a notation of Honors on their college transcript next to the appropriate course. To graduate with an Honors certificate a student must have completed a minimum of 12 Honors credits and have an overall GPA of 3.40. All Honors Chemistry/Biochemistry/Biology students are asked to take the Sci Finder workshop and are assigned an account to use in their Honors course projects. Honors certificate graduates are recognized at the annual commencement ceremony” (1). As a result of these experiences such student scholars at Queensborough have found their chances for scholarships, internships and transfer process to better programs upon graduation greatly enhanced. In fact several of our recent graduates were willing to complete more than 30 Honors credits often sacrificing a potentially higher GPA. The all-time standing record of Honors credits taken by a Queensborough student is 40.5- all in STEM classes. The majority of Honors designated sections are STEM classes with Introductory Chemistry, General Chemistry I and II, Biology II, Calculus I and II, Biotechnology, Bioinformatics and Genetics offered every semester. In addition Honors credit is given to students who complete all-but-one weekly Honors assignments in Biology I and Pre-Calculus. Finally research courses that require a minimum of 45 hours (clocked) per credit per semester are also offered by the Biology, Chemistry as well as the Mathematics and Computer Science Departments. The average number of Honors certificate awarded graduates is more than 20 per year with a standing record of 33 in 2015. 97 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


Most Honors students have the opportunity and are asked to present their research findings at the Annual QCC Honors Conference which is usually held on the first Friday afternoon every May. The first such conference was held in 2005 with about 60 presentations and has expanded to more than 200 twelve years later (2016). The grand majority of scholars make oral power point presentations of their work in an academic set up of up to 18 rooms all equipped with podia and projectors. The remaining ones, usually engineering students, demonstrate their robots and other homemade electronic devices in the Science Building lobby. During the last few years we have also invited our colleagues from other colleges to also submit abstracts online. They have responded positively by sending a few of their honors students to participate side by side with ours. A program book that includes all abstract submissions as well as an annual Honors Newsletter that includes more than 50 reflections by Honors students, alumni and professors are distributed to all participants and attendees during the conference.

Undergraduate Research at Queensborough Undergraduate research started in a very simple, low-key manner by getting a young Pakistani female GED student to work on a variation of the Pinacol-Pinacolone rearrangement under the supervision of Paris Svoronos and Sasan Karimi. Although the reaction was known for more than a century, varying the nature of the dehydrating acid was found to produce a change in the relative ratio of pinacolone: 2,3-dimethylbutadiene. The findings were first presented orally at the 48th American Chemical Society-New York Section Undergraduate Research Symposium (ACS-NY section URS) at Fordham University- the first time ever by a community college student. The results were subsequently submitted in a poster form at the 220th National ACS Meeting in Washington DC (August 2000). The administration supported the trip with all registration, hotel and travel expenses in this unprecedented experience. The results were further reproduced and later submitted and published in Tetrahedron Letters (2).This was the first ever publication by a Queensborough student with results obtained while still being a student in the college. Svoronos was elected chair of the Chemistry Department during the summer of 2001 in addition to his appointment as the director of the Honors Program and through this additional responsibility he recruited four new students for research- all, intentionally, from a different ethnic background. All were femalesone from Haiti, one from China, one from South Korea and one from Brazil and were registered in a newly approved Honors credit-bearing research course. Their projects involved simple pH meters to determine the kinetic solvolysis rate of reactive alkyl halides and a UV-visible spectrophotometer to measure the distribution coefficient of dyes in organic solvents. All presented their results orally at the 2001 ACS-New York section URS at Pace University while earning Honors credits. In addition to Svoronos and Karimi, Pedro Irigoyen, a lab technician, was also involved as a co-mentor. 2002 celebrated the 50th Undergraduate Research Symposium of the ACSNew York section which was held at Hofstra University. More faculty joined the 98 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


mentoring of students that led to twelve presentations by an ever more diverse group. This included two Haitians, two Pakistanis, two Brazilians, a Venezuelan, a Greek, an Indian, a Nigerian, a Burmese (Myanmarese) and a South Koreanall, but two, females. This was the beginning of an uninterrupted sequence of years where Queensborough’s student presenters make up the largest contingency among all New York City participating colleges and universities. The number of students at this conference expanded even further to fourteen in 2003 (Stony Brook University) with the inclusion of some students who conducted biochemical research at Queensborough’s Department of Biological Sciences and Geology. That year’s students’ ethnic background included Pakistan, Iran, Uzbekistan/Israel, Venezuela, Nigeria, Bangladesh, Greece, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Haiti, Dominica, and Colombia, Argentina as well as the first US-born scholar. Thirteen of them had their poster abstracts accepted at the 36th Middle Atlantic Regional Meeting (MARM) at Princeton University (June 2003) and seven at the National American Chemical Society Meeting in New York City (August 2003). As the years passed the number of student researchers increased and fluctuated according to the number of faculty involved and the conferences our cohort could participate as dictated by the financial availability provided by external grants. In addition an annual average of 1.5 peer reviewed publications bearing Queensborough students’ name for the research conducted on site has been recorded. Listed below (Table 1) is the list of research students who had at least one professional ACS conference and their corresponding ethnic diversity

Table 1. List of Queensborough Research Students and Their Ethnicity Who Had at Least One Professional Chemistry Conference Presentation Year

Asiansa

Blackb

Hispanicc

Whited

Total

2000

1

0

0

0

1

2001

3

1

1

0

5

2002

5

2

6

1

14

2003

7

4

3

2

16

2004

9

7

11

3

30

2005

8

12

12

3

35

2006

12

8

13

3

36

2007

11

5

3

3

22

2008

17

2

9

5

29

2009

17

8

6

2

33

2010

17

5

7

3

32

2011

10

6

6

3

25

Continued on next page.

99 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


Table 1. (Continued). List of Queensborough Research Students and Their Ethnicity Who Had at Least One Professional Chemistry Conference Presentation Year

Asiansa

Blackb

Hispanicc

Whited

Total

2012

18

4

7

7

36

2013

22

1

9

5

37

2014

20

1

6

2

29

2015

14

1

7

1

23

2016

16

0

10

1

27

a

Asians includes Chinese, South Koreans, Taiwanese, Hong Kongese, Indians, Pakistanis, Afghanis, Bangladeshis, Burmese, Thai, Sri Lankan, Nepali, Iranian, and Asian Russian. b Black includes US-born African Americans, Africans, Jamaicans, and Trinidadians. c Hispanic includes Puerto Ricans, Central and South Americans as well as Native Americans d White includes US-born whites as well as Europeans.

Instituting Research Facilities in the Department The main issue new research faculty had was the availability of laboratory space and instrumentation. A young faculty always has problems adjusting to the new environment of mentoring students whose academic background is lower than the one encountered in doctorate institutions. Therefore it was the chair’s task to seek grant opportunities that would help support credible research projects. One-by-one instruments were purchased through independent grants- and no financial support by the administration. Currently the chemistry department has the following on site • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Biotage Initiator Plus Microwave Reactor Biotage Initiator 2.5 Microwave Oven Biotage Isolera One Flash Chromatograph Anasazi EFT 90 MHz FT-NMR Hitachi TM -1000 Tabletop SEM and Swift ED-TM EDX Reichert Mark II Plus Abbe Refractometer Nicolet 6700 FT-NIR PE 2400 CHNS/O Analyzer Varian Cary 50 Bio UV-Visible Varian 2100T GC/MS Innov X Systems x-Ray Fluorescence Sentro Tech Furnace VWR 1415 Vacuum Oven Chromatron Metro Toledo Karl Fisher Coulometer Shimadzu FT-IR 8400S Thermo HPLC P1000 100

Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


• •

Dionei Ultimate 3000 HPLC Rudolph Research Analytical Automatic Polarimeter

The increasing number of posters necessitated the funds for an HP Desk Design 500 Poster Maker which were secured as early as 2002. It is estimated that spending of about $500 in ink and postage yearly would guarantee the printing of 100 posters for the professional conferences. The next task would be to secure a laboratory for the student researchers since the dramatic increase of the STEM students would not allow the use of teaching labs. In addition the initial trend of our faculty to use the laboratories of other institutions as guests became impractical due to commuting and scheduling conflicts. Through grant funding again two laboratories were created from scratch (2007 and 2011) and the availability of a total of six fume hoods and eight benches allows a total of up to twelve students to conduct research at the same time. As a result of this effort research students were more likely to be selected for scholarships, internships and awards due to their enhanced resumes. Listed below (Table 2) is the summary of these opportunities with the ethnic diversity in each case

Table 2. List of Queensborough Students and their Ethnicity Who Benefited from Various Internships Awards and Scholarships Opportunity

Asiansa

Blackb

Hispanicc

Whited

Food and Drug Administration

7

0

3

1

New York City-Division of Environmental Protection

31

8

16

5

ACS-Scholars

0

1

6

0

NSF-REU Internships

17

2

11

0

a

Asians includes Chinese, South Koreans, Taiwanese, Hong Kongese, Indians, Pakistanis, Afghanis, Bangladeshis, Burmese, Thai, SriLankan, Jordanian, Nepali, Iranian, Asian Russian, Philippino. b Black includes US-born African Americans, Africans, Jamaicans, and Trinidadians. c Hispanic includes Puerto Ricans, Central and South Americans as well as Native Americans. d White includes US-born whites as well as Europeans.

Unpaid Internships at the Food and Drug Administration in Jamaica, NY Since 2001 we have succeeded in securing at least one unpaid intern during the academic year at the Northeast Regional Lab (NRL) in Jamaica NY. The NRL is “a mega-laboratory capable of analyzing most analytes for which food and drug samples are collected for chemical analysis. NRL performs the following chemical analysis as a servicing laboratory for a majority of the compliance programs that require analytical support; filth and sanitation, sensory decomposition and chemical indices of decomposition, residues in seafood, 101 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


elemental analysis of food and tableware, mycotoxins, pesticides and industrial chemicals, allergenic ingredients, human drug product and API testing, and feed contaminants. NRL also performs analyses of food and color additives as well as food, pharmaceutical and cosmetic microbiology” (3). Students who have completed at least a year of this experience have solidified their interest in the chemical/biological/health fields and have proceeded with successful post-Queensborough careers as seen in Table 3. Most had their internship findings presented in poster form at various conferences including the annual Columbia Undergraduate Research Symposium, ACS regional meetings such as the Northeast Regional Meeting (NERM) and Western Regional Meeting (WRM) in addition to MARM as well as National ACS Meetings.

Table 3. List of Queensborough Students who were Awarded an Unpaid Food and Drug Administration Internship in Jamaica, NY Current status

Year of student participation

Gender

Country of Origin

2015-16

Male

S.Korea

Physician Assistant student at Case Western Fall 2016

Female

Taiwan

Currently at QCC Biochemistry major

Male

S.Korea


Female

Taiwan

Currently at QCC Biochemistry major

2013-14

Male

S.Korea


2012-13

Male

S.Korea

Currently at the University of Maryland/Baltimore Pharmacy

2011-12

Female

Pakistan

Currently B.S. at Queens College- Biochemistry

2010-11

Female

Pakistan

Currently B.S. at Queens College- Biochemistry

2009-10

Male

Peru

Graduated B.S.in Chemistry Hunter; Ph.D. Student CUNY-Hunter

2008-09

Male

Peru

Graduated B.S.in Chemistry Hunter; Ph.D. Student CUNY-Hunter

2007-08

Female

Colombia

Graduated QCC in STEM/Math

2006-07

Female

India

Graduated QCC in STEM

2005-06

Male

China

B.S. Stony Brook in Biochemistry; M.D. St. George’s; currently an MD

2004-05

Male

China

B.S. Stony Brook in Biochemistry; M.D. St. George’s; currently an MD

2014-15




Table 3. (Continued). List of Queensborough Students who were Awarded an Unpaid Food and Drug Administration Internship in Jamaica, NY Year of student participation

Gender

Country of Origin

Current status

2003-04

Female

Puerto Rico

B.S. Physician Assistant York College; currently a Physician Assistant at Queens General Hospital

2002-03

Female

Pakistan

B.S. Rider University, NJ; M.S. University of Oklahoma/Johns Hopkins Public Health

2001-02

Female

Greece

B.S. Biochemistry Stony Brook DDS Stony Brook; currently a dentist

Paid Summer Internships at the New York City Department of Environmental Protection In 2007 York College (Panayiotis Meleties, PI) and four other community colleges, including Queensborough (Svoronos as the co-Pi) were successful in being awarded a three-year Advanced Technological Education (ATE) grant of approximately $800,000 with the goal to provide promising students with paid summer internships at to the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYC-DEP). This agency protects both public health and the environment by securing clean drinking water, collecting and treating wastewater, as well as reducing pollution associated with air, noise and hazardous materials. The DEP employs nearly 6,000 employees and “manages and conserves the City’s water supply; distributes more than one billion gallons of clean drinking water each day to nine million New Yorkers and collects wastewater through a vast underground network of pipes, regulators, and pumping stations; and treats the 1.3 billion gallons of wastewater that New Yorkers produce each day in a way that protects the quality of New York Harbor. To achieve these mandates, DEP oversees one of the largest capital construction programs in the region. As the City agency responsible for New York City’s environment, DEP also regulates air quality, hazardous waste, and critical quality of life issues, including noise” (4). The students were assigned to work only with the water-associated division for a total of 280 (clocked) hours and were asked to provide a written summary of their findings and experience. Once more the effect of this experience has been paramount as seen in the data that appear in Table 4.



Table 4. List of Queensborough Students and their Ethnicity that Were Awarded a Paid Summer NYC-DEP Internship Current Status

Year of Student Participation

Gender

2015

Female

Taiwan

Currently at QCC; on a summer 2016 NSFREU internship at Jackson State MS (cancer research); also offered but declined 2016 internship at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (nanochemistry); a Biochemistry/ Physician Assistant major hopeful

Female

South Korea

Currently at QCC; on a summer 2016 NSF-REU internship at Binghamton University (nanochemistry); a Forensics major

Female

Malaysia

Currently at QCC; on a summer 2016 NSF-REU internship at Georgia Tech

Female

Sri Lanka

Currently at QCC; an Engineering major

Female

China

Currently at QCC; STEM major

Male

South Korea

Graduated QCC 2016 as a Health Sciences Major; Starts as a Physician Assistant (PA) student at Case Western Fall 2016

Female

Bangla-desh

Graduated QCC 2016 as a Science/Mathematics major; Starts as a STEM junior at City College in Fall 2016

Female

Dominican Republic

Moved to Dominican Republic before graduating from QCC

Female

Italy

Graduated QCC 2015 as a Science/Math major; Currently a Biochemistry major at Stony Brook; awarded 2015 NSF-REU internship at University of Connecticut and turned down one at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (nanochemistry); Jack Kent Cooke Scholar; Gold PTK scholar

Female

Hong Kong

Graduated QCC 2015 as an Engineering major; Currently an Engineering major at CUNY-City College

Female

Colombia

Graduated QCC 2016 as a Science for Forensics major; awarded 2015 summer internship at Lehman College; A BioPrep 2016 intern at Stony Brook; Will start as a junior at Stony Brook Fall 2016

Female

Taiwan

Graduated QCC 2016 as a Nursing major; A Hunter nursing junior Fall 2016

2014

2013

Country of Origin



Table 4. (Continued). List of Queensborough Students and their Ethnicity that Were Awarded a Paid Summer NYC-DEP Internship



2012

Gender

Country of Origin

Current Status

Female

South Korea

Graduated QCC 2014 as a Science/Math major; Graduated as a Biochemistry major at Queens College (Honors Program); awarded 2014 NSF-REU internship at Hope College; Will start as Physician Assistant (PA) major at Case Western (Fall 2016)

Male

Venezuela

Diseased before graduating from QCC

Male

India

Graduated from QCC Spring 2015; On a summer 2014 NSF-REU internship at Binghamton University; an Engineering major at CUNY-City College

Female

Ecuador

Graduated from QCC Spring 2015; On a summer 2014 summer NSF-REU internship at Georgetown University; on a summer 2015 NSF-REU internship at Princeton University; Currently at John Jay College; Jack Kent Cooke Scholar; Bronze PTK scholar; ACS Scholar

Female

Mexico

Transferred to Wheaton College

Female

El Salvador

Graduated from QCC Fall 2015; currently at Queens College

Female

South Korea

Graduated from QCC Spring 2015; On a summer 2015 NSF- REU internship at University of Connecticut (physical chemistry); also offered but declined 2015 internship at University of Memphis; a Biochemistry Honors Program at Queens College

Female

Peru

Graduated from QCC Spring 2014; on a summer 2013 summer NSF-REU internship at Stony Brook University; on a summer 2014 NSF-REU internship at Princeton University; Currently at Stony Brook University; ACS Scholar

Male

Hong Kong

Graduated Queensborough in Engineering Fall 2013; Currently a B.S. student in Engineering at CUNY-City College. Starts Podiatry School in Fall 2016. Continued on next page.





2011

Gender

Current Status

Country of Origin

Female

China

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM Fall 2013; Graduated from Stony Brook Biochemistry Spring 2016; In Germany for graduate studies starting Fall 2016; on an NSF-REU at Stony Brook University Summer 2013; First ever QCC Jack Kent Cook scholarship recipient; Full Year Thesis scholarship recipient while at Stony Brook

Male

South Korea

Graduated Spring 2013; University of Maryland/Baltimore Pharmacy

Male

China

Two semesters at Queensborough; two at Queens College

Male

China

Graduated from Queensborough in Engineering Fall 2012; B.S. University of Buffalo Chemical Engineering 2016; working in industry as R&D associate

Female

Mexico

Dropped out

Female

Ukraine

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2012; B.S. St. John’s University; B.S. Nursing New York University; Currently an RN

Female

Albania

Graduated from Queensborough Health Spring 2012; Graduated from St. John’s University Nursing; Currently an RN

Male

Singapore

Graduated from Queensborough LS1 in Math/Science Spring 2014; Currently in Pharmacy School Buffalo

Male

Thailand

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2013; Currently at Hunter College

Male

Nigeria

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2011;York College (2011-2013); currently working in Texas in industry in Pharmaceutical Sciences

Female

China

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2014; Biochemistry major at Hunter

Male

Jordan

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2011; Currently at Queens

Female

India

Graduated as STEM student from Queensborough Summer 2012; Graduated from Queens College Spring 2016 Continued on next page.


Table 4. (Continued). List of Queensborough Students and their Ethnicity that Were Awarded a Paid Summer NYC-DEP Internship Year of Student Participation


2010

Gender

Current Status

Country of Origin

Female

Iran

Graduated from Queensborough Health Sciences Spring 2012; At York College

Male

Guyana

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2014; Dental lab technician

Male

Colombia

Graduated from Queensborough in Engineering Summer 2012; Currently at City College in Engineering

Female

Mexico

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2010; Graduated with a Physician Assistant Program York College 2012; Currently a Physician Assistant

Female

Burma/ Myarmar

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM Spring 2012; Graduated with a B.S. in Biochemistry Queens College; Currently in Graduate Biochemistry Program Queen College

Male

Colombia

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM Spring 2012; Graduated from Stony Brook in Biochemistry Spring 2015; Currently an MD student at Stony Brook; ACS scholar 2012; On a summer NSF-REU internship at Rutgers University (Summer 2011)

Female

China

Part-time lab technician

Male

Greece

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2011; At Hofstra University

Male

Nigeria

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2011; Graduated with a B.S. York College Fall 2014; In Graduate School Queens College

Female

Hispanic

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2012; Currently an Engineering student at CUNY-City College

Female

Nicaragua

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM Spring 2012; Graduated from Stony Brook in Biochemistry Spring 2015; Currently an MD student at Albert Einstein Medical School; ACS scholar 2012; On a summer NSF-REU internship at Stony Brook University 2012

Male

Colombia

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2010; Graduated from City College 2013; Back at QCC (2015- ) (2nd career) Continued on next page.



Table 4. (Continued). List of Queensborough Students and their Ethnicity that Were Awarded a Paid Summer NYC-DEP Internship Current Status


Gender

2009

Female

Guyana

Graduated from Queensborough Fall 2011; Process Engineer at The Estée Lauder Companies

Female

Egypt

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM Spring 2009; Graduated from Stony Brook in Biochemistry Spring 2011; Currently in a PhD/MD program in Italy

Male

Sudan

Graduated from Queensborough Fall 2010; Currently at York College

Female

Guyana

Graduated from Queensborough Summer 2010; Graduated from New York City Tech Fall 2013; Graduate student at City College

Male

US-African American

Graduated from Queensborough in Computer Engineering Spring 2010; Currently a college lab technician

Male

Puerto Rican

Unknown

Female

South Korean

Graduated from Queensborough Fall 2014; Currently at Hunter College

Female

South Korea

Graduated from Queensborough Fall 2010; Graduated as a Physician Assistant Pace University 2013; Currently a Physician Assistant

Female

Pakistan

Graduated from Queensborough as an Engineering Science students in Spring 2009; Graduated with a B.S. in Engineering City College Spring 2012; Environmental Engineering-Assistant Project Manager

Female

Afghanistan

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2010; Graduated from York College 2014

Female

South Korea

Graduated from Queensborough in STEM; Graduated from York College 2014

Male

Greece

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2009; Queens college transfer (2009-11)

2008

Country of Origin






Gender

Current Status

Country of Origin

Male

US African American

Graduated from Queensborough Spring 2009; City College Computer -14); State of New York Metropolitan Transportation Authority employee

Female

US-African American

Transferred to York without graduating; stayed at York for two semesters; currently at LaGuardia Community College

Grants Obtained for Securing the Success The first grant obtained was a small ($5,000) NSF grant in 2000 that promoted Peer-Led Teaching and Learning (PLTL) tutoring. It helped several students, whose native language was not English, establish the confidence and eloquence needed for their professional conference presentations. The next target was to obtain an NSF STEP grant that would provide mainly stipends and conference participation for both faculty and students. However the PI (Svoronos) and co-PIs (Melvin Gorelick of the Department of Biological Sciences and Geology at Queensborough and Tom Strekas of Queens College’s Chemistry Department) had to demonstrate that the proposal was doable. In order to achieve the outcomes within the limited budget it was necessary to limit the expenses. Therefore we avoided attending conferences whose venues were far, tried to make the trip last only one day and used the college Athletic Department vans for the transportation. The Student Government and the Office of Student Affairs would subsidize the student presenters’ registration while the office of Academic Affairs would cover the faculty’s expenses, The strategy worked and Queensborough got the highest ever grant at the time ($2,000,000) for the period of 2007-2012 which because of careful spending was left with enough funds to justify an extension to 2014. The outcomes were appreciated by the NSF officers and in fact the grant was unofficially ranked as #1 in 2011 at the Grantees meeting in Arlington, VA. The grant originally also involved internships at the Brookhaven National Laboratory but eventually also included the NYC-DEP once the grant with York College expired in 2012. In addition to supporting internships, faculty and professional conference participation the grant also supported group tutoring by exceptional in all courses. From the period of 2012-14 a free Introductory Chemistry class for 20 incoming freshmen STEM students was offered during the summer. The collected tuition that was paid by the grant did cover the instructor’s and lab technician’s salaries. Many of these students proceeded to continue in STEM sciences and engaged in undergraduate research (5, 6). In 2014 a US Department of Education MSEIP (Minority Science and Engineering Improvement Program) three-year grant of about $670,000 was 109 Nelson and Cheng; Diversity in the Scientific Community Volume 2: Perspectives and Exemplary Programs ACS Symposium Series; American Chemical Society: Washington, DC, 2017.


awarded to Queensborough (Nidhi Gadura, of the Department of Biological Sciences and Technology, PI and Svoronos co-PI). Its main goal is to use undergraduate research as a tool to engage, retain and graduate. The ongoing results for this grant are in pace with the proposed goals and support of students and faculty and have followed the same pattern as the NSF-STEP grant. More concerted efforts are on the way to secure more grants that would extend this effort as more STEM Fields are involved in this endeavor. As a recent example a total of 54 posters and talks by Queensborough students were made at the recently held 44th Middle Atlantic Regional Meeting (MARM 2016) at the College of Mount St. Vincent in Riverdale NY and 19 posters were presented at the National ACS Meeting in Boston (August 2015).

The ACS Scholars Award The American Chemical Society offers monetary awards to support qualified undergraduates in the chemical sciences as a way to reward their accomplishments while encouraging progress. These eligible individuals who can apply for such an ACS Scholars Award must be “African American, Native American [or] Hispanic/ Latino students planning to pursue full-time study in a chemically-related field with outstanding academic records and a desire to pursue a career in the chemical sciences.” Such underrepresented minority students must continue in chemistry or a chemistry-related field with awards of up to $5,000 (7). Queensborough has been successful in having seven of its students winning this prestigious award as seen in Table 5 below.

Table 5. List of all Queensborough students and their Ethnicity who Were Selected as ACS-scholars Current status

Award Year

Gender

Country of origin

2016

Male

Ecuador

B.S. Biochemistry-Stony Brook University (ongoing)

2015

Female

Ecuador

B.S. Forensics Biochemistry-John Jay College (ongoing)

2014

Female

Peru

B.S. Stony Brook University-Biochemistry

2012

Female

Nicaragua

B.S. Biochemistry-Stony Brook University; Currently an MD student at Albert Einstein College of Medicine

2012

Male

Columbia

B.S. Biochemistry-Stony Brook University; Currently an MD student at Stony Brook University Continued on next page.



Table 5. (Continued). List of all Queensborough students and their Ethnicity who Were Selected as ACS-scholars Current status

Award Year

Gender

Country of origin

2008

Female

Ivory Coast

B.S. Pharmacy-University of Buffalo; Currently a pharmacist in Texas

2007

Female

Peru

B.S. Biochemistry-University of Buffalo; Currently M.S. Long Island University; Working in a New York pharmaceutical company

NSF-REU Internships Once enhanced student resumes that include more than strong GPAs and quality courses were created, the thought of applying for NSF-REUs was promoted. The NSF funds research opportunities for undergraduate students through its REU Sites program. According to the program website “an REU Site consists of a group of ten or so undergraduates who work in the research programs of the host institution. Each student is associated with a specific research project, where he/she works closely with the faculty and other researchers. Students are granted stipends and, in many cases, assistance with housing and travel. Undergraduate students supported with NSF funds must be citizens or permanent residents of the United States or its possessions. An REU Site may be at either a US or foreign location” (8). Our first chemistry REU student was Rosa Rosales (-Ronquillo) whose selection as a First Team all-USA student led to her selection by the Cornell University program for two consecutive years (2006 and 2007). A listing of all such Queensborough student awardees appears on Table 6. Several students were also selected for a second (and even third) REU experience during the same summer and had to decline.

Table 6. List of Queensborough Community College students who were awarded non-CUNY NSF-Funded Summer Paid REU Internships REU site

Year of internshp

Gender

Country of origin

Also Offered but Declined

2016

Female

Taiwan

Jackson State University, MS

Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, NY

Female

China

Boston University, MA

Cornell University, NY; Georgetown University, DC

Female

China

University of Pennsylvania, PA Continued on next page.


Table 6. (Continued). List of Queensborough Community College students who were awarded non-CUNY NSF-Funded Summer Paid REU Internships


Year of internshp

2015

2014

REU site

Gender

Country of origin


Female

Malaysia

Georgia Institute of Technology, GA

Male

USA

University of Washington, WA

Male

China

Vanderbilt University, TN

Female

S. Korea

Binghamton University, NY

Female

S. Korea


Female

Ecuador

Princeton University, NJ

Female

China

Boise State University, ID

Female

China

Vanderbilt University, TN

Male

Puerto Rico


Male

Hong Kong


Female

Italy

University of Connecticut

University of Memphis, TN

Female

S. Korea

University of Connecticut

University of Rochester, NY

Male

China

University of South Dakota, SD

Female

Peru

Princeton University, NJ

Female

Ecuador

Georgetown University, DC

Male

China

University of South Dakota, SD

Male

Bangladesh Binghamton University, NY

Male

Indian


Female

S. Korea

Hope College, MI

University of Michigan, MI

Boston University, MA

University of Tennessee, TN




Table 6. (Continued). List of Queensborough Community College students who were awarded non-CUNY NSF-Funded Summer Paid REU Internships REU site

Year of internshp

Gender

Country of origin

2013

Female

Peru

Stony Brook, NY

Female

China

Stony Brook, NY

Male

Jamaica

Iowa State University, IA

Male

Puerto Rico


Male

China


Male

Colombia

Rutgers University. NJ

Female

Nicaragua

Stony Brook University, NY

2008

Female

Ivory Coast

Rutgers University. NJ

2007

Female

Peru

Cornell University, NY

2006

Female

Peru

Cornell University, NY

2012


Jack Kent Cooke Undergraduate Transfer Scholarships This scholarship is awarded to top community college students who intend to transfer to a senior college and complete their bachelor’s degrees. It is the largest private scholarship for community college transfer students in the country (9). In its history Queensborough has been fortunate with four students earning this award, three of which are STEM undergraduates (Table 7). In addition two more succeeded in becoming semifinalists (Table 8).

Table 7 Current Status

Year of Award

Gender

Country of origin

2014

Female

China

Biochemistry Graduate (Stony Brook University)

2015

Female

Italy

Biochemistry major (Stony Brook University

2015

Female

Ecuador

Forensics major (John Jay College-CUNY)


Table 8 Year of Award

Gender

Current Status

Country of origin

2016

Male

Ecuador

Biochemistry major (Stony Brook University)

2016

Female

China

Chemistry major (Stony Brook University)


Conclusions The pioneering goal of including research, internships and Honors classes in addition to a great GPA has helped the students’ progress in an admirable way. Needless to say the concerted effort between faculty mentors and research students has led to a cohort that is based on diversity, thirst to succeed in this country, patience and mutual trust. More than a dozen students since 2000 have earned a doctorate in chemistry, biochemistry or biology and an equal number has either completed or are in a medical or dental degree program. And it is up to all involved to stay the course and achieve the American dream.

References 1. 2. 3.

4.

5. 6.

7.

8. 9.

Office of Academic Affairs - Honors Program. http://www.qcc.cuny.edu/ AcademicAffairs/HonorsProgram/ (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). De Lezaeta, M.; Sattar, W.; Svoronos, P.; Karimi, S.; Subramaniam, G. Tetrahedron Lett. 2002, 43, 9307–09. U.S. Food and Drug Administration: Protecting and Promoting your Health- Northeast Regional Lab. http://www.fda.gov/ScienceResearch/ FieldScience/ucm258927.htm (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). Mission Statement of the New York City Department of Environmental Protection. http://www.nyc.gov/html/dep/html/about_dep/mission_ statement.shtml (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). Svoronos, P. D. N. J. Chem. Educ. 2010, 87 (12), 1294–1295. Gadura, N.; Marchese, P.; Svoronos, P. Increasing Retention, Graduation Through the Queens Borough Bridge STEP Program. Tapping the Potential of All: Undergraduate Research at Community Colleges; Hensel, N. H., Cjeda, B. D., Eds.; Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR): 2014; pp 103−109; ISBN: 0-941933-50-4; available: http://www.cur.org/assets/1/7/ tapping_potential_final_web.pdf. How to Apply for an ACS Scholars Award. https://www.acs.org/content/acs/ en/funding-and-awards/scholarships/acsscholars/apply.html (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REU). https://www.nsf.gov/ crssprgm/reu/ (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). Jack Kent Cooke Foundation: Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship. http:/ /www.jkcf.org/scholarship-programs/undergraduate-transfer/faqs/ (accessed Aug. 1, 2016). 114

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