PACIFIC SOUTHWEST ASSOCIATION OF CHEMISTRY TEACHERS PERSONALITIES AND TRENDS JOHN LEO ABERNETHY California State Polytechnic College, San Luis Obispo, California
FACULTY members and
students have contributed ern California, Norman Kharasch is writing a source substantially to the progress of chemistry in the book of organic chemistry to accompany a semester Pacific Southwest throughout this year. Mention text in this field. should be made of some of these contributions and their Of the many schools that hold a science day for contributors, because much of what is being done a t teachers or prospective students, Caltech, of course, present or is planned for the near future will have an offersone of the most satisfying. At their last annual effect locally and in some cases nationally. Details of students1-day program, more than 1000 high-school and some of these will be presented in expanded form later. junior-college students and teachers visited this campus. Stanley W. Morse, chairman of the division of natural Caltech undergraduates took the visitors, representing sciences at San Francisco State College, was granted a some 125 private and public institutions, on campus sabbatical leave for the spring semester of 1956 to tours and pointed out their analog computer, hypersonic study the relation between "general education" and wind tunnel, microwave laboratory, and solar furnace. ',professional science" programs a t various institutions. A lunch was then given for visiting students in the He will welcome any communications related to this student houses, for which housing Caltech is renowned. problem, particularly fkom those who have had experi- After the lunch, the student body president, Philip R. ence in this expanding field of integration. The chair- Conley, gave a brief welcome followed by a talk by Lee man of the chemistry department of Occidental College, A. Dubridge, Caltech president. The teachers lunched L. Reed Brantley, has been elected counselor of the with Caltech faculty members a t the Athenaeum and southern California section of the American Chemical gathered later t o hear an address by Clark B. Millikan, Society. He retains his position as secretary of the professor of aeronautics and director of the Guggencouncil committee of the National Society on Chemical heim aeronautical laboratory. In the afternoon, a Education. At San Diego State College, Lionel program of demonstration lectures was given by staff Joseph, professor of chemistry, has been appointed by members and graduate students of the institute, with a Harry F. Lewis, chairman of the Division of Chemical wide choice for the varied interests of the visitors. Education of the American Chemical Society, to act Similar activities are held a t other colleges. Nelson as the Sau Diego representative of the Division. One Smith of Pomona College states that the science day of the duties of Richard Wistar of the chemistry they have requires tremendous effort but always prodepartment of Mills College is to work as a member of duces the feeling that the rather exhausting experience the committee on accreditation of the Association of has established the proper interest in chemistry for the Western Colleges. Visits to numerous colleges to visitors. San Diego State College assists in the San meet with administrative officers, to confer with faculty Diego Science Fair. Ambrose Nichols and Lionel members, and t o look over facilities of these institutions Joseph are chairmen of some of the committees. are all a part of this committee's appraisal. Exhibits of projects of city and county high-school One of the recent associate editors of THIS JOURXAL, students are sponsored by local industrial organizations. G. Ross Robertson, who is now a professor emeritus of On the central coast of California, the California State chemistry a t UCLA, has been traveling in the Orient. Polytechnic College opened its doors this year to the Dr. Robertson always manages to muster up a host of county science-teachers organization of San Luis interesting information during his travels along the Obispo county. The new $2,750,000 science building lines of chemical education and chemical industry. No was displayed. Bruce Kennelly of the chemistry doubt he will have a great deal t o report on his return. faculty a t Cal Poly conducted a tour through the Carl S. Noller of Stanford University is busily engaged chemistry laboratories and explained the objectives of in a revision of both of his texts on organic chemistry. the new major in agricultural chemistry. Glenn Those who teach organic chemistry will look forward Noble, chairman of biological sciences, continued the to the results of his work. At. the University of Sonth- tour through his department and Lewis Hammitt of the
VOLUME 33, NO. 5, MAY. 1956
physics faculty exhibited the facilities of the physics wing. The central coast area is particularly impressed with the advancements made a t Cal Poly. Three persons, Gilbert Rogers of the San Luis Obispo countyschools offices, Vance Lewis representing Cal Poly, and Frank Shaw, who represents the teachers, were appointed to promote activities of the county science teachers. Charles Blodgett will take on the responsibilities for the National Science Teachers Association membership and dues. At Cal Poly, Glenn Wight of the chemistry faculty was called upon to speak before a meeting of the Future Farmers of America organization on the campus. There is a real awakening of a more mature nature in chemistry a t Cal Poly. Erwin Hubert, recently of San Francisco State College, accepted a chair in the "History of Physical Science" a t Harvard University. He had been assigned a Fulbright instructorship from San Francisco State College t o the Max Plauck Institute and the University of Gottingen, in Germany. He studied the origin of early papers related to thermodynamics. One of the new staff members a t San Diego State College is Jack Stewart, who received his bachelor's degree there some time ago. After obtaining his doctorate a t Oregon State College, he spent a year a t Wieland's laboratory in Frankfurt, Germany. Ross A. Baker, lecturer in chemistry at San Diego State College and long associated with chemical education in the United States, is visiting the Mediterranean countries. If chemistry keeps up with the growth of student enrollments in our colleges, the next few years will see unprecedented strides. At a recent meeting in Los Angeles of ten of the state college presidents (who do not include adminstrators of the eight campuses of the state university), the Sacramento office pointed out that enrollments of the state colleges alone should be double their present enrollments by 1962. This means that a school like Cal Poly, with a modest enrollment of 3100, will attain a size of more than 6000 by that time. Already, many new people have been added t o the chemistry faculties of the Pacific Southwest schools. At the Santa Barbara College of the University of California, Robert H. De Wolfe and James W. Curry are new. Robert De Wolfe held a post-doctoral research fellowship on allylic rearrangements under William G. Young a t UCLA. James Curry joins the staff after being in research a t Dow Coming Corporation of Midland, Michigan. His Ph.D. is from Illinois; his research interests involve organo-silicon compounds. New faculty members a t San Diego State College are: John A. Neptune, formerly instmctor in chemistry a t the University of Wisconsin, quantitative analysis; Rohert W. Richardson, a recent instructor a t UCLA, general chemistry; LeRoy A. Spitze, formerly professor of chemistry a t Southwestern College, Kansas, general chemistry; and Lloyd Van Alta, recently a research associate a t the University of Washington, general chemistry. Dr. Freeman Bovard has joined the faculty of Clare-
245
mont Men's College. He left a research position with Du Pont Company in New Jersey. The science huilding for his work was built by Claremont College to he used for the present by Claremont Men's College and perhaps later by Scripps College. Sacramento State College has taken on C. Robert Hurley, who taught a t the University of Denver and the University of Colorado, after receiving his doctorate from the University of California a t Berkeley. Donald Balcom is a new addition t o the chemistry staff of San Francisco State College. He taught at San Jose State College, after receiving his Ph.D. from Stanford. The California State Polytechnic College in San Luis Obispo added Fred Dietz from Sandard Oil Company and John Leo Abernethy, who returned after teaching a t Humboldt State College. More faculty additions will be needed in the future. San Diego State College will add four new staff members in chemistry this fall. Pomona College was fortunate in hearing Linus Pauling speak before the Channing Club on the subject of "The genesis of ideas" this past year. Details of this talk will he given a t a later date. At Redlands University and Stanford University, Dr. W. C. Nixon, famed physicist of the Cavendish Laboratory a t Cambridge, England, has been a visitor. He has lectured and carried on research on the X-ray microscope. New science buildings have been erected a t San Jose State College, Fresno State College, Long Beach State College, Santa Barbara College, the University of California at Riverside, the California State Polytechnic College in San Luis Ohispo, and Sacramento State College. Chemistry has received much needed space in each instance. The Associated Colleges of Claremont will shortly add a new science college, geared to meet the future needs for more graduates trained in science. It is fine to see an awakening of research in our state colleges. Both Harold Walba and Rohert W. Isensee of San Diego State College published a paper on a spectrophotometric study of hydrolysis constants of negative ions of some arylimidazoles, in a recent issue of the Journal of the American Chemical Society. Support was given t o them by grants from the Research Corporation and the National Science Foundation. With the two main branches of the University of California, at Los Angeles and a t Berkeley, each rapidly approaching an enrollment of 20,000 or more, it is the duty of our state college presidents, whenever possible, to remain keenly aware of their moral responsibilities to the state of California. Relief must be given to the state university by educating students in the areas where they live or in areas where they can avoid problems of unnecessarily heavy enrollments. This has been part of the purpose in establishing new state colleges in strategic locations in the state. The success of state-wide education will depend to a large extent on the ability of adminstrators to anticipate the needs of sudden growth. This partial picture of our public and private institutions expresses some of the trends in science in the Pacific Southwest.
