Departmental News


Spring 2013

  • Our biggest news of spring 2013 is that Professor Ruth E. Riter was promoted from Associate Professor of Chemistry to Professor of Chemistry. Congratulations Dr Riter, your hard work and dedication is appreciated by the Department of Chemistry!  
  • Professor Lilia C. Harvey was invited to give the lecture at the annual Agnes Scott College Dean’s Colloquium Lecture, where she spoke about a difficult and thought-provoking topic “The Right Chemistry: Rethinking Courses Students Love to Hate”
  • Professor Sarah A. Winget was invited to talk about her Agnes Scott research at the 245th American Chemical Society (ACS) National Meeting in New Orleans.
  • Genefine Sapateh (class of 2013), a chemistry major, has won a place in an American International Sports Teams (AIST) program and will represent the USA in basketball on a tour of Italy this summer. 
  • The student Affiliates of the American Chemical Society (ACS) on campus hosted their first Chemistry Department Game Afternoon, a fun event for the staff, faculty and students of the chemistry department.  Thank you to all who came, and a special thank you to the students who brought such great games!

Fall 2012

  • The brand new research-grade FTIR spectrometer has arrived, thanks to the National Science Foundation (NSF) grant obtained by Professor Ruth E. Riter (PI) and Professor Sarah A. Winget (co-PI).   Students will be using it in their spring 2013 courses!
  • Professor T. Leon Venable got the kids excited about chemistry at the local Fernbank Science Center, giving chemistry demonstrations as part of National Chemistry Week.
  • The brand new chemistry curriculum was taught for the first time.  Please look at our Majors/Minors page for more details.

Summer 2012

  • Congratulations to Professor Ruth E. Riter (PI) and Professor Sarah A. Winget (co-PI) for being awarded $195,997 from the National Science Foundation (NSF) for their research into Enriching IR spectroscopy learning through inquiry-based activities.
  • Christine Franzel (class of 2013), a chemistry and mathematics double major, has been awarded a 2012 Goldwater Scholarship, a prestigious national scholarship awarded to outstanding science, math and engineering students.
  • Professor Ruth E. Riter and Professor Sarah A. Winget joined like-minded chemists at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) this summer to join a national National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded project to create Process Oriented Guided Inquiry-based Learning (POGIL) laboratories in physical chemistry.
  • Professor Lilia C. Harvey worked with a team at Georgia Tech this summer on a National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded project to implement scientific research into biochemistry and organic chemistry teaching laboratories.
  • Professor Ruth E. Riter was invited to be a facilitator and session leader at the South East Regional Process Oriented Guided Inquiry-based Learning (POGIL) meeting at Guilford College, NC.
  • Professor Ruth E. Riter presented a poster about her Agnes Scott research at the Process Oriented Guided Inquiry-based Learning (POGIL) National Meeting in St Louis, MO.