Dear VIPEr Colleagues,

I hope all is well. As you are aware, one of my passions focuses on chemical education, specifically using concepts of Hip Hop to attract young people to the chemical sciences. There is a faculty member (Chris Emdin, Columbia) that is really pioneering this kind of work. I wanted to share a useful link to you about this type of work to engage young people.

http://cenblog.org/newscripts/2013/04/gza-liquid-swords-rap-science-sch…

Sibrina

Check the BITeS post (https://www.ionicviper.org/blog-entry/picture-worth-thousand-words) and comment...

Hello, VIPErs,

This fall I am scheduled to teach my organometallics course, a junior/senior level textbook/primary lit course. However, it turns out there will only be two students enrolled. My normal method involves small group presentations and discussions of the primary literature, but that isn't going to work. I am certainly not going to lecture to two students. How have you dealt with this situation? I don't want to cancel the class. I have attempted to do private readings on this topic in the past when I couldn't offer the course, and that didn't work very well.

I am thinking about incorporating some calculation exercises into my inorganic course in the fall (possibly something like the Using Computational Chemistry to discuss backbonding in CO).   We currently have a license for Spartan (which can certainly do a number of different types of levels of calculations, including DFT).   Has anyone else used Spartan for such things?  If so, what basis sets did you use for your calculations?       

It is the time of year when the bookstore is hounding me for my past-due textbook selection for the fall!   It has been several years since I've taught our inorganic course at the junior/senior level with pre- and post-P-Chem students.  The last few times I've used various editions of Housecroft and Sharpe, and I'm considering that again.   I'd also be interested in what peope think of the new Miessler, Tarr, and Fischer.

I have a conundrum, running out of class dates to do the following...

Cover a little more on the basics of coordination chemistry (1 class day)

Give an exam (while my 50 minute class period will get chopped up due to an awards day cermony preceding it)

Give the ACS 2 semester exam

Oh, and my MWF loses both this Friday and next Monday to Easter holiday...

Any suggestions on a good take-home assessment object that can sub in for an exam?

Thanks!

I am interested in teaching crystal field theory and/or ligand field theory in a sort of inquiry-based, student-led manner in an upcoming class.  Just wondering if anybody has any thoughts or links to resources that could be handy in putting this together. 

(Full disclosure:  in re-working my syllabus a bit for this semester, I thought it would be a "good idea" to dedicate a lab period to learning CFT and LFT--now that the lab is approaching, I'm scrambling to figure out a useful way to fill 3 hours!) 

All thoughts are much appreciated.  Thanks!

--Jeremiah

Check out the latest Inorganic Chemistry Forums, a great resource for the classroom:

Metals in Medicine and Health

Guest Editors: Debbie Crans and Tom Meade

http://pubs.acs.org/toc/inocaj/52/21

Imaging and Sensing

Guest Editors: Chris Chang and Ken Raymond

http://pubs.acs.org/toc/inocaj/53/4

Dear inorganic faculty,

We are seeking BMB accreditation for our biochem major. I was asked to provide "core concepts and learning objectives" for inorganic. Those of you who know me know that I speak this language, but I'm still daunted by trying to map my course goals onto BMB's objectives.

Has anyone else done this? Can I copy you?

Thanks,

Joanne