This summer Steve attended the Biennial Conference on Chemistry Education (BCCE), which was held at the University of Notre Dame in South Bend, Indiana, as well as the fall national meeting of the American Chemical Society in Boston.  He presented three talks at those conferences about recent metacognition research in organic chemistry as well as a classroom demonstration. The presentation titles are “The Metacognitive Exam Tool to Help You Learn (METHYL) project for sophomore organic chemistry,” and “Creating CSI experts in NMR analysis: an engaged, group-inquiry exercise in spectroscopy.”

Traveling to Boston for the ACS meeting offered an opportunity to join a T. Ross Kelly research group alumni reunion from Boston College.  Ross was Steve’s undergraduate research mentor, and is in the middle-left of the picture.  Twenty years ago, Steve completed the first total synthesis of luotonin A, a pyrroloquinazolinoquinoline natural product, with Ross and post-doc Rich Silva!  

Since then, the BC men’s ice hockey team won a few national championships, and it was nice to see the banners hanging from the rafters in Conte Forum.  

In addition, Steve’s Ph.D. advisor, NYU Professor Keith A. Woerpel (formerly of UC Irvine), was awarded a prestigious ACS Cope Scholar Award for his explorations of stereoselective reactions involving oxocarbenium ions.  The X-ray crystal structure of an axially-substituted six-membered ring dioxocarbenium ion from Steve’s 2005 JACS paper was featured in the award address.  It was great to catch up with a few group alumni from the early 2000s.