The award from the Chemistry Division supports an Undergraduate Research Centers (URC) planning grant. The PI is Gregory Herzog. The co-PIs are John Krenos and Joseph Potenza from Rutgers, Paul Schueler from Raritan Valley Community College and Diane C. Trainor of Middlesex County Community College. The planning grant will work towards 1) improvement of a large first-year laboratory course by adding a research-oriented project carried out in small groups; 2) recruit students for a second semester research project; 3) match these students with an active research group; 4) create a new second semester 3-credit course with research and laboratory components. The project directors will assist students to find further research opportunities, supervise their final reports, evaluate the program elements for effectiveness and scale up, and initiate wide ranging discussions of the results. Student participants will be drawn from the two community colleges and the undergraduate colleges at Rutgers. Faculty research mentors will be drawn from several academic units at Rutgers and the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey. Industrial scientists from pharmaceutical companies in New Jersey will help to teach the new course.
