MIT Women in Chemistry hosts second annual Scientist for a Day camp

Middle school girls from the Cambridge area spend an afternoon on campus, participating in hands-on scientific experiments.

See coverage and photos from our second annual Scientist for a Day camp for middle school girls from MIT News and the Department of Chemistry.

Nicole decants carbon dioxide into a bottle, which was later exposed to light to demonstrate how carbon dioxide retains heat in a small-scale version of the greenhouse effect.

Summer Faculty Lunch Series

This summer WIC is hosting three lunches with faculty members outside of MIT’s Department of Chemistry. These lunches serve as an open forum to get to know faculty members better, hear about their journey, and discuss any topics of interest to the group.

May: Linda Griffith (MIT), School of Engineering Professor of Teaching Innovation, Biological Engineering, and Mechanical Engineering

 

June: Mala Radhakrishnan (Wellesley College), Whitehead Associate Professor of Critical Thought; Associate Professor of Chemistry

 

July: Karen Atkinson (Bunker Hill Community College), Professor of Chemistry

Girls Day at the MIT Museum

Extracting chlorophyll from spinach leaves — hands-on demonstration run by WIC at last year’s Girls Day.

The MIT Museum will be holding its annual Girls Day on March 4th! This year’s theme is math. Last year WIC ran a booth where students could extract the chlorophyll from spinach leaves and observe how it fluoresces (red!) under UV light. It’s very exciting to see a photo from our demo used to promote this year’s event!

More information at the MIT Museum website: https://mitmuseum.mit.edu/program/girls-day

Graduate Women @ MIT Spring Empowerment Conference

gw@mit is putting on the annual spring empowerment conference. This year’s theme is “Be Bold. Be Heard.” and events include a keynote by Vicki Kennedy and several workshops to improve your communication and writing. Register for events here.

Special thanks to the WIC members who were also involved in planning this year’s conference!

Call For Applications! Due May 1st

We are now accepting applications for the Women in Chemistry Professional Development Grant! This grant provides funding for women graduate students and post-docs in the Department of Chemistry to attend leadership and research conferences. The goals of this program are to increase attendance and participation of women at research conferences and to increase accessibility of leadership conferences to women in the Chemistry Department. You can read more about past recipients.

We are accepting applications for research and leadership conferences between May 1st and August 31st.

Continue reading “Call For Applications! Due May 1st”

WIC volunteers help make Science on Saturday a success!

WIC co-president Michelle at Science on Saturday: Chemistry

Thanks to all the volunteers from WIC and the chemistry department who helped with the main presentation as well as demonstration tables at the Chemistry Science on Saturday. An estimated 1,000 people showed up despite the cold weather!

Continue reading “WIC volunteers help make Science on Saturday a success!”

Call for applications!

We are now accepting applications for the Women in Chemistry Professional Development Grant! This grant provides funding for women graduate students and post-docs in the Department of Chemistry to attend leadership and research conferences. The goals of this program are to increase attendance and participation of women at research conferences and to increase accessibility of leadership conferences to women in the Chemistry Department. You can read more about past recipients at http://wic.scripts.mit.edu/wic/travel-grant/travel-grant-recipients/.

We are accepting applications for research and leadership conferences between January 1st and June 30th. Leadership conferences could be a typical leadership/professional development conference, as well as any conference that would help you become a leader in your chosen field/career (fields like science education, science writing, etc. hold conferences).

Application Deadline: January 10th, 2017 (for conferences between January 1st and June 30th)

Email completed application materials (doc, docx, or pdf format) to wictravelgrant@mit.edu. If you are applying for a research conference, please have your advisor send his/her letter of support to wictravelgrant@mit.edu.

WIC Lunch with Professors Buchwald and Van Voorhis (Associate Department Heads)

We are excited to announce the next WIC lunch with Professors Steve Buchwald and Troy Van Voorhis! They are the Associate Department Heads and are on the new Quality of Life Committee. Join us for this opportunity to get to know Professors Buchwald and Van Voorhis, talk about the current state and future of the department, and discuss any other topics of interest to the group.

The lunch will be on Tuesday, November 10th at noon in the Moore Room (6-321). Sign up here by noon on Wednesday 11/4: http://signup.mit.edu/lunch_buchwald_vanvoorhis

— WIC Board —