CNSM at Home - April 2021
A Message from the Dean
Dear Faculty & Staff,
As all of you know, our college works hard internally and externally to recognize and fight injustice not just in STEM but everywhere. I echo President Conoley's sentiments about the verdict in the Derek Chauvin trial, and while this gives hope for equitable justice, we must not relax. We must remain vigilant and work towards a future where it doesn't take a nine-minute video and national protests to achieve an indictment and conviction; we must remain vigilant and work towards a future where killings, like those of George Floyd, Tamir Rice, Adam Toledo, and Breonna Taylor do not occur; we must remain vigilant and work towards a future where the color of someone’s skin does not limit their ability to achieve their life's dream; and we must never forget that the work for equity and justice is always ongoing. It is also important that we take a moment to appreciate this verdict as a step in the right direction and a sign that a better world is possible.
Now that we are in the homestretch of our Spring semester, it's time to start thinking about Commencement. As most of you know, Commencement has been a moving target throughout the pandemic. But as of now, CSULB will have an in-person Commencement ceremony for the classes of 2020 and 2021 as well as virtual. As of this writing, our college's Commencement will take place on May 31 in a regional stadium in Anaheim. I am looking forward to celebrating the achievements of our graduating classes in person! By this point you should have received an invitation, and if you plan to attend, please be sure to RSVP as soon as possible. I encourage you to check the Commencement website for updates as we get closer to that date.
This newsletter began as a fun tether to keep us connected while we dealt with the difficult and sometimes lonely effects of the pandemic. But pending the University's repopulation, I'm hoping we will be able to reconnect without a newsletter soon. For now I plan on keeping up the biweekly messages, but I am working with Allie Puz, our Communications and PR coordinator, to come up with other ways to keep us connected as campus repopulation evolves.
Be safe, be well, be just.
Curt
Commencement Dates to Remember
- May 1, 2021: Last day for graduates to provide a photo and personal quote in MarchingOrder for their custom graduate slide.
- Mid May: Electronic ticket distribution to all elligible graduate's student email address
- May 31, 2021: CNSM Commencement Ceremony
If you plan to attend the 2020-2021 CNSM Commencement Ceremony on May 31 (Memorial Day), please RSVP by end of business TODAY (4/23/21).
Faculty Feature: A New Way to Teach
By: Eddie Partida
Science can be taught through textbooks and lectures, but science majors know that hands-on experience is priceless.
Laura Henriques, professor of Science Education at CSULB, applies that approach to give doctoral and post-doctoral students experiences about what it is like to be a faculty member at a comprehensive campus like CSULB with a program called the Pre-Professors Program (PREPP).
In collaboration with the University of California, Irvine, PREPP was launched 3 years ago through the BUILD grant. The program pairs CSULB faculty mentors with PREPP Fellows from UCI. The mentors show PREPP Fellows what faculty members do at CSULB. To date, 15 PREPP Fellows have participated in the program.
Henriques and BUILD colleagues are now going on to partner with the Chancellor's Office to expand PREPP to other CSU campuses. Through the Chancellors Doctoral Incentive Program (CDIP), CSULB and five other CSU campuses will mentor CDIP recipients in a CSU PREPP experience. She believes the PREPP programs can increase diversity and inclusivity as members discover more about CSU campuses and CSULB specifically. Provost Brian Jersky, Henriques, and the BUILD collaborators who started PREPP are excited to see where this project is going and its potential impact.
The work of PREPP expands on some of the themes Henriques and fellow CSULB professors Dr. Don Haviland and Dr. Anna M. Ortiz wrote about in Shaping Your Career: A Guide for Early Career Faculty (2017).
While PREPP focuses on prospective faculty, Henriques is also busy helping current CSULB faculty reflect upon and improve their instruction with the Faculty Formative Feedback Project. Partnering with Professors Kristin Stout and Kerri Knight-Teague, the project aims to provide faculty with timely instructional feedback which is useful and actionable. Faculty participating in the Faculty Formative Feedback Project collect and analyze student engagement data, have an FFP partner who observes a class, and participate in a class debrief where the instructor and partner jointly reflect upon the data to improve the teaching/learning experience.
Henriques believes taking time to reflect on instructional practices is important to everyone, but especially now as the shift to digital instruction has made novices of us all.
Henriques finds it rewarding to work with her current and future colleagues in these programs. She is proud to play a small role in helping good faculty become even better.
In the News
Dr. Ted Stankowich, Associate Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences and Director of the Mammal Lab, provided comment for the New York Times on a rabid bobcat attack video that went viral earlier this month.
Spring 2021 Fellows Colloquium
Friday, May 7, 2021 7:00 pm
Exotic Phases of Matter: The Promise of Quantum Computing
Dr. Michael Peterson, Associate Professor of Physics & Astronomy
In 1981, Richard Feynman suggested that certain computational tasks could be done exponentially faster by exploiting the power of quantum physics. Tasks like searching for a needle (a number) in a haystack (a lot of numbers), factoring huge integers into their prime factors, designing life-saving drugs from the atoms on up, etc. You might be able to guess that a couple of those seemingly innocent tasks are intimately connected to cryptography, security, and potentially espionage. So, nearly 40 years later, why aren't "quantum computers" everywhere? It turns out that maintaining the fragile quantum mechanical nature of the quantum computer long enough to complete the task remains the biggest and most important challenge. Join us as Dr. Peterson discusses how combining nanotechnology, materials science, mathematics, and quantum mechanics has pushed science right to the edge of realizing Feynman’s dream by leveraging exotic phases of matter to construct a fault-tolerant quantum computer.
Dr. Michael Peterson is an Associate Professor in the Department of Physics & Astronomy. He received his B.Sc. in Mathematics and Physics from the University of Utah and his Ph.D. in Physics from The Pennsylvania State University. He completed his postdoctoral training in Theoretical Condensed Matter Physics at UC Santa Cruz, the University of Maryland at College Park, and UC Santa Barbara before joining CSULB as an Assistant Professor in 2011. His research interests focus on strongly interacting electron systems under extreme quantum mechanical conditions in which exotic topologically ordered phases of matter emerge with applications to fault tolerant quantum computers. Dr. Peterson’s research has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation and CSULB.
Register for the Spring 2021 Fellows Colloquium!
"It has been a joy to work with you all in creating this newsletter. I hope it helped to keep us connected despite the strangeness of the past year. Looking forward to seeing you again soon."
- Allie Puz, Communications & PR Coordinator, CNSM
Stay Safe & Healthy CNSM!
