The Georgia Institute of Technology caps its yearlong  celebration of the International Year of the Periodic Table of the Chemical Elements with “ASTOUNDING ELEMENTS,” an exhibit in Crosland Tower. Formally opened today, the exhibit celebrates elements – real and fictional – and looks back at some events and artifacts from activities led by the College of Sciences. 

Following are remarks from College of Sciences Dean Susan Lozier at the opening event:

The periodic table is one of the most recognizable icons in chemistry, perhaps in science as well.  With its collection of elements, the periodic table is also a visual metaphor for how science works.

Though attributed to Mendeleev, a 19th-century Russian chemist, he did not conjure the periodic table on his own.

Sam  Kean, author of "The Disappearing Spoon and Other true tales of Madness, Love and the History of the World from the Periodic Table of the Elements," wrote that six other chemists independently developed the periodic table, all based on work by an earlier generation of chemists. 

Kean suggests that Mendeleev transformed previous “gestures” at how elements should be grouped into the periodic table we know today, much like Homer transformed disconnected Greek myths into "The Odyssey."

But Mendeleev not only reached back, relying on past work, but he looked forward.  At the time he arranged the periodic table, 62 elements were known. 

What set him apart from others also working on this arrangement was that he left gaps where no known elements would fit, and he also boldly predicted that new elements would be discovered in the years ahead. 

This I think is the essence and beauty of science: that it is a collective effort that spans generations. 

So, when you look at this periodic table, with the individual elements of hydrogen, helium, gold and silver, think of it also as a metaphor for how we do science.  Whatever field of science we are in, we are most all working on individual “elements” that fit into a bigger picture.  

And increasingly, as exemplified by this display and this yearlong celebration, scientists are working with designers, writers, artists, to bring this bigger picture to a bigger and bigger audience.

ASTOUNDING ELEMENTS was produced by Maureen Rouhi, director of communications in the College of Sciences; Lisa Yaszek, professor in the the School of Literature, Media, and Communication (LMC); and Kirk Henderson, manager of exhibits at the Georgia Tech Library. Information for the elements in science fiction came from research by Yaszek's student Lily Steele.   

Today's opening event also featured a panel discussion between Atlanta-based science fiction writers and scientists. Organized by Yaszek, the discussants were Milton Davis, an Atlanta science fiction writer and chemist; M.G. Finn, a Georgia Tech professor of chemistry; Deirdre Shoemaker, a Georgia Tech professor of Physics; and Amanda Weiss, an assistant professor in the School of Modern Languages and science fiction writer. The conversation revolved around the intersection of science, fiction, and chemical elements. It was moderated by Charlie Bennett, public engagement librarian.  

ASTOUNDING ELEMENTS will be on display in Crosland Tower until Dec. 31, 2019. The exhibit has three sections: elements in science fiction in floor 1, periodic table makeovers in floor 2, and periodic-table inspired art in floor 6.

Photo caption
From left: Charlie Bennett, Maureen Rouhi, Kirk Henderson, Amanda Weiss, Milton Davis, Lisa Yaszek, M.G. Finn, Lily Steele, Deirdre Shoemaker, Susan Lozier (Photo by Renay San Miguel)

The new dean of Georgia Tech’s College of Sciences, Susan Lozier, has moved into her office in Tech Tower. That would be her — landlocked — office. It’s a nice office, but she has another unofficial one, and it’s a bit farther away.

How far? Try the Atlantic Ocean, where Lozier, a renowned physical oceanographer, is set to return in 2020 as the lead investigator on a major international research program.

Lozier's research into how climate change is impacting the oceans of the world and  phenomena like the Gulf Stream is the focus of ScienceMatters Season 3, Episode 10, "The Physics of the Ocean."

That title also describes what physical oceanographers study, Lozier says. This particular type of oceanography "can run anywhere from people studying about waves at the shoreline all the way to what I do, which is study the very, very large-scale ocean circulations," she says. "So I'm interested in currents that move from Antarctica up to the northern North Atlantic, or what we would say is the global ocean circulation," also known as the "global ocean conveyor belt."

Lozier describes some of the history behind phyical oceanography, a well as her busy forthcoming schedule: In addition to her planned ocean reserach in 2020, Lozier will take over as president of the American Geophysical Union in 2021. She also wants to continue a mentorship program she's established with the National Science Foundation and other federal agencies.

Each ScienceMatters episode includes a quiz that refers to facts mentioned in each podcast. A winner will be chosen randomly from all who submit correct answers. Winners will receive special College of Sciences gifts.

The Episode 10 quiz question:

Jess Hunt-Ralston, director of marketing and communications for the Atlanta BeltLine Partnership, is the new director of communications for the College of Sciences. She will begin her new position on Feb. 1.

“I am elated to join the College of Sciences and help share the story of incredible people and projects at the forefront of scientific inquiry and discovery, education and mentoring, and collaborative development and innovation,” Hunt-Ralston says. “I look forward to getting to know the faculty, staff, students, alumni, and friends who make this work possible and to begin working with the College in tandem with campus communicators to support and expand the sciences at Georgia Tech.”

For Hunt-Ralston, it’s a return to both her alma mater—she graduated from Georgia Tech with honors in May 2012—and a former employer: She served as communications officer and senior designer for the School of Civil and Environmental Engineering from 2012 to 2018.

“This moment is quite a homecoming for me,” Hunt-Ralston says. “It’s been more than a decade since I arrived on campus to study industrial design and nearly as long since I began working in communications at Georgia Tech. I am thrilled to soon reconnect with old friends and begin forging new friendships and collaborative initiatives with colleagues.”

“Our faculty, students, and staff work every day to expand our knowledge of the sciences with next-level research. We are excited to have Jess back on the Georgia Tech campus to help us tell those stories and guide our communications strategies,” says Susan Lozier, College of Sciences Dean and Betsy Middleton and John Clark Sutherland Chair. “Jess’s work on one of the more visible and successful Atlanta development projects of the last decade is a model of community engagement and advocacy, and we’re excited about that here at the College.”

Hunt-Ralston takes over from current College of Sciences Communications Director Maureen Rouhi, who is retiring from Georgia Tech. Rouhi’s work included planning special content and campus activities for the first day of classes on August 21, 2017, which coincided with a near-total solar eclipse watched by thousands on Tech Green.

Rouhi also planned this year’s content and campus educational events for the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements (IYPTCE), celebrating the periodic table’s 150th anniversary. The activities were interdisciplinary efforts involving other Georgia Tech schools and colleges. They included special Frontiers in Science lectures, a Halloween carnival in June, an art crawl, and a scavenger hunt during the first week of the fall semester.  Thanks to Rouhi, three items of branded “swag” related to the Institute’s IYPTCE activities—a College of Sciences periodic table t-shirt, a commemorative beaker, and a periodic table “makeover” bound volume by the School of Industrial Design—will soon be enshrined in the Science Museum, in London. 

“We have been enormously privileged to have had Maureen in this post over the past few years,” Lozier says. “In my short time here, I have come to appreciate her creativity, dedication, and enthusiasm. Though we are poised to welcome Jess into our community, that welcome is bittersweet since we will certainly miss Maureen.”

The Atlanta BeltLine Partnership is the nonprofit arm of Atlanta BeltLine Inc., a long-term plan for urban redevelopment of a former railroad line encircling the city’s core. Conceived by Georgia Tech student Ryan Gravel, work on the project officially began in 2006. Several sections are now open as multi-use trails, with retail stores, bars, restaurants, offices, and apartment complexes along the paths.

Hunt-Ralston’s BeltLine Partnership duties involved strategy, design, and development to achieve the Atlanta BeltLine vision through fundraising, programs, events, outreach, and advocacy.

“Serving as Atlanta BeltLine Partnership’s first communications director has been an honor and an adventure,” Hunt-Ralston says. “Since joining, we’ve secured the BeltLine’s largest philanthropic gift to date to begin building Atlanta’s Westside Park, celebrated the connection of more than 12 miles of contiguous trails, and significantly expanded our community outreach and initiatives around health, housing, volunteering, art, and culture.

“I also look forward to bringing a spectrum of strategic communications, community engagement, and development tools and insights into this new role at Georgia Tech."

They chose to study at Georgia Tech. Once here, they discovered that the academic rigor and leading-edge science research they’ve heard so much about is true – and demands their best. Some found Tech overwhelming at times, but all succeeded.

Wherever their journey started, our graduates discovered something else in the heart of Atlanta: the Tech experience, which involves forming new and lasting friendships, stretching out of their comfort zones, becoming part of the Georgia Tech family, and more.

Meet six graduating students from the College of Sciences. Headed in various directions, each feels well-prepared for the next step in their professional life because of their Georgia Tech education. Georgia Tech helped them achieve their goals and join a larger community, one that values friendship and collaboration, as well as scholarship.

Congratulations, Fall 2019 graduates! We can't wait to see what comes next for you!

Maria Furukawa, B.S. in Chemistry, Polymers Concentration

Nicholas Pinto, B.S. in Mathematics and B.S. in Economics

Daughtry St. John, B.S. in Neuroscience

Shannon Valley, Ph.D. in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences

Andrea Welsh, Ph.D. in Physics

Caroline Zabinski, B.S. Biology with a certificate in Earth and Atmospheric Sciences

Photo Caption
Top from left: Maria Furukawa, Nicholas Pinto, Daughtry St. John
Bottom from left: Shannon Valley, Andrea Welsh, Caroline  Zabinsky

Stacey Bass, who leads grants administration for 55 researchers across the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences and the School of Psychology, has won one of the highest honors awarded to Georgia Tech staff members.

Stacey Bass receives this year’s Spirit of Georgia Tech Award from the Institute’s Department of Human Resources, “by being a shining emblem of operational effectiveness through constant improvement, shared insights, strategic teamwork, and creative disruption, when necessary,” says J. Candice Bovian, Human Resources Program Manager for Employee Wellbeing and Engagement.

“I’m honored to receive the Spirit of Georgia Tech award and grateful to my schools for the nomination,” Bass says. “I feel very lucky to work in schools who have always been supportive of me and appreciative of my work. I’m especially grateful to be associated with Georgia Tech’s mission and values, and to be seen as an effective and positive contributor in the workplace.”

As grants administrator lead for both schools, Bass provides direction, support, and advice for 55 faculty, postdoctoral researchers, and graduate students in obtaining and managing research funding.

“I oversee proposal development and submission, explore funding opportunities, and assist with post-award oversight, in conjunction with the schools’ finance offices,” she says.

Bass also serves as a point of contact for the central Office of Sponsored Programs, as well as research administrators at other institutions and, on occasion, funding agencies. Overall, grant administrators oversee proposal submissions to ensure compliance with sponsor guidelines, and to strengthen the case for obtaining funding. Both of these roles directly and indirectly support Sciences research, which strengthens institutional infrastructure.

Kim Cobb, Georgia Power Chair and ADVANCE Professor in the School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, nominated Bass for the award. “Stacey is a shining emblem of operational effectiveness through constant improvement, making outsized contributions to Georgia Tech’s progress,” Cobb says. “At the same time, she works with humility and a sense of community that is embodied in the word ‘service’. Indeed, she is the closest thing I can think of to a walking embodiment of the Georgia Tech motto."

“As our faculty members know, Stacey is an invaluable colleague and collaborator in the grant seeking process,” says Mark Wheeler, School of Psychology chair and professor.

Georgia Tech undergraduates have a unique opportunity when they start studies on campus: They have a chance to engage in the kind of research that other schools might not offer until they are in graduate studies. In Georgia Tech’s College of Sciences, undergraduates can ask questions, use their skills, and test their knowledge to solve problems and explore issues no one has ever addressed before.

Every year, a select group of undergraduates distinguishes itself with meaningful research, guided by faculty members and other mentors who get to watch the development of some of the country’s best young scientific minds.

Please join us in congratulating this year's undergraduate research award recipients:

Shaun Eisner

A. Joyce Nickelson and John C. Sutherland Undergraduate Research Award
This endowment gift of Jen Nickelson and John Sutherland is presented to a student studying physics and mathematics.

Eisner, a physics major, conducts his research with Professor Flavio Fenton. A research study he co-authored, “Baseline Wandering Removal in Optical Mapping Measurements With PID Control in Phase Space,” was presented via poster session at the 2019 Computing in Cardiology conference in Singapore.

Steven Creech

Georgia Tech College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Award
Creech, a mathematics major, researches under the guidance of Professor Matthew Baker. He studies algebraic number theory and algebraic geometry. Creech is also an undergraduate teaching assistant and the president of Club Math.

Amitej Venapally

Georgia Tech College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Award
A double major in biochemistry and computer science, Venapally researches under the guidance of Professor Loren Williams. An undergraduate teaching assistant, his research explores the origin of life, and how peptides stabilize RNA.

Sara Brockmeier

Georgia Tech College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Award
Brockmeier, a psychology major who researches with Professor Philip Ackerman, is conducting research that is helping to determine the reliability of aptitude tests used by the U.S. Navy. She is the social chair of the Psychology Club at Georgia Tech and was a GT 1000 first-year seminar leader for the Science and Math Research and Training (SMART) Living and Learning Community.
 

College of Sciences Undergraduate Research Awards are co-sponsored with the Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program.

By Kate Williams, Georgia Tech Center for Teaching and Learning
Story via On Teaching and Learning @ Georgia Tech
 

Recent Georgia Tech Ph.D. graduate from the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Dominic Sirianni has his goals set on a faculty position that combines equal parts research and teaching. The Tech to Teaching certificate was instrumental in expanding his professional development in teaching.

Says Sirianni upon receiving the certificate this month, “I had never learned about evidence-based best practices in course design, lesson design, and especially assessment — let alone how to incorporate them effectively into my teaching.”

He will take these skills with him into his next position as a postdoc at the University of Richmond, mentoring undergraduate students in quantum chemistry.

Georgia Tech launched the Tech to Teaching program in 2009 in response to the nationwide call to expand graduate student and postdoc training in teaching. Originally an NSF-funded project, the design of the certificate program was evaluated, revised, and relaunched in fall 2016. At the same time, Georgia Tech joined the Center for the Integration of Research, Teaching, and Learning (CIRTL), a 37-institution network whose mission is to improve undergraduate STEM education through the development of future faculty.

Tech to Teaching participants complete 10 learning outcomes that are organized around major pillars of evidence based teaching: how students learn, the impact of student diversity on learning, effective teaching techniques, creating and assessing learning goals, and integrating technology into teaching. Participants select from multiple pathways to achieve the foundation-level learning outcomes, including 3-credit graduate level courses, on campus workshops, or online resources. Upon completing the 10 foundation-level outcomes, participants receive the CIRTL Associate Level certificate.

In the Tech to Teaching Capstone, participants practice and receive feedback on their teaching either as instructor-of-record or as a co-instructor with a faculty mentor. The CTL seminar that accompanies and supports the teaching experience provides cross-disciplinary opportunities for participants to give and receive feedback about teaching, expand their faculty network, and prepare their teaching statement.

Recent capstone participant Cristian Crisan says, “this has been a wonderful experience for me that has exceeded my expectations and made me learn many new skills. I would highly recommend the program to anyone interested in academia.”

This year, a record 49 graduate students and postdocs received the Tech to Teaching certificate and 68 participants received the CIRTL certificate. The Center for Teaching and Learning has awarded 114 Tech to Teaching certificates and 170 CIRTL certificates since 2016.

Graduate students and postdocs interested in learning more should start by submitting a Tech to Teaching interest form.

The Center for Teaching and Learning congratulates all of this year’s CIRTL and Tech to Teaching certificate recipients.

2020 Tech to Teaching Certificate Recipients

Mayank Agrawal, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Kera Allen, History and Sociology
Beste Basciftci, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Mario Bianchini, History and Sociology
Joshua Brooks, Aerospace Engineering
Sammie Buzzard, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences
Paloma Casteleiro Costa, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Jingdao Chen, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Cristian Crisan, Biology
Simone Douglas, Biomedical Engineering
Terri Dunbar, Psychology
Kenton (Blane) Fillingim, Mechanical Engineering
April Gadsby, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Archana Ghodeswar, Economics
Xin Gu, Economics
Anthony Harding, Economics
Blake Hayes, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Junqi Hu, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Bilal Iftikhar, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Adrian Ildefonso, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Qingxu (Bill) Jin, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Logan Kageorge, Physics
Youngeun Kim, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Sung Hoo Kim, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Chung Jae Lee, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Cynthia Lee, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Laura Mast, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Emily McGuinness, Materials Sciences & Engineering
Madeline Mei , Biology
Anish Mukherjee, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Larissa Novelino, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Sunjae Park, Computer Sciences
Firaz Peer, Literature, Media, & Communication
Elaine Rhoades, Physics
Chase Rock, Applied Physiology
Travis Rotterman, Biology
Michael Ryan, Physics
Abhilasha Saroj, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Darshan Sarojini, Aerospace Engineering
Richard Savery, Music
Aarohi Shah, Aerospace Engineering
Dominic Sirianni, Chemistry & Biochemistry
Gabi Steinbach, Physics
Alexander Stroh, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Shu Tang, Architecture
Umesh Unnikrishnan, Aerospace Engineering
Xiaoxi Wang, Economics
Yue Xu, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Jiwon Yeon, Psychology

2020 CIRTL Certificate Recipients

Qandeel Almas, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Beste Basciftci, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Aradhya Biswas, Computational Science & Engineering
Joshua Brooks, Aerospace Engineering
Garrett Bunyak, History and Sociology
Drew Capone, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Paloma Casteleiro Costa, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Stevie Chancellor, Interactive Computing
Jialei Chen, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Olga Churkina, Public Policy
Shlomi Cohen, Physics
Maria Coronel, Mechanical Engineering
Cristian Crisan, Biology
Ezgi Dogan-Guner, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Xiaoyu Dong, Economics
Wilson Espinoza, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Kenton (Blane) Fillingim, Mechanical Engineering
April Gadsby, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Leonardo Garcia Bottia, Building Construction
Miguel Joao Gois Ferreira Gaspar Neves, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences
Shawn Gregory, Materials Sciences & Engineering
Xin Gu, Economics
Mohit Gupta, Aerospace Engineering
Edward Yuhang He, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Junqi Hu, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Nene Igietseme, City and Regional Planning
Alison Jenkins, Mechanical Engineering
Prakirt Jhunjhunwala, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Qingxu (Bill) Jin, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Elizabeth Jones, Chemistry & Biochemistry
Evanthia Kallou, Aerospace Engineering
Esma Karagoz, Aerospace Engineering
David Kent, Interactive Computing
Sharjeel Khan, Computer Sciences
Sajad Khodadadian, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Taisuke Kojima, Biomedical Engineering
Arvind Krishna, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Theodore (TJ) LaGrow, Electrical & Computer Engineering
Chung Jae Lee, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Yunping Liang, Civil & Environmental Engineering
David Loughrey, Biomedical Engineering
Marguerite Matherne, Mechanical Engineering
Madeline Mei, Biology
Shauna Morrisey, Music
Hassan Mortagy, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Alexander Murphy, Mechanical Engineering
Sean Najmi, Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering
Derek Nichols, Mechanical Engineering
Sunjae Park, Computer Sciences
Firaz Peer, Literature, Media, & Communication
Hathaichanok Phuengkham, Biomedical Engineering
Toyya Pujol-Mitchell, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Katily Ramirez, Chemistry & Biochemistry
Abhilasha Saroj, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Heriberto Solano, Aerospace Engineering
Krzysztof Stopka, Mechanical Engineering
Alexander Stroh, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Shu Tang, Architecture
Timur Tankayev, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Udaya Lakshmi Tattamangalam Ananthanarayanan, Interactive Computing
Casey Vantucci, Biomedical Engineering
Tyler Vollmer, Earth & Atmospheric Sciences
Kerisha Willaims, Materials Sciences & Engineering
Liyan Xie, Industrial & Systems Engineering
Yue Xu, Civil & Environmental Engineering
Jiwon Yeon, Psychology
Boni Yraguen, Mechanical Engineering
Stephanie Zhu, Aerospace Engineering

In the College of Sciences at Georgia Tech, 2020 started out as ordinarily as most other spring semesters on campus. Students, faculty and staff filled lecture halls, offices, and labs. They began settling into research, projects, and studying for exams — with many looking forward to spring break travels, commencement festivities, and celebrating the end of another academic year on campus alongside colleagues, classmates, mentors, and friends.

Researching a curious coronavirus

Yet, as spring semester quietly began to pick up speed, so did something else: the international incidence of a novel coronavirus. Spotlighted in an open forum held on February 10 by the Center for Microbial Dynamics and Infection, the outsized “size, speed, and strength” of this new virus was the subject of three talks and a discussion led by a pair of Georgia Tech scientists and their colleague in Washington State.

Joshua Weitz, a professor in the School of Biological Sciences and Director of the Interdisciplinary Ph.D. in Quantitative Biosciences, shared insights on coronavirus outbreak strength estimation. Phillip Santangelo, a professor in the Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering, discussed opportunities for drug development. And Trevor Bedford, a faculty member in the Vaccine and Infectious Disease division of the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle, joined via BlueJeans video conference service to present his work on real-time sequence analysis and “nCOV” phylodynamics.

Across campus and around the world, researchers were already working together to better understand the evolution, epidemiology, effects, challenges, potential futures and possible solutions for a virus that would receive its official name the day after the campus coronavirus forum was held: severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).

A month later, sweeping spread of COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, would swiftly upend schedules across campus, alongside classrooms and labs around the country — mirroring efforts underway around the globe to rapidly respond to a newly classified pandemic.

And as COVID-19 began to enter the American lexicon and universities were faced with “a worldwide challenge unlike any in living memory,” the greater Georgia Tech community had joined the fight, contributing expertise, innovation, and indomitable spirit to the effort.

Rapid response and a revamp to remote

On March 16, the University System of Georgia announced that all courses across the state’s 26 institutions would move to online instruction for the remainder of spring semester, a decision soon followed by another to conduct May and summer courses in distance format. With word that classes would resume online after an extended spring break, College of Sciences faculty, teaching assistants, and staff set to work on adjusting and revamping classes for remote learning environments.

Most professors were already familiar with Canvas, Georgia Tech’s online course management system. But a smaller number had used Canvas’ chat and quizzing functions, or BlueJeans software to stream, record and post videos of their classes. In tandem with colleagues across campus, the College’s Academic and Research Computing Services IT support group designed and held a series of online tutorials and training sessions, led by Lew Lefton and Justin Filoseta, to help rapidly equip instructors and staff with a complete toolbox of remote teaching resources.

“College of Sciences faculty, teaching assistants and students rose to the significant challenges associated with retooling the entire teaching and learning process in the middle of spring semester,” says David Collard, Associate Dean for Academic Programs, and a professor in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry. “In this process, many faculty will likely have been introduced to new online instructional tools that they may choose to use even when we are back to teaching on campus.”

Two months together — apart

Now, after research ramp downs and campus shut downs, with safe return and recovery planning underway, and spring semester and graduation in our rear view — two months after we officially began the transition to Georgia Tech’s first semester of remote teaching, learning, and conducting critical business and research from a distance — we’re gearing up for another unprecedented moment: a second semester of remote learning for May and summer terms.

We wanted to take a moment to talk to people in the College of Sciences, to check in about the past couple of months, talk about distance learning and teaching experiences, and to ask and share answers to one really important question: So, how’s it all going?

What follows is a collection of thoughts from our undergraduates, graduate teaching assistants, and faculty, gathered over the phone and by email over the first two weeks of May 2020 by Renay San Miguel, communications officer and science writer for the College of Sciences at Georgia Tech.

How have you adapted to remote learning as an instructor or student?

Mary Holder
Academic Professional and Advisor in Neuroscience in the School of Psychology:

During the week of spring break, I led in the creation of a Canvas course for all neuroscience majors as a way to share information, forms, procedures, etc. This also provided the opportunity to answer student questions in a way to benefit all the students. We also reached out to our students in ‘ready to learn’ surveys that included questions about their personal situations after the move to online; several of the students noted in that survey particular issues, and I made it a point to reach out to those students individually to see how I could help.

I routinely start my advising sessions by asking how my students are doing, but after the switch to online, I asked more specific questions about their adjustments: Do they have quiet study/work space? Are they experiencing stressors that are disrupting their ability to study and learn? How are they supporting their mental and emotional health? While most of the students indicated that they were in safe and supportive learning environments, a few indicated they were struggling with structuring their time or maintaining motivation. Those students and I discussed particular strategies that may be useful, and I reminded them of all the Georgia Tech resources that they could access even in this distance format.

Sara Singer
Third Year Undergraduate in the School of Biological Sciences:

I found myself getting depressed and wanting to sit around all day because I felt a little hopeless. This is when I realized that I needed to start exercising more and finding some hobbies to help me recover such as gardening, cooking, blogging, etc. I made sure to interact with my family a lot, and I have especially been leaning on my siblings for that emotional and social support. While my family has been a huge help, my friends are also so important to me and I feel very distant from them during this time. I think it really helped me to find a quarantine buddy outside of my family to visit with because it allowed me to get the support I need with a face-to-face interaction.

Chrissy Spencer
Senior Academic Professional in the School of Biological Sciences:

To make things more interactive, I was told to get some of that creative thinking from the students, and some came from me. I asked all sorts of questions from them, including, how do you want to see the syllabus modified for these kinds of assignments? We always did a lot of in-class exercises, questions around math equations or images or creating graphs, where they had to do some in-depth analysis, and we always did them in teams. I didn’t want to lose that and they didn’t either, but we had to figure out how to do that.

In-class exercises were on a worksheet as a list of questions online. I set that up ahead of time and made enough copies so that every team had enough. I put the students in breakout rooms and each room had their own doc. They could all edit at the same time in each breakout room. And I could see into their breakout rooms on the tech platform. If they got one part right but got another wrong, I was able to comment in the doc and say, “go back and work on it again.” They were able to respond very quickly.

Benjamin Breer
Second Year Undergraduate in the School of Physics and School of Aerospace Engineering (Dual Major):

My solution? Create my own structure. I set a standard 8:00 AM to 5:00 PM work schedule, with a lunch break in between. As my father will attest, the morning ‘commute’ from my bedroom to the ‘office’ occasionally resulted in a delayed start. We went for walks in our neighborhood every afternoon at 5:00 PM and made dinner shortly thereafter. Once a week, we had a video call with family living in other states.

This routine established a sense of structure that enabled me to continue focusing on my work while also being able to stay connected to family and friends. From bi-weekly Skype calls to catching up individually over the phone, my friends and I discussed this new world we live in. We shared several opinions regarding the online learning experience, including the flexibility of many professors and accommodating measures being taken, such as moving to asynchronous lectures to account for students living in different time zones. We agreed that many courses seamlessly transitioned to a complete online format.

Were there any pleasant surprises from remote learning? Any creative workarounds to the new situation?

Declan McCarthy
Graduate Teaching Assistant in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry:

I’m grateful for the fact that most faculty have been extremely understanding and willing to work with students, including graduate students, regarding any of the potential issues that may have arisen as a result of COVID-19. Another sort of anecdotal experience I would like to share is regarding some of the virtual meetings we have participated in as graduate students. In spite of being physically distant from others, I feel as though I may have gotten to know a different side of my peers. In some of the meetings we have all checked in with each other and are seeing some personal aspects of each other’s lives, like seeing someone’s dog or hearing a child ask about snack time.

Marc Weissburg
Professor in the School of Biological Sciences:

I think the fact that the students understood clearly that their learning was really contingent on being able to interact with each other, and finding ways to do that outside the technology, was a nice surprise. Not every student did that, but a number of students did. That indicates to me that they were still trying to be motivated, but also at least as a result of their prior experience in class, actually talking to their classmates, they understood how valuable that was to them, and made some attempt to get that experience in whatever way they possibly could. That’s something that would always come up in course reviews, where students ended up appreciating that it was good to see they were realizing that in the moment, and they felt they needed to get that done in some other way.

I think the other nice surprise is that the students used this as an opportunity to talk about other stuff that they might not have talked about. Because it could be difficult to focus on what you’re learning, the students’ attention could wander a little bit. I remember the first week we came back doing this, I was in my home office, and I asked the students if they had any questions. One of the students said, “yeah, what’s the painting you have on your wall? It looks interesting.” We got into this discussion on what this art was about, and how I came to have it, and why art is interesting and important. It was nice to be able to have some of those normal interactions working remotely.

Sydney Popsuj
Graduate Teaching Assistant in the School of Biological Sciences:

I thought switching to remote learning would create really overwhelming and difficult testing procedures for students. This concern was also shared by the course instructors and students because it's very hard to create a fair environment for everyone while also ensuring academic integrity. After a lot of discussions with both the professors and the students, we were eventually able to devise a way of testing that took into account the myriad new variables remote learning introduced. For all of the original anxiety, we found the class averages substantially increased as did students' confidence in the materials. 

Bruce Walker
Professor in the School of Psychology and School of Interactive Computing

Walker and School of Interactive Computing graduate student Brianna Tomlinson recently collaborated with the University of Colorado-Boulder to develop a new course, Sound and Sonification Design for Interactive Learning Tools, for the education technology platform Coursera.

Our interest is more about how online learning is new to many of us, and we all want to make the experiences for students as engaging and as inclusive as possible. Adding sound to our online learning materials, be it on a learning platform, or just web pages and demos and simulations, can help with both of these goals.

But it is not always clear how to start when it comes to designing sounds that would be added to our teaching materials. The Sonification Lab is well known for our research in multimodal and auditory learning tools, so we wanted to bring our expertise in this area out to the masses. We developed an online course that will help teachers, educational materials developers, sound designers, and others make sounds that are effective and engaging.

The Coursera platform provided us with a great way to bring that content to our potential audience. Since both Georgia Tech and the University of Colorado-Boulder are affiliated with Coursera, it was relatively straightforward to jointly develop the course, have input from both universities, and then release the course under both schools' catalogs. Anyone who is interested in the topic can take the course for free, and then hopefully use what they learn to make their online and interactive learning content more accessible and more effective.

What has been the biggest challenge for you after the switch to remote learning?

Sara Singer:

For me, the biggest challenge to switching online was staring at electronics all day. I used to enjoy getting to walk around campus in between classes to get some fresh air, but it’s hard to have that same feeling when I am stuck on my computer all day for classes, homework, meetings, office, hours, exams, and anything else. Staring at a screen for eight hours a day is not healthy for anyone, yet professors and students are both having to do this in order to make virtual classes work. I find that it’s hard for me to dedicate the same amount of time and energy to my work while living at home and also trying to take care of my mental and physical health. I used to be able to stay focused on my work throughout the day because I was also getting social interactions and intermediate breaks. However, it’s hard to find those same outlets while staying at home and avoiding human interaction.

Dan Margalit
Professor in the School of Mathematics:

The most important differences and difficulties were keeping a personal connection with the students, managing student anxiety, and designing assessments. The personal connection was difficult for several reasons. For one thing, I could not figure out how to get the technology platform to show me more than four students' faces at a time. It is always really helpful to see confused looks or nodding heads while teaching. Since I didn't really have that, I had to ask the students to do things like input their affirmations in the chat if they were understanding (virtual head nodding). To try to build connection, I came early to class to chat a little with the students. I even played music at the start and end of class to keep things engaging.

Benjamin Breer:

I am a big believer in what I call ‘knowledge osmosis’. Even if you are tired and struggling to pay attention, there is no substitute for in-person instruction. Just sitting in the classroom facilitates some learning, whether we are aware of it or not. I think the biggest challenge for me when switching to a completely remote learning experience was the sudden removal of the in-person classroom experience and any sense of structure: activities like research, clubs, and spending time with friends constituted the scaffolding that held my college life together.

Marc Weissburg:

What’s important in my class is that the students are actually working together, talking about it, discussing, putting ideas down on paper. That is the most challenging part of this way of learning. When we migrated to a distance format, keeping the students engaged, keeping them motivated, keeping them asking questions of themselves and of us (instructors), and not being passive was the biggest challenge. ... In class I would walk around, along with teaching assistants, and we would say, “show me what you’re doing”. None of that could happen in the format available. One of the most unpleasant surprises for me is how sterile it is to be talking to the students through a computer, where I can’t really read their body language in a way that I can when I’m in class with them. It’s really stressful, and why after a day of Zoom meetings you’re tired, you’re spending so much mental energy trying to pick up on social cues that you innately get when you’re in somebody’s presence, and now you’re trying to compensate for them.

Sydney Popsuj:

As someone who wants to become a professor of biology one day, I really struggled with not getting to engage with my students as easily. The best part of being a TA for me is getting to watch my students grow, and discovering what makes them passionate about biology. I no longer had the opportunity for students to drop by after class or recitation to tell me about how this lesson made them realize a new field they wanted to explore, or how something I taught them in recitation ended up being a question their trivia team encountered. It was rather disheartening to feel disconnected from their individual learning paths, but eventually we all adjusted.

What has been your experience with remote learning technology?

Nicole “Nikki” Aiosa
Graduate Teaching Assistant in the School of Chemistry and Biochemistry:

I am a first-year GTA, and everything has been an adjustment this past year, so being flexible wasn't really new to me. It is definitely more challenging to keep the attention of my students online, but I understand it is a difficult transition for them as well. In my undergraduate studies, I took several fully online courses and some hybrid online courses where lectures were online, but you came into a lecture hall to take a proctored exam.

Chrissy Spencer:

In my course, everything went fine. The upper level courses are heavily discussion-based, and everyone was able to be on video and audio, and make it work. I checked in with the students incessantly to make sure they were okay, to make sure they could come to class and give them options if they couldn’t. The expectation was you had to be there to have face-to-face discussions with peers, but I wanted a backup plan, and several students took me up on alternative assignments. I recorded everything and posted on a Canvas site. We had access to all course material, and they did fine.

Stephanie Bilodeau
Graduate Teaching Assistant in the School of Biological Sciences:

Teaching online was easy in terms of technology, but challenging in terms of content for the ecology lab I was TAing. We just made all the labs and projects for the rest of the semester independent for students to work on in their own time, and then turned our scheduled lab periods into ‘open office hours’-like consulting sessions on BlueJeans, where students could ask questions of the TA or other students and get help on these independent assignments — sort of an extreme ‘flipped classroom’ approach. Having said that, ecology lab is meant to be a practical, interactive course, and transitioning it online this way really took away from what the students were able to learn and experience.

As a student, organic interactions with other students and with the professor have been the biggest thing lost with remote instruction. Even if all students keep video on, which our software and other platforms typically do not handle well, it is difficult to ask and answer questions, especially in large classes. I do think WebEx, which the class I teach now is using, works a bit better for this. It is also very frustrating that other students don’t always understand appropriate protocol when on a big group call, and will forget to mute their mics when not speaking, even when explicitly asked to. Some platforms allow instructors to mute everyone automatically, but not all instructors remember to do this.

Marc Weissburg:

Theoretically, technology should come to the rescue, but in practicality, no. Some of this is a fundamental limitation, and some of it is some sort of software glitchiness. Theoretically there’s a way to allow the software platform to set up sub chats within the platform, so that students can talk amongst themselves. The problem is as soon as you do that, I am excluded from the conversations, so I can’t actually do what I need to do, which is listen in on what the students are doing. It has some utility for the students to talk amongst themselves, but the software, at least for me and for other people, it’s so glitchy that this function does not work very well. I’ve tried it and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t. Right now it’s unreliable enough so that trying to get that to work ends up being a distraction.

What’s the biggest lesson learned for you regarding remote learning? What advice would you give to faculty and students?

Stephanie Bilodeau:

My advice to students is to take online courses seriously. Take some time before the first class and each day before the call starts to make sure your audio/video is set up, your notes or browser are accessible, and you have access to anything else you need, like Learning Catalytics or the course textbook or Canvas page. Also, show instructors the same respect you usually would and don’t email them with questions an hour before an assignment is due. Just because we are all working from home does not mean that instructors do not still have other responsibilities. In fact, they may have more.

As an instructor, take time before classes start to test out whatever platform(s) you intend to use with TAs and/or volunteer students in the class. Holding one or more voluntary ‘practice sessions’ can help. The professors I know who did this had a much smoother transition back into actual classes when Georgia Tech went fully remote. This also gives students who may be worried about their setup an opportunity to jump on with the instructor or TA and a small number of peers, and make sure things work in a less stressful environment without disrupting class itself.

Marc Weissburg:

There’s the opinion that remote delivery is a magic bullet that will make education easier and less costly, and more widely available to people, and that it will democratize education. Nothing is further from the truth. The way we do it now, online learning will disadvantage people because of the technology limitations, and it’s only suitable for a very small portion of students who have the right mental habits to be able to deal with it. It undervalues what teachers do, and gives people the false idea that content and learning are the same thing.

Nicole “Nikki” Aiosa:

We need to make these online courses much more interactive, even more so than in person. This will hopefully keep everyone more engaged.

Dan Margalit:

Overall, the class went well from a technical perspective, all things considered. So I know we can do this as long as we need to. But I don't think we should start closing down the campus in favor of online learning. I certainly missed running into my students around campus, and I know the students missed seeing each other. I do think it is a good time to reflect on what we like about being on campus, so we can be ready to do those things even better when we get back. I also think it's a good time to think about what is better about online learning, so we can continue to do those, as well!

The Center for 21st Century Universities at Georgia Tech

The Center for 21^st Century Universities at Georgia Tech (C21U) is also gathering data from faculty and surveys on how the sudden switch to remote learning has impacted and evolved instruction. The goal is to find out what technologies and methods worked well, and to understand challenges and opportunities for future learning. Learn more here.

Have a story you’d like to share?

We want to hear from you. Please email renay.san@cos.gatech.edu and jess@cos.gatech.edu to get in touch.

A letter from Susan Lozier, Dean and Betsy Middleton and John Clark Sutherland Chair:

Many voices have expressed pain, anger and frustration over the past few weeks about the recent deaths of Black men and women at the hands of police and at the centuries of racial injustice. While strides have been made in the past, recent cries for change have too often been met with inaction and indifference in this country. Change is needed, and words alone are not enough. There is plenty of work to do at national, state and local levels, but there is also work to do within our own College of Sciences community. There are steps that we can individually take to educate ourselves on countering racism, such as learning how to be anti-racist.  Transformative change within our College, however, will take collective input and collective action. For that reason, I am charging a task force to address the following two questions:

1. How do we build a College of Sciences community that is just, fair, and equitable for all members of our community – staff, students and faculty? 

To answer this question, we should ask: Who does not feel welcomed, supported, or valued in our community? What practices, written or unwritten, create a discriminatory environment?  What practices should we dismantle? Which should we construct?

2. How do we attract and retain Black faculty, students and staff to our community?

To answer this question, we should ask: Why have previous efforts to attract Black faculty failed? Why is the number of Black graduate students so low? What practices, written or unwritten, are responsible for these outcomes? What practices should we dismantle? Which should we construct?

Task Force Members

• Co-Chair: Lewis Wheaton, Associate Professor, School of Biological Sciences
• Co-Chair: Matt Baker, Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Professor of Mathematics
• Tamara Bogdanovic, Associate Professor, School of Physics
• Emma Blandford, Assistant Director, Living Learning Communities, College of Sciences
• Dania Ibrahim, Undergraduate, Neuroscience
• Jasmine Martin, Assistant to the Chair, School of Biological Sciences
• Lea Marzo, Assistant to the Chair, School of Mathematics
• Minda Monteagudo, Graduate Student, School of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences    
• Keith Oden, Director for Academic Diversity, College of Sciences
• Mary Peek, Principal Academic Professional, School of Chemistry and Biochemistry
• Doby Rahnev, Assistant Professor, School of Psychology
• Alonzo Whyte, Academic Professional, School of Biological Sciences

I expect the work of this task force to commence this summer and to finish next May. Along the way, there will be many conversations across the College as we work to answer these questions and chart a path forward. While we do not have answers today, collective good faith will ensure that we can effect transformative change in the years ahead.

To close, I want to thank each of these members of our community for so readily agreeing to serve on this task force.  Please extend your thanks to them as well.

LAST CALL: Today, June 23, is the last day to nominate individuals to our first College of Sciences Staff Council. CoS students, staff, and faculty are invited to nominate CoS staff members who they would like to represent the College. Nominate staff members here.