I joined the leadership team for the Silicon Valley ACS Section in 2018 as an Alternate Councilor and served in that role until 2020 when I became a section Councilor. SVACS has been a great way for me to be connected to the local chemistry community. I have especially enjoyed opportunities to partner with various Bay Area groups, like the Cal ACS Local Section and the SJSU chemistry and chemical engineering clubs, to organize programming including trivia, networking, and escape room activities. I am proud of my involvement in developing our strategic plan and in the Paving the Path Initiative, which provides resources and programming for Community College students and specifically aims to support future transfer students. I have also served on the national Women Chemists Committee (WCC) since 2021 where my efforts have centered around promoting diversity, inclusion, equity, and respect (DEIR) and working to see through more lenses of diversity. With WCC, I was a liaison to the International Activities Committee, I actively serve on the Women Chemists of Color subcommittee, and I have organized events and symposia around the WCC 95th Anniversary (2022), Women Entrepreneurs (2023), and Celebrating Chemistry Beyond the Binary (2024).
Biography
I am an Associate Professor of Chemistry at San José State University (SJSU), where I joined the faculty in 2017. I have my undergraduate degree in chemistry from Stanford University where I worked in the laboratory of Prof. Robert Waymouth, my PhD in organometallic chemistry from Caltech where I worked with Prof. Theodor Agapie, and I did a 3-year postdoc in polymer chemistry with Prof. Marc Hillmyer at the University of Minnesota – Twin Cities where I was a Dreyfus Environmental Chemistry Fellow and co-lead for the Women in Science and Engineering Initiative. At SJSU, I teach inorganic, polymer, and analytical chemistry and lead a group of undergraduates and Master’s students working to catalyze challenging reactions relevant to human health and fuel production using a combination of organometallic and inorganic catalysts and polymeric frameworks.