Lulu Cooks and Tells: As I Retire from IUP - Reflections on Three Life-Changing Questions

The first thing that people ask when they learn that I teach at Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) is, "You actually drive that far everyday?" (Not really everyday but 3 to 4 times a week depending on my schedule of classes for that semester). And I would say yes.

I never minded the long one hour drive from Monroeville to Indiana County since I was on a mission. I wanted to teach. I wanted to teach students to learn. I wanted to make them think. I wanted them to fall in love with chemistry. And yes I loved making up questions for them to answer during activities, homeworks, quizzes and exams in the lecture and in the lab as I countered their querries with questions after questions to their chagrin.

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My life itself was shaped by questions - actually three life changing ones. The first was asked of me when I was in my mid-twenties after I just finished a six week training course on the use of radioisotopes for pesticide residue analysis in Sao Paolo, Brazil. I was to bring back the knowledge back to the Philippines where I was engaged in analyzing DDT in human tissues at the Philippine Atomic Energy Commission. But fate had other plans.

I used quozio.com to make this.

Enroute to New York to visit my cousin, I heard that the train was stopping in Washington DC. I decided to stop there instead since that was my next destination after New York and up to now I do not understand why the travel agent did not make it my first stop. I got off there and to make the story short, my friend, Seville Detera, and I had dinner at her apartment after she picked me up. She was a graduate student then but she was able to prepare a feast for me consisting of steak, corn and I believe potato of some kind.

My friend and mentor, Dr. Sevilla Detera-Wadleigh of the National Institutes of Health, during the Philippine American Academy of Science and Engineering meeting this May, 2014 at North Carolina State University.

I remember we were sitting on the floor and not on a table eating our dinner when she asked me the question: "Are you happy where you are now?" I was perplexed by the question and did not know where she was heading to with it. Before I know it, she was calling Dr. Britt, the chair of the George Washington University (GWU) Chemistry Department inquiring for an assistantship for me. A few days later I found myself in Ottawa, Canada trying to change my red official passport to a civilian one. That was the only way I could change my visitors visa to a student one. Yes that phone call Seville made got me the assistantship.

The process of changing visa status took weeks. I even found myself filling the coin slot of a phone booth by the youth hostel (actually a former jail house) I was staying in with coins as I tried convincing the Commissioner of the office where I worked in the Philippines to grant me permission to study in the United States via a long distance call. He finally did permit me several weeks later.

The youth hostel I stayed in at Ottawa, Canada where I changed my visa status in order to study at George Washington University, Washington, DC. The bunk beds were located along the corridors not the cells.

That phone call made by Seville started my quest to further my studies in chemistry which started at George Washingtom University under Michael M. King and ended in Ames, Iowa where I got my PhD in Physical Organic Chemistry under the late Glen A. Russell. It was also in Ames where I met and married Bob, another physical organic chemist and had my first daughter, Wendy.

Dr. Michael M. King, my Masters thesis adviser on the Fluorination of Pyrolles Using TrifluoroAcetic Acid. He is presently the Chair of the GWU Chemistry Dept.

Corcoran Hall, George Washington University, which houses its Chemistry Department.

Dr. Glen A. Russell, my research adviser at Iowa State University posing with his beloved MG.

Gilman Hall, Iowa State University, where I worked on my PhD under the great Free Radical Chemist, Dr. Glen A. Russell on the use of Semidiones in Studying Long Range Coupling in Bicylic Heteroatom Containing Compounds and the SH2' Reactions of Alpha Beta Unsaturated Stannane Compounds.

Bob and I got married in Ames, IA. The Filipino community in Ames helped me have a Filipino wedding complete with lechon, roasted pig with skin intact.

After we finished our graduate studies at Iowa State, Bob got a position at Kansas City while I did my three year postdoctoral fellowship in Biophysical Chemistry on Lipid Alcohol interactions using NMR at the VA Medical Center research division which was affiliated with the University of Kansas Medical Center. I also had another daughter Bettina during that time. Later I landed a position in a drug company, Marion Merrell Dow. The last position I had before coming to Pittsburgh was teaching part-time at Longview Community College while I raised a young family. That was where I started to figure out how to teach.

On my second semester at Longview, my husband thought he was going to accept a job offer at Michigan State at a lab developing biodegradable materials while I might have the possibility to help set up their analytical lab. I wanted to tell the good news to one of my students about what I consider a possible dream job. She was about my age in her 40's at that time and I wanted to share it with her since both of us had always put on hold our career when our children were concerned. She quit her job and took care of her child when she found him handcuff to his crib by his baby sitter. I thought she would be ecstatic when she heard the news but instead I was surprised when she asked the question. "Why don't you teach?" I thought to myself, "What is she talking about? This is a dream job". I remember her saying when I asked why, "It is the way you say things".

My husband did not take the offer from Michigan State but instead decided to work for PPG in Monroeville Pa as a polymer chemist. Meanwhile I taught first at Westmoreland County Community College where I got hooked on teaching and chemistry. I taught general chemistry from the awesome but highly challenging Brown and Le May's book to nursing students who did not have any introductory chemistry at all. This experience was how I discovered one can teach to anybody anything, what mattered was how you teach it.

Later on, I taught at Carlow University where I developed the first of my "famous" lecture packets. I also developed a course called Chemistry and Society which afforded nonscience majors another option to fulfill their science requirement. It was also there that I had an epiphany of some sort when I was wondering about improving the performance of the students in my chemistry courses. I wondered if they would perform better if they had a better high school science education. I even made bolder supposition, "Would I not have more impact to society if I taught in high school preferably in the inner city?". So I enrolled at the University of Pittsburgh to obtain my certificate in teaching high school chemistry. It was an investment in learning how to teach which I did not use in high school but I applied at IUP where I stayed for 12 and half years.

Carlow University, Oakland Pa.

Weyandt Hall at IUP which houses the chemistry department. This is the view from the beautiful Oak Grove.

Did I regret doing so? Namely giving up that dream to make that impact on students' lives and learning at that earlier age of high school. I remember a friend, Marilyn, assuring me it is never too late for anything and she should know. For many years, she headed Bethlehem Haven where women in their thirties up to even I believe fifties learn new skills in life.

I have taught many courses here at IUP. They were all memorable. Perhaps the one I felt I had the most influence on were the students in my CHEM 101 classes composed of freshmen some of whom were unprepared for college. Years of teaching this course, convinced me that it was never too late for anybody to learn how to learn, how to think, and sometimes fall in love with chemistry in fact even within the same semester. My greatest joy was to see students who could not even do simple mathematical problems develop better study habits and thinking abilities towards the end of the semester even asking their own critical questions.

My students in CHEM 101 Fall 2011.

I would not be here without my students who inspired as well as challenged me. They were always appreciative of whatever I tried to do to make them learn and think. I have flipped, project based, etc etc method after method, And yes I have lecture packet-ed (developed five lecture packets while at IUP) and D2L-ed (online quizzes and homework). I even danced Gangnam style once.

Me dancing gangnam style in my CHEM 101 class 2011.

Just two days ago, I was stopped by a student as I was walking to my car to go home. She had this concern in her eyes when she asked how I was. She had heard I was sick. I asked her if she was a former student and she said no but she had sat in in my class. She had heard that news from one of my students in that CHEM 101 class in 2011 with whom I shared one of the most emotional time of my life. That was the day I found I had a small c or early stage cancer. I am grateful that I had somebody to share that emotional news with - my stupefied students. I knew they cared but not as much as when I was asked about that day three years later by this wonderful student who learned about my small c from one of them. I do remember that day vividly since I used it as a teaching moment to show how relevant chemistry was. In fact, this Monday for my last lecture I will be showing the mask that was used in the radiation therapy that I went through as a show and tell device to illustrate how chemistry helped saved my life.

The "mask" during my radiation therapy. More on this in this blog.

As I was thinking of retiring, I remember the third question that was asked of me 14 years ago. While at Carlow, I obtained a minority grant to investigate the use of lipid vectors for drug delivery at the University of Pittsburgh Pharmacology Department. Before I started on this grant, I called my post doc mentor, Dr. Elizabeth Rowe, to tell her that I got it because Dr. Leaf Huang at Pitt knew her and liked her work which matched the research project he had crafted for me.

Dr. Elizabeth S. Rowe, my Postdoctoral mentor at the Research Center at the VA Medical Center, KC and KU medical center.

Dr. Leaf Huang who I worked with at the University of Pittsburgh Pharmacology Department where I investigated the use of Lipid Vectors as Drug Delivery System. He is presently at the UNC.

To my surprise, during our conversation she asked a question which I did not expect, "Why don't you write? Just write, anything." How about my prepositions la di da la di da I asked her since I struggled with them as she reviewed the papers I wrote. She assured me that was fine. She liked the flow of the papers I wrote and which she could not change no matter how much she tried. It took me years to answer yes to this question. But I finally did. This summer I continued the blog site I started three years ago with a welcome post but nothing else. It is on healthy and decadent recipes as well as interesting reflections in life. People are asking what my plans are for retirement. This is one of them, to continue writing and cooking for my blog. I want to travel and have more time with my family especially Maddie my granddaughter who I already taught an addictive habit of watching YouTube videos of nursery rhymes.

I would like to thank people in my evaluation committee (Anne Kondo, Jaeju Ko, Bobbie Eddy, Charles Lake and the late John Woolcock, and the three chairs I was under, (Ruiess Ramsey, John and George Long) for being so generous of their time and patience as I pursued my mission. I want to thank each and every one in the department and staff as well as members of the other departments for always taking the time to talk to me and making me laugh while we met in the corridors. Most importantly I thank everyone, faculty and students for accepting me as I am and allowing me to do things in sometimes over the top way that they sometimes did not understand at first but I hope they do now.

I wanted to really retire this summer especially after seeing the three 8 o'clock lab classes I was assigned but what made me come back was hearing that song from Frozen, Let It Go. I remember the fun I had dancing like Elsa upon her transformation to some of my students this spring of this year as that song was humming in my head. Well that song is in my head as I let go of the wonderful time at IUP. Thank you everyone.

Thanks to the department for the send off party held during our holiday party. Below are some of the pictures.

George gingerly putting decorations on the tree. Thanks George and wife Julie for preparing the decorations and delicious perfect menu.

The recipe for this cake lovingly made by Dr Ellen Chinn is in this blog.

Loved everything but most especially the bean salad. I will try making that and share the recipe in a future post.

My partners in crime in Reflective Practice General Chemistry Teaching Circle. Drs. Anne Kondo and Wendy Elcesser. Love them.

Dr. George Long giving the blurb about my service to the department especially preparing the graduation powerpoint and lately videos.

The students, faculty and staff listening to me go on and on about this and that during my thank you talk.

Thanking the department for the wonderful Williams Sonoma gift card which I can use now that I am food blogging and the very well designed wallet I could use for my future travels especially.

Behind are the other goodies to die for, the banana cake, brownies, rocky road, peanut butter fudge, chocolate chip cookes and other cookies. Please share the recipes with me before I leave guys. I brought the Last Minute Nut Balls the recipe of which is in this blog.

The nautical themed cake was inspired by Ellen's shirt shown above. Awesomely creative.

Dean Deanne Snavely and I knew each other from when we played tennis the summer before starting first year of grad school at Iowa State. Neither one of us btw knew how to play.