{"id":128769,"date":"2019-11-14T08:30:53","date_gmt":"2019-11-14T13:30:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=128769"},"modified":"2020-09-18T16:14:16","modified_gmt":"2020-09-18T20:14:16","slug":"awards-and-tributes-to-legendary-bates-chemistry-professor-thomas-wenzel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2019\/11\/14\/awards-and-tributes-to-legendary-bates-chemistry-professor-thomas-wenzel\/","title":{"rendered":"A national award and Bates tribute to legendary chemistry professor Thomas Wenzel"},"content":{"rendered":"

In the early 1990s, Bates professor Thomas Wenzel began to think that the traditional approach to teaching chemistry \u2014 lectures and what he calls \u201crecipe-based\u201d laboratory assignments \u2014 was missing something.<\/p>\n

For instance, students that Wenzel expected to thrive in his courses scored poorly on exams. Yet, in contrast, the students he hired to perform hands-on research in his Bates lab were highly engaged with the material.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seemed that the learning that happened in the research work was so much deeper and so much longer-lasting,\u201d Wenzel says. \u201cI realized I needed to make my instructional laboratories more research-like in their approach.\u201d<\/p>\n

So in his courses, Wenzel started putting students in groups to puzzle through questions and calculations. He framed his lab assignments as solving problems instead of following recipes. His students engaged more robustly with the material, and exam scores went up.<\/p>\n

\"Dana<\/a>

Dana Professor of Chemistry Tom Wenzel, who will retire in 2020, has been honored with the establishment of a student research fund in his name and an achievement award from the American Chemical Society. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n

Those simple steps began a pedagogical evolution that has made Wenzel, now the college’s Dana Professor of Chemistry, a national leader in the teaching of chemistry \u2014 including pioneering work to create open-access course materials \u2014 as well as a model for involving students in research and a prolific researcher.<\/p>\n

And at the start of his last year of teaching before retirement from Bates in 2020, Wenzel received two major honors that recognize his contributions to his field and to the lives of his students.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s hard to imagine a more gratifying way to end my career.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In August, the American Chemical Society awarded him its 2019 George C. Pimentel Award for \u201coutstanding contributions to chemical education.\u201d<\/p>\n

Soon thereafter, one of Wenzel’s former students paid tribute to his mentor by establishing the Thomas J. Wenzel Endowed Fund for Undergraduate Chemistry Research, to support students conducting summer research on campus.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt’s hard to imagine a more gratifying way to end my career,\u201d Wenzel says of the two career honors.<\/p>\n

\n\t+<\/span>A Few Wenzel Awards<\/a>\n\t<\/h5>
<\/p>\n

Since joining the Bates faculty in 1981, Tom Wenzel has produced 181 scholarly publications: 96 on research activities (refereed); 35 on educational activities (refereed); and 50 others, many of which have to do with efforts to promote undergraduate research. His external grants for research and education total more than $3.75 million.<\/p>\n

Wenzel’s honors have included:<\/p>\n