Hi All,

I've been asked to organize the Inorganic Chemistry sections of the 2022 Western Regional meeting to be held in Las Vegas during fall 2022.  One thought would be to have a session on aspects of teaching Inorganic Chemistry.  The exact dates for the meeting were not fixed last I heard, but it will be during fall semester, so attending might involve missing a lecture or two.  If there is interest, I'll propose it to the organizing committee.  Feel free to either reply to this on the forum or email me (paul.forster@unlv.edu)

My colleague and I are getting interested in ball mills for our solid-state synthesis work with students.  I used one in graduate school (20 years ago), but have not used one since.  Does anyone else out there like to use ball mills, and if so, can you recommend a good one (or a good company to took at?)  A quick look online shows that these can get very expensive.  Thanks for any suggestions you can provide!

Deborah Polvani, Washington & Jefferson College

OK, so here's a new one for me. My colleague who is teaching Gen Chem I this Fall got a notice from Student Access and Accomodations about a student with a service animal. Have any of you ever had to work with a student who has a service animal in lab? Any experiences would be helpful.

Is linear algebra a pre-requsite for the (first) inorganic chemistry class at your institution?

How does having or not having a linear algebra pre-requsite impact how you approach group theory?

Have you found or created materials, in particular readings, that allow students to apply group theory to chemical problems such as molecular orbital diagrams and spectroscopy without passing through at least some of the matrix algebra that underlies group theory? 

I would like to invite your students to participate in the inaugural Clarion University Crystal Growing Competition.

All right, I am about to teach Gen Chem II for the first time in Spring 2019. I was chatting with some students this week who were studying for their sophomore analytical final, which is the ACS exam, and thought about it. Illinois State University uses the organic ACS exam for the Organic II final, the Inorganic ACS exam for the advanced inorganic final, why not use the ACS Gen Chem exam for the Gen Chem II final? I don't give multiple chioce hour exams, so it would be a change for the students, but I see some benefits.

Hi,  I am looking for a lab that utilizes 2-D NMR.  Ideally the students would synthesize the compound and use 2-D NMR for charaterization. We have a new 400MHz NMR and am looking to integrate some simple 2-D concepts into my senior level inorganic class.

How often do people change thier homework and other assignments when teachg the same class for multiple years/semesters?  This semester is the first time I've taught a class for the second time, and I've noticed there's a certain (small) fraction of students who are just copying last year's answer key on homework assignments.

Hope College in Holland, MI seeks to fill a tenure track position, Assistant Professor of Analytical Chemistry, starting Fall 2019. Review of applications for this position will begin September 21, 2018. A full description of this tenure track position can be found at:  https://www.schooljobs.com/careers/hopeedu

One of my brightest students, graduating this month, completed a senior thesis on perceptions of green and sustainability practices in undergraduate chemistry lab classes. She has a large database of survey responses that are worthy of an in-depth statistical analysis, but neither I nor she has that expertise. I envision a J Chem Ed article. Can you recommend a collaborator interested in doing the statistical heavy lifting and writing a joint paper with us? Thanks!