Dear Faculty, Staff, Postdocs, and Graduate and Undergraduate Students of the Department of Chemistry,
I am delighted to inform you that Dr. Samer Gozem has been appointed Director of Graduate Studies in Chemistry (DGS). Dr. Lei Li has been appointed Associate Director of Graduate Studies in Chemistry, effective December 17, 2024.
Dr. Suazette Mooring will officially commence a one-year (renewable) term on January 13, 2025, as a Program Director in the Division of Undergraduate Education at the National Science Foundation. During the professional leave of absence, Dr. Mooring will gain experience in the development and management of large federal programs while providing valuable expertise in chemistry and chemistry education research to the National Science Foundation. Dr. Mooring will continue to direct her research group part-time but will step down from any service and teaching roles at GSU.
The Department of Chemistry sincerely thanks Dr. Mooring for her unwavering dedication to her role as DGS in Chemistry. During her tenure, which started in October 2021, Dr. Mooring and her Team implemented an orientation program for new graduate students, developed a comprehensive orientation agenda for incoming graduate students during both the Fall and Spring semesters, updated the graduate handbook to reflect current policies and procedures, designed and introduced new forms to improve accountability for graduate students and faculty, including annual Ph.D. committee meeting forms, advisor designation forms, and travel request forms, developed comprehensive FAQs for prospective and current students, which was made accessible on the department of chemistry website, increased interaction with graduate students through open office hours, online scheduling via Calendly, and annual meetings, completed annual graduate program assessments, created a rubric for evaluating Ph.D. oral qualifying exams, updated course plans for each Ph.D. concentration and the M.S. program, replaced outdated audit sheets for clearer student guidance, collaborated with the College of Arts & Sciences to integrate new course requirements into Degree Works, facilitating better tracking of student progress, and oversaw the implemented a holistic application process with an accompanying rubric, which included the removal of the GRE as a requirement. With Dr. Mooring’s leadership, there was an increase in applications from 150 to 285 and new enrollment of graduate students from 37 to 52 from 2022 to 2024.
Best,
GSU CHEMISTRY