Announcing the 2016 Paul Simon Outstanding Teacher-Scholar: Dr. Cristina De Meo, Dept. of Chemistry
The Paul Simon Outstanding Teacher-Scholar award is presented to an SIUE faculty member who has been recognized as an outstanding teacher and research scholar. The award demonstrates the belief that to be a good teacher, one must also be a good scholar. Winners of the Outstanding Teacher-Scholar award have shown significant contributions to original research or creative activities and have successfully integrated those contributions into their teaching practices.
Dr. De Meo came to SIUE as an assistant professor in 2003. Since her arrival she has been a Principal Investigator (PI) or Co-PI on 10 grant submissions, resulting in over $500,000 in externally funded grants and $9,306 in internal grants. Most currently, De Meo has submitted a $2.1 million NIH proposal, focused on her specialty of sialic acid containing oligosaccharides, with Dr.’s Demchenko (UMSL) and Stine. She has received 5 Summer Research Fellowships and a Research Corporation. Altogether, her research activities have led to 6 peer-reviewed journal publications, 10 seminars, and 19 conference presentations of SIUE research data. Most notably, she has been invited to speak at the Gordon Research Conference –June 2011 and June 2015 – as well as, the annual International sialic acid conference, SialoGlyco 2014, held in Gold Coast, Australia, where she also served as a session chair.
She was instrumental as a co-PI on an NSF Award through the Course, Curriculum, and Laboratory Improvement program, resulting in funding which allowed for the purchase of an isothermal titration calorimeter, and experiments have been developed and implemented in upper-level chemistry laboratories. During this project 3 graduate students and 3 undergraduate students were personally trained to perform the experiments as teaching assistants. Another 60 undergraduate students were also trained to use the isothermal calorimetry.
In her thirteen years with SIUE, De Meo has trained 38 students: 25 undergraduate students and 13 graduate students. She has served as Chemistry Club Advisor (2008-2010); Student Assessment & Standards Committee Member (2012-2013); Curriculum Committee Member (2012-2014, as well as Curriculum Committee Chair in 2013.
De Meo espouses a teacher-scholar model in her interactions with students and she finds the interconnection between research and teaching to be one of the most interesting and often fulfilling aspects of her job. With the support of CAS, The Graduate School and the Department of Chemistry, almost all of De Meo’s students have had the opportunity to travel and present their research at conferences. Sixteen of her students have been credited in her 22 publications.
Please join us in congratulating Dr. Cristina De Meo, the 2016 Paul Simon Outstanding Teacher-Scholar Award recipient, on her remarkable achievements.
