women, an orange, and a steamship

Subtitle: SERMACS 2019, Day Two

Who is that ultra-relaxed person?
That would be me, responsibilities for NCW d-o-n-e!
The Undergraduate Lunch & Learn with Women in Industry was the first item on my radar today.
Remember how much I loved being a lunch lady in Augusta?
That's why I paid to attend all three luncheons here at our SERMACS.

The meal today, designed to attract the younger crowd and to fit their budget, consisted of nice five-inch sandwiches and plenty of salad greens.
I had the grilled chicken wrap and the turkey club,
both sans bread.
That certainly made a mighty fine luncheon salad!

There were nine women on the panel.
From the left, the specialties of these women are medical research, pharmaceutical chemistry, forensics and court cases, public outreach, plastics manufacture, and production of textiles.

Again from the left, the specialties for these three panelists are pine-based products, wood products from utility poles to pulp, and quality assurance and control of imported goods.
(Hi, Erica! Good to see you here!)

All nine strongly recommended to the students the need to take classes outside of their science core.
Take a business class, they said, to better understand how to be a manager.
Take a speech class, to be more prepared for presentation at meetings.
They also echoed the same message of gender bias to the young women in the audience.
The two oldest women, working in a "man's world" for

almost thirty years, had only slightly easier experiences than mine as an electronics tech in the Navy.
That was forty years - or two generations - ago.
However, all agreed that treatment in the workplace has greatly improved in the past ten years, as the older generation retires and takes its biases with it.
As I've mentioned before, change requires the passage of multiple generations, if it is to occur at all.


After the lunch, I was off to the riverside for a walk in the sunshine - ah!
That put me in mind, naturally, for the afternoon session for "Advancements in Environmental Chemistry"!
("Naturally", right? Get the pun?)
I caught the ones on uranium in the marshes; the toxic chromium+6 and ways to reduce it; the puzzle of how technetium was oxidized to +6; and a very interesting look at cloud droplet formation from ocean spray particle size and shape.

Time for wandering around and exploring the expo!
And guess what I discovered?
An orange in need of rescue from torture?
Nope, this orange had volunteered to be a battery!
I had heard of using a potato for such things, from Professor Proton's tv show (get it?).
But using an orange was certainly a new twist.
Quite interesting... and fun!

This was very interesting and fun, too!
Labster is a new virtual reality tool for students to gain lab experience without using chemicals.
They still had to wear goggles, though!
Well, actually, it was a virtual reality helmet, but it still served as eye protection, so that counts - yes, it does!
It made me a bit disoriented and dizzy, but the students just loved it!

The students loved the ice cream social, too!
I had almost decided to allow my lactose intolerance to take the win, but... no.
Leopold's had brought Mint Chocolate Chip as a choice, so I chanced it.
So much tasty fun I had, mining for chocolate in the mountains of creamy mint!

T last it was time for the evening's featured presentation, starring... the Steamship Savannah!
The same groundbreaking vessel that had been lauded on National Maritime Day was in the foreground once more!
John Laurence Busch had written a book about her, "Steam Coffin: Captain Moses and the Steamship Savannah Break the Barrier", and has a website to spread the word to all.
To encourage interest, he had crafted several different talks.
For us chemistry nerds, the topic was prevention of corrosion of metal in a sea water environment.
(smile!)

Why had the man gone to such lengths to spread the word about this 200-year-old ship?
As he explained, she represented high technology.
Specifically, she was "an advance that moved people through time and space in a way not natural".
Until steam power proved its usefulness for transport of people and goods across the ocean, sail power and good old-fashioned use of an oar were the only methods.
Steam allowed a much faster and more reliable transport.
What a nifty way to share his knowledge!
(smile!))