Background

Goal

One of the primary missions of the Division is the training of early-career scientists, as well as supporting the Laboratory’s goal of enhancing workforce diversity. Including outreach to underrepresented minorities is a natural extension of this mission.

Accomplishments in 2004

• New graduate students and postdoctoral scholars for faculty research groups
  The Division successfully recruited 6 graduate students from underrepresented groups in 2004, including 4 females and 3 Asian/Pacific Islander Americans. Three new postdoctoral scholars were also Asian/Pacific Islander Americans, and a new female postdoc joined the Division.

• Staff additions/changes
  Christopher Chang, Associate Professor of Chemistry at UC Berkeley, joined the Chemical Sciences Division as a Faculty Scientist. Elva Torres was the recipient of a UCOP Presidential Postdoctoral Fellowship.

• Visit by Professor Diola Bagayoko in February
  A staff scientist arranged a talk, at the Advanced Light Source, by Diola Bagayoko, a physics professor at Southern University at Baton Rouge, and the director of the Timbuktu Academy, a mentoring institute for minority undergraduate scholars. Professor Bagayoko was invited to LBNL by the Best Practices Diversity Council (BPDC).

• National Society of Black Physicists and Black Physics Students (NSBP) Annual Conference, February 18–21
  A staff scientist attended the National Society of Black Physicists annual conference and presented a talk. A concurrent one-day visit was made to Howard University to discuss a possible research collaboration.

• Jackson State University (JSU) graduate students visit on February 24
  A staff scientist conducted a tour of the Chemical Dynamics Beamline for ten JSU chemistry graduate students. A UC Berkeley President’s Postdoctoral Fellow associated with a Chemical Sciences faculty scientist took the students to visit labs on campus. The faculty scientist, the head of the Center for Science and Engineering Education (CSEE), and the Director of Research and the LSAMP Bridge coordinated the students’ visit.

• National Organization for the Professional Advancement of Black Chemists and Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE) Annual Conference, April 12–17
  A faculty scientist and a staff scientist attended the NOBCChE annual conference. The staff scientist presented a talk.

• High School Student Research Participation Program
  The Actinide Chemistry Program hosted a high-school participant in the CSEE six-week summer program.

• Community College Institute (CCI) Program
  The Actinide Chemistry and Atomic, Molecular, and Optical Sciences programs each hosted a CCI participant (one of whom was female) during the ten-week CSEE summer program.

• Laboratory Science Teacher Professional Development (LSTPD) Program
  A staff scientist hosted an LSTPD participant at the Molecular Environmental Science Beamline during the CSEE summer program.

• Laboratory Women’s Forum, October 26–27
  A staff scientist attended and participated in the conference, whose theme was “ New Directions—Women of Influence in the National Laboratories.” She submitted a poster, served as a tour guide, and assisted in the final report preparation.

• The Berkeley Edge Conference, November 4–7
  A staff scientist participated in the conference as a tour guide at the Molecular Environmental Science Beamline at the Advanced Light Source (ALS).

• JSU Conference on Current Trends in Computational Chemistry, November 12–13
  A faculty scientist served as a member of the organizing committee, and was the after-dinner speaker in the “Noble Lecture Series.”

• Recruitment effort
  A staff scientist initiated contact with two female scientists, mentored and helped them in their research efforts, and helped them write proposals for beamtime at the ALS. As a result, they were awarded time at the Polymer Scanning Transmission X-ray Microscopy Beamline. Prior to the staff scientist’s involvement, there were no female general users at this beamline; including the staff scientist, there are now three.

• JSU appointment
  A faculty scientist was appointed Adjunct Professor to the JSU Department of Chemistry.

• Museum of African American Technology (MAAT) Science Village
  A faculty scientist serves as a board member of MAAT, which is under the auspices of the Northern California Council of Black Professional Engineers.

• Statistical study
  A staff scientist who is also a CSD Best Practices Diversity Council (BPDC) representative initiated a study of LBNL exit interviews that took place between 1997 and 2004. The goal of the study is to identify any differences from the norm in treatment experienced by women and minorities on issues relating to their workplace environment, and to determine if there were differences in the retention of women and minorities compared to the norm. The study began in October and continued in 2005.

• Tour guides
  A graduate student, two postdocs, and a staff scientist conducted numerous tours at LBNL throughout the year, and will continue to do so in 2005.

Action Items for 2005

• Participate annually in the Berkeley Edge Conference, a National Science Foundation Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate, designed to recruit talented, underrepresented minority students for UC Berkeley doctoral programs in the sciences. Division management will actively promote the participation of Chemical Sciences principal investigators in this conference, seeking to develop links with minority-serving institutions and professional organizations.
• Seek opportunities for peer-to-peer interactions and for future collaborations with faculty and students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCU) and other minority-serving institutions. Continue to foster links with faculty at Howard University, Jackson State University (JSU), and Southern University at Baton Rouge. Two faculty scientists will each host a chemistry graduate student from Jackson State University (JSU) as part of the JSU Louis Stoke Alliance for Minority Participation (LSAMP) Bridge to the Doctorate Program.
• Work in collaboration with the Workforce Diversity Office to identify methods for fostering collaborations between minority serving institutions and the national laboratories, e.g., through peer-to-peer interactions, sabbaticals, scientific collaborations.
• Actively participate in Berkeley Lab’s Center for Science & Engineering Education (CSEE) programs. Division management will meet annually with CSEE to explore areas for CSD participation. CSEE will identify Chemistry and Chemical Engineering majors among applicants, taking into consideration their diversity statements, and forward names of prescreened undergraduates to Division Director Neumark.
• Efforts will be made to recruit participants for the CSEE undergraduate and teacher programs. A staff scientist will host a returning high-school teacher as part of CSEE’s Laboratory Science Teacher Professional Development (LSTPD) Program.
• Host two high-school student participants in the CSEE six-week High School Student Research Participation Program.
• Chemical Sciences Division meetings will include discussions of diversity goals and outreach opportunities. Division management will continue to communicate outreach opportunities to principal investigators.
• Diversity statistics and progress will be included in the Division overview during annual reviews by Chemical Sciences DOE/BES (Office of Basic Energy Sciences) and the Laboratory Director.
• Continuing a 2004 statistical study of exit interviews, a CSD staff scientist who is also a CSD BPDC Representative analyzed 800 interviews conducted during a four-year period, from 2000 to 2004, and presented the results to the BPDC. The staff scientist collaborated with another Committee member to complete statistical analyses of the preliminary findings, and a second presentation of the results followed. The goal of the study is to identify any differences from the norm in treatment experienced by women and minorities on issues relating to their workplace environment, and to determine if there were differences in the retention of women and minorities compared to the norm. A written report was submitted to Associate Laboratory Director David McGraw and Workforce Diversity Office Head Harry Reed; the results of the study will be presented to the Human Resources Department as well as Laboratory senior management.
• A faculty scientist will serve as advisor for an undergraduate student from Morehouse College as part of the Summer Undergraduate Program in Engineering Research at Berkeley (SUPERB), offered by the Center for Underrepresented Engineering Students. The scientist will also participate on a faculty panel, organized by SUPERB, on the subject of graduate school, and will speak to a group of African American high-school seniors who are being encouraged by the nonprofit agency Stiles Hall to apply to UC Berkeley. In addition, the scientist will serve as Chair of the newly created Gordon Research Conferences Blue Ribbon Committee on Diversity, and will continue to serve as a member of the organizing committee for the JSU Conference on Current Trends in Computational Chemistry. Finally, he has written the forward to the book Beyond Small Numbers—Voices of African American PhD Chemists, by Willie Pearson, Jr., published in 2005 by Elsevier.

For more information regarding this diversity plan, contact Daniel M. Neumark, Chemical Sciences Division Director.		Download this Diversity Plan in printable .rtf format.