Alumni Partners
Chemistry grads share career information
Amanda Carr '04, PharmD, Wal-Mart, Selinsgrove, PA
Email: acarr_82@hotmail.com
Amanda Carr is a staff pharmacist in a retail pharmacy. She counsels patients on prescription and over-the-counter medications. Amanda takes doctor calls and troubleshoots insurance issues. She verifies the correct drug, dose, and directions for all prescriptions encountered. After graduating from Franklin and Marshall College in 2004, Amanda attended pharmacy school at Lake Erie College of Osteopathic Medicine (LECOM) where she graduated in 2008.
Steve Emkey '02, Pharmaceutical Territory Manager, Bausch & Lomb, Central PA and NY
Email: stemkey@hotmail.com
Steve Emkey is currently a pharmaceutical territory manager with Bausch & Lomb. The purpose of his job is to market and sell a novel ester steroid to ophthalmologists and optometrists. He partners with his customers to find where his products can help their patients with ocular surface disease and post operative inflammation control. After graduating from F&M in 2002, he spent two years as a sales manager at a family business in Reading, PA. He moved his career into pharmaceuticals by joining Eli Lilly & Company selling their neuroscience portfolio to primary care physicians in Boston, MA. After two years of a successful career with Lilly, he was recruited to join Bausch & Lomb at his current position.
Keith Hamilton '02, Senior Internal Medicine Resident, University of Pennsylvania
Email: kwhamil@gmail.com
Keith Hamilton graduated from F&M in 2002 with a BA in Chemistry. Keith went on to get his Masters degree at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. He is currently a Senior Internal Medicine Resident at the University of Pennsylvania and has started his fellowship in Infectious Diseases.
Jeff Rowand '07, Third Year Medical Student, Penn State College of Medicine, Hershey, PA
Email: jeff.rowand@gmail.com
Jeff Rowand is a 3rd Year medical student at the Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, PA. He graduated Franklin & Marshall College in 2007 where he participated in student research in Chemistry and was a member of the Varsity Baseball team. Immediately following graduation, Jeff started his medical school education.
Meha Shah '00, Senior Chemist, Nalco Company, Energy Services Division, Sugar Land, TX
Email: meha@jhu.edu
Meha Shah is a Senior Chemist at Nalco in their Energy Services Division. Her main function is to provide technical support to the Chemical Process Industry through both analytical work, the synthesis of new chemical additives, and basic monitoring of plant operations. After graduating from Franklin and Marshall College in 2000, Meha Shah worked at DuPont Ag in Newark, DE as an associate chemist. While there she worked in R&D Discovery on the synthesis of novel herbicides and fungicides. After a year there she decided to enroll in graduate school to pursue her PhD. She began graduate school in 2001 at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, MD. While working towards her PhD in synthetic, organic chemistry she worked as a teaching assistant for organic chemistry. Her PhD thesis was in the area of asymmetric catalysis in the synthesis of small molecules. After graduate school she pursued a post-doctoral fellowship at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in the Dept. of Pharmacology. Her post-doctoral research was in the area of prodrug design and development. She presented her research at the National ACS conference and from there was recruited by Nalco for her current position in Sugar Land.
Steve Jamieson '01, Reference & Systems Librarian, Covenant Theological Seminary, St. Louis, MO
Email: steve@stevejamieson.com
Steve Jamieson oversees public services at the J. Oliver Buswell Jr. Library at Covenant Theological Seminary in St. Louis, MO. His primary duties include providing reference service, instructing students on research methodology, managing electronic resources, supervising circulation desk staff, and maintaining a high level of service to the student body. After graduating from Franklin & Marshall in 2001, Steve went on to earn a Master of Divinity degree at Covenant Seminary in 2004. Based on his inside knowledge of the Seminary's curriculum and technological aptitude, he was then hired by the Seminary's library to lead the public services division. He is currently finishing his Master of Library Science degree at the University of Missouri-Columbia, has published an article on the ethics of peer-to-peer file sharing, and has an interest in researching the information literacy and research practices of pastors.
Trishul Shah '00, Research Associate, Allergan, Inc., Irvine, CA
Email: trishuls@verizon.net
Trishul Shah was born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya. He joined F&M as a freshman in 1997 and graduated in 2000. Trishul graduated with a Master's in Chemistry from California State University Northridge in December 2004. He started working at Polypeptide Laboratories in Torrance, CA as a Production Chemist in January 2005. Trishul started working at Allergan in May 2007.
Jeremy Steinbacher '03, Post-Doctoral Fellow, University of Vermont, Burlington, VT
Email: stein03@gmail.com
Jeremy Steinbacher began study at Franklin & Marshall College in 1999. While at F&M, he nearly completed three different minors and graduated with a B.A. degree in chemistry in the spring of 2003. He entered graduate school in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at Cornell University in August 2003 and began work in the laboratory of D. Tyler McQuade shortly thereafter. Jeremy began a 9-month leave of absence starting in June 2004 and engaged in river ecology research in the wilds of Olympic National Park and enjoyed substitute teaching at home in Pennsylvania. Jeremy returned to Cornell the following spring, transferring to the Department of Chemistry and Chemical Biology, and continued work with Professor McQuade. He attained his M.S. in chemistry in 2006 and defended his Ph.D. research in July 2008. Currently, Jeremy is employed as a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the University of Vermont. His current research is in the field of drug delivery with porous microparticles. Typical payloads include small-molecule cancer therapeutics (such as Doxorubicin) and macromolecules, like DNA plasmids and short interfering RNA. Also, he has a project using the same microparticles as contrast agents for MRI imaging.
Stephanie Stockalis '01, Pediatric Resident MD, West Virginia University Hospital, Morgantown, WV
Email: sstockalis@hotmail.com
Stephanie graduated from F&M in 2001 and began medical school at Temple University. Stephanie is currently a third-year pediatric resident at WVU hospital in Morgantown, WV. Her primary interest is in newborn care, delivery room resuscitation and stabilization, and neonatology.
Neil Strotman '01, Senior Research Chemist, Merck & Co., Rahway, NJ
Email: neil_strotman@merck.com
Neil graduated Franklin and Marshall College in 2001 and began graduate school in chemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After graduating, Neil began a post-doctoral fellowship at MIT in 2006. Neil has been working at Merck in New Jersey in the process research division since 2007.
Joseph Teel '99, Medical Director, Johnson Health Center, Lynchburg, VA
Email: joeteel@hotmail.com
Joseph Teel graduated from F&M in 1999 with a Chemistry major went on to Medical School at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia where he was supported through a scholarship from the National Health Service Corp. This is a federally funded program to recruit health professionals to medically under-served communities. Joseph spent three years in his Family Medicine Residency at the Middlesex Hospital Family Medicine Residency Program in Middletown, Connecticut. It is a well-established community-based and academic-affiliated training program with ties to UConn and Yale. In 2006 Joseph finished his training and took a position at the Johnson Health Center in Lynchburg, VA, where he has been since. He was recently appointed to the position of Medical Director and oversees the care of approximately 15,000 patients and 3 locations. Joseph's ultimate goal is to work on a broader scale to unify the system of Federally Qualified Health Centers with academic institutions to close gaps in the medical safety net across the country.
Jim Terzian '03, Radiology Resident, Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, Philadelphia, PA
Email: toyzian@yahoo.com
Jim Terzian graduated in '03 from F&M with a B.A. in Chemistry. He went on to get his M.D. at SUNY Upstate Medical University in Syracuse, NY. From there Jim decided to pursue Radiology and he is currently doing his Radiology Residency at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia, PA.
Cara Sheaffer '04, Event Coordinator, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
Email: sheaf011@umn.edu
Cara Sheaffer spent two years after graduation working in industry at two separate labs as an analyst. Cara decided to attend graduate school and in spring of 2008 she completed her Masters degree in Educational Policy and Administration and currently helps University student groups plan, implement, and finance events held in the Student Union. The focus of the position is student development.
Jonie Young '01, Nurse (CNII), Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Boston, MA
Email: jonieyoung@hotmail.com
Jonie Young is a Registered Nurse on a neuromedicine and neurosurgery unit at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) in Boston, MA. She cares for two to six patients at a time, which may require telemetry (heart) monitoring or continuous vital sign monitoring, as in an ICU. Some of the disorders Jonie's patients have include stroke/TIA, epilepsy, subdural hematoma, subarachnoid hematoma, brain and spinal tumors, multiple schlerosis, myasthenia gravis, ALS/Lou Gehrig's Disease, trauma or fall injuries. Jonie is responsible for neurological checks every one to four hours, monitoring telemetry, medication administration, and activities of daily living (i.e. bathing, toileting, feeding).
After F&M, Jonie went to Temple University School of Medicine for 1.5 years but felt like she never had enough time to really understand all of the details and information she had to reproduce for exams. Jonie also struggled with the fact that she did not have time to be with her family or have time to enjoy life. She decided to take a leave and never looked back. Jonie worked in a spinal cord research lab at Drexel University Medical School for two years prior to going to nursing school. Jonie attended Saint Joseph College in West Hartford, CT, in the Accelerated Second-Degree Program, and graduated from the 16-month program in August 2006. She moved to Boston, MA, and started working at BIDMC in November 2006.
The aspects of nursing that Jonie loves most are that she can see, understand, and contribute to the medical aspects of a patient's care, but she also gets to be there to explain details and provide comfort and care to patients and their families. Nursing is also great because she and her co-workers appreciate the abilities of each other and support each other's strengths and weaknesses.
She really appreciates the ways in which she was able to grow as a student at F&M. F&M inspired in Jonie a great love for learning and open-mindedness about the world we live in. Jonie would never want to change the way she went about getting to where she is in life. There are so many "second-degree" nursing programs available that take one to two years to complete. It really is a great way to enjoy the benefits of an F&M education and go on to a great profession in nursing!
Brian Cohen '01, Research Associate, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY
Email: bwcohen@bnl.gov
Brian Cohen graduated from F&M in 2001 with a BA in Chemistry. From there, he went to graduate school at the University of Chicago. At the University of Chicago he worked for Mike Hopkins and graduated in August 2008 with a Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry. Upon completion of his doctorate degree he began work at Brookhaven National Laboratory working with Etusko Fujita. He is currently a research associate at BNL, with current research interests involving ruthenium bis (bipyridine) complexes that can be used for solar fuels and carbon dioxide sequestering agents.
Neetha Khan '99, Associate Director, MRSEC (Materials Research Science and
Engineering Center), Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
Email: neetha_khan@yahoo.com or neetha@andrew.cmu.edu
After graduating from F&M in 1999, Neetha Khan pursued a PhD in Materials Science from the Materials Science and Engineering Dept at the University of Delaware. Her research focused on the field of surface science and catalysis-specifically, the chemistry of bimetallic/alloy surfaces. After receiving her PhD in 2004, she then accepted a postdoctoral fellowship from the Alexander-von-Humboldt Foundation in Germany for 18 months. In the Chemical Physics Department at the Fritz Haber Institute, her research was to investigate the chemical and physical properties of nanoparticles on surfaces. Upon returning to the US, she spent two years working as a researcher at the National Energy Technology Lab in Pittsburgh. The work at this lab focuses on developing clean energy technologies. In 2008 she took a position at Carnegie Mellon University to help run the MRSEC (Materials Research Science and Engineering Center) in the Materials Science and Engineering Dept. The responsibilities in this position include organizing numerous activities in the center and running educational programs such as the REU (Research Experience for Undergraduates) program and other k-12 outreach programs.
Timothy Crall '01, MD, PGY 4 Resident, Harvard Combined Orthopaedic Residency Program, Boston, MA
Email: tcrall@partners.org
Tim is a 4th year resident in orthopaedic surgery at the Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Combined program in Boston, Mass. It is a 5 year program so he is close to being done! His job entails seeing patients with orthopaedic/musculoskeletal injuries or problems in the emergency department or the office, planning and assisting in surgery, and helping to take care of patients in the hospital after surgery. Being a surgical resident entails working some very strange hours but is very rewarding and a lot of fun. After graduating with a degree in chemistry in 2001, Tim attended Washington University in St. Louis School of Medicine. He graduated in 2005 and moved to Boston to begin residency.
Katie (Alfare) Garber '03, Ph.D. Candidate, Department of Chemistry, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
Email: alfare@chem.wisc.edu
Katie Garber is a sixth year graduate student in the Department of Chemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. After graduating from Franklin & Marshall College in 2003 with a degree in chemistry, she entered the graduate program at UW and joined the Kiessling lab later that year. Her current research involves the design of a general scaffold for use in targeting lectins, or carbohydrate-binding proteins, which are important to a myriad of cellular processes. Specifically, she is studying a protein called DC-SIGN, a cell-surface receptor involved in immune system function that has been implicated in HIV infection. After obtaining her Ph.D. from UW, she is planning to pursue post-doctoral studies, with the goal of obtaining a tenure-track position at a small liberal arts college.
Mark Werley '03, First Year Resident, Diagnostic Radiology, Cooper University Hospital, Camden, NJ
Email: mark.werley@gmail.com
Mark Werley is currently in his first year of a residency in diagnostic radiology at Cooper University Hospital in Camden, NJ. After leaving F&M, Mark attended Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, graduating in 2007. Mark then completed a general medical internship at Frankford Hospital System in Philadelphia. Mark started a four-year radiology residency in July of 2008. His job involves performing and interpreting all varieties of medical imaging, including x-rays, CT and MRI scans, ultrasounds, and radioisotope scans.
Melissa Hansen '03, Second year Pediatrics Resident,
University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
Email: melissa.hansen@alumni.fandm.edu
Melissa is training to become a pediatrician and is currently in her second year of residency at the University of Rochester/Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester, NY. After graduating from Franklin & Marshall College in 2003, Melissa attended medical school at Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, PA.
Heather Wood '05, Assistant to the Director, University Honors Program, The Catholic University of America, Washington D.C.
Email: heathermwood7@gmail.com
Heather Wood (nee: Brown) graduated from F&M in 2005. After graduation, she spent a summer in Mexico as a missionary and then dedicated her next year to working for AmeriCorps in Paterson, NJ directing an after school program and summer camp for inner city elementary school children and teenagers. Since Heather has a passion both for youth and Chemistry, she became certified as a High School Chemistry Teacher through the alternate route graduate program and taught high school chemistry and Environmental Science for two years in NJ. Heather moved to Washington, DC where she is Assistant to the Director of the University Honors program and will be resuming graduate study in the spring in the areas of Latin and Theology.
Rebecca Toroney '04, Fifth Year Graduate Student,
Chemistry Department,
Penn State University, University Park, PA
Email: rut115@psu.edu
Rebecca graduated from Franklin and Marshall College in 2004, after performing independent study research as a chemistry major with Dr. Ryan Mehl. Rebecca entered graduate school after graduation, and is currently working on her PhD in Chemistry at Penn State, University Park, in the lab of Dr. Philip Bevilacqua, Department of Chemistry. Her work focuses on investigating the link between RNA folding and human disease through studies of the RNA-binding protein, PKR, a component of the innate-immune response in humans. In 2007, Rebecca was part of a collaboration between the Bevilacqua group and members of Dr. Craig Cameron's group (PSU Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Department) which resulted in a publication in the journal Science. Rebecca hope to complete her thesis work and apply for post-doc positions in the near future.
Arthur Catino '00, National Institutes of Health Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University, Cambridge MA
Email: ajcatino@fas.harvard.edu
Arthur Catino graduated from Franklin & Marshall College in 2000, later obtaining his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Maryland in 2006 working with Professor Michael P. Doyle where he developed a number of catalytic processes using dirhodium metal complexes. He moved to the laboratory of Professor David A. Evans at Harvard University as a National Institutes of Health (NIH) post-doctoral fellow where he initiated a fundamentally new strategy for the synthesis of phorbol, a potent naturally occurring protein kinase C agonist. In January of 2009, he will join the Medicinal Chemistry Department of Boehringer-Ingelheim Pharmaceuticals in Ridgefield, CT.
Melissa Reinard ’03, Chemist, Aberdeen Test Center, Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD
Email: melissa.reinard@gmail.com
After graduating from Franklin & Marshall College in 2003, Melissa attended the University of Delaware where she received her Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry in 2008. Melissa's dissertation research focused on the use of mass spectrometry to uncover the chemical and physical properties of nanoparticles (both naturally occurring and anthropogenic) suspended in the air we breathe. She is currently employed as a Chemist for the U.S. Army with Aberdeen Test Center, in Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD. There, Melissa has had an incredible opportunity to do important defense work, which helps protect the lives of American soldiers. Her group primarily focuses on testing the air quality that soldiers are exposed to in a wide variety of military situations. From toxic gas exposure during weapons firing, to monitoring toxic fumes discharged from automatic fire extinguishing systems in military vehicles, to evaluating personnel survivability in extreme threat situations, Melissa's work contributes to evaluating cutting edge technology aimed at helping soldiers safely complete their mission objectives at home and abroad.
Matthew Mousley '01, Associate, Duane Morris LLP, Philadelphia, PA
Email: MCMousley@duanemorris.com
After Matthew Mousley graduated from F&M, he attended Villanova University School of Law. While in law school, Matthew was a research assistant for a law professor and a summer associate at Duane Morris, where he currently practices. After he graduated from Villanova Law, Matthew was a judicial clerk for Hon. Marjorie Rendell on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit (federal appellate court for PA, NJ, DE, and the Virgin Islands). After the clerkship (1 year), Matthew started as an associate in the IP Practice Group at Duane Morris, where he is currently employed. Matthew's practice involves all aspects of patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, and technology law, including obtaining patents and trademarks (prosecution), IP portfolio counseling, IP enforcement and litigation (trial and appellate), software and technology transactions, and e-Commerce and Internet law.
Douglas Williams '03, Synthetic Organic Chemist, Adesis Inc., New Castle, DE
Email: dwill1016@comcast.net
Douglas Williams is currently working as a synthetic organic chemist at Adesis Inc. in New Castle, DE. Adesis is a contract research organization which means they are hired by various companies (big pharma, biotech, etc...) to make compounds for their research programs. This is his first job out of grad school. Douglas spent the last 5 years at the University of Pennsylvania earning his PhD in the labs of Eric Meggers. The research there was focused on making structurally complex molecules built around a single metal atom for the purpose of generating potent and specific protein kinases inhibitors. The research was very rewarding and successful resulting in a number of publications and patents.
Stephanos Tsirakoglou ‘99, Professor, Temple University and Saint Joseph's University, Philadelphia, PA
Email: StephanosT@gmail.com
Stephanos is using his Master's degree in chemistry to teach at a number of institutions of higher learning in the Philadelphia area. His main interest, however, is music, and Stephanos is pursuing a career as an opera singer. He has sung with the Seattle Opera Company, the Utah Festival Opera Company, Opera New Jersey, Intermezzo Opera in Florida, Lake George Opera in New York, and others. To underwrite his interest in the performing arts, he has spent the last 6 years working as an academic mercenary, teaching general and organic chemistry at whatever university will have him. He occasionally considers a career in science teaching, but the draw of the lyric stage is too great.
