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Dr. Ekaterina Sukhanova, QCC-LSAMP Director
 The NYC--LSAMP program reflects the core values stated in our college mission: making high-quality education accessible to all and helping students succeed. Students are provided an excellent opportunity to work closely with a faculty mentor and start forging their own professional identity. Participation in the program is an important step towards connecting intellectual study to personal fulfillment, academic preparation to work, and knowledge to social engagement.
We are looking forward to another productive year of implementing the program. Special efforts will be made next year to further increase the visibility of the program on campus, with an emphasis on reaching out to newly hired faculty members.
SEFTON BENNETT, Activity Coordinator
 At Queensborough CC, the LSAMP program went through the normal transition of students’ participation with excellent outcomes. Being a fostering institution for the senior colleges, the number of graduates and transfer students within CUNY indicates that the program is consistent with its mission.
The New York City Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation program introduced the activity coordinator’s component to adhere to its push to produce Doctoral Candidates. This position continues to provide necessary tools and experiences for my development as a Ph.D. candidate. The opportunity to work with students and faculty will go a far way in my growth.
As we continue to work towards the provision and exposure of available research opportunities on and off campus for minorities and the added benefits gained, the QCC LSAMP research program will work assiduously to maintain and further improve this effort.
Dr. Sharon Lall-Ramnarine, Faculty Mentor
 “I cannot sing enough praises about the AMP program. I have been affiliated with the LSAMP program for several years beginning in the Fall of 1997 when I was a student in the Masters program at Queens College. At that time I became the LSAMP Activity Coordinator at Queens College and received tuition reimbursement, medical benefits and an equivalent Graduate student salary through this position. The support enabled me to complete my Masters 2 semesters later with a 4.0 GPA. In the Fall of 1998 I entered the doctoral program in chemistry at the CUNY Graduate Center and continued to function as an Activity Coordinator until August 2001. The position allowed me to gain administrative experience and to network with students and faculty not only outside of my discipline but across CUNY. The program at Queens College grew from 8 students when I started to over 30 students and 15 mentors when I left. Recruiting students and encouraging and motivating them to pursue research and careers in science, math, engineering and technology have equipped me with skills to be a research mentor. In addition throughout my time as a graduate student in Professor Robert Engel’s lab I assisted in mentoring students, and had mentored a total of 11 students by the time I graduated in 2003. I received an LSAMP dissertation fellowship in 2001/2002 and was able to concentrate on my research full-time. LSAMP provided me with partial support to attend several national American Chemical Society meetings and present my research on ‘Ionic Liquids’. This allowed me to network with researchers and fellow scientists in my field. I owe the LSAMP program a lot and credit them largely for my academic achievements. LSAMP has always been there and continues to be there for me. In the fall of 2003 I graduated with my Ph.D. in Chemistry from CUNY. I joined the faculty at Queensborough Community College, CUNY in the spring of 2004 as a tenure track assistant professor in chemistry. I have mentored 4 AMP eligible students on individual research projects related to the synthesis and characterization of ionic liquids. This summer I received a Faculty and Student Team (FaST) grant from Brookhaven National Lab to conduct research with my students there. Students Vanessa Hernandez and Heidi Martinez were funded under the FaST program while Kijana Kerr, Jasmine Hatcher and Annu Ipe were funded under the Community College Initiative (CCI) program. These positions are DOE/NSF/AMP supported. We work under the guidance of BNL scientist Dr. Jim Wishart in his lab that can only be described as a “dream lab” for ionic liquid studies.
I can never repay LSAMP for all that they have given me but I can continue to carry out their mission. I try to educate students and faculty about the program and to impress upon students the value of the opportunity they’re being given.”
DR. MONI CHAUHAN, Faculty Mentor, Chemistry Dept.
It has been a pleasure to mentor students supported by AMP. This scholarship gives students not only the monetary support but an opportunity to work in a four year college while taking courses at Queensborough CC. The exposure makes students well trained and exposed to cutting edge research projects and gradually they tend to continue in STEM majors after transferring to a four year institution. With the AMP support, students travel and make presentations at conferences all over the country, at times where no other community colleges are being represented. Students in my group have learned to do manipulations under air free conditions use instruments like UV, IR, NMR and interpret their own results. The most rewarding part of mentoring students is to watch them learn from the beginning and ending up making presentations and also having peer review publications with the mentors. At this point the students compare themselves with others knowing they have come a long way. I appreciate very much the support of AMP to our minority students and I would continue to recruit more of them in the future.
Rihab Guneid, CSTEP Director
 “The ongoing collaboration between CSTEP and AMP has been encouraged and has proven to be very beneficial to the CSTEP students. They acquire research skills and the necessary tools needed to conduct research. Through the AMP research program students have learned to create and present effective poster presentations, write scientific text, and use critical thinking. Additionally, students have gained invaluable skills in conducting laboratory work. Collaboration with the AMP program has given our students a chance to establish a mentor-student relationship by working one on one, and has provided them with the opportunity to explore subjects in a more in-depth manner than can be accomplished in a classroom setting.”
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