Featured Faculty Member of the Month

Biographical sketch of Dr. Moni Chauhan

I received B. Sc (Bachelors in Science) and M. Sc (Masters in Science) from Christ Church College of Kanpur in India. There after I joined IIT (Indian Institute of Technology) Kanpur after winning CSIR (Council of Scientific and Industrial Research of India) fellowship and obtained Ph. D. in 1996 in the guidance of Professor Robert Corriu at Montpellier University in France, on the stabilization of cationic species of silicon and phosphorus. I briefly worked in Professor M. Tanaka’s group at “National Institute of Materials and Chemical Research” in Tsukuba, Japan before joining Professor Boudjouk’s group in “ North Dakota State University” in 1997. I was appointed Assistant Professor at Queensborough Community College of CUNY in 2002. My research interests are in the area of catalysis, nano-drug delivery and inorganic polymeric materials in general. I have mentored ten QCC students in my research program and currently have two students working under my guidance. One of my research students ‘Richard Pantano’ has also co-authored a peer reviewed publication in 2004 while he was still at QCC and other student Shiva K. Avvari was invited to make an oral presentation of original research at “Beacon Conference” in 2003 held at SUNY Ulster Community College. Beacon Conference is highly competitive conference and involves community colleges from four states (NY, MD, PA, and NJ). My students have won fellowships from NYC Louis Strokes Alliance’s research experience programand Merck AAA’s scholarship.

Teaching Philosophy

Teaching is a shared responsibility and a tremendous opportunity to have an impact on the future of the country. By experimenting and practicing over time, I have developed the necessary interrelated skills: conceiving a course as a totality which includes the subject’s larger contexts, planning pragmatically how the course will proceed, cooperating with fellow teachers and assistants, stirring students to participate and in a variety of ways explaining and illustrating ideas as well as modeling and exercising problem solving techniques.

For example in General Chemistry II honors lecture classes I have introduced the state of the art technology using computers along with the traditional methods of teaching with the black board. The student’s response to this methodology is very enthusiastic and favorable. I prepare students for an Oral power point presentation on the concepts of the course. Fifteen of my honors students presented at the “First Honors Conference” at QCC on April 15 th, 2005. I believe in making chemical science writing intensive, in order to develop student’s skills in writing, disseminating and articulating scientific experimental process, I introduced and piloted the concept of writing lab reports in a scientific and stepwise manner and a short paper on the topic of their presentation. The students start with difficulty but by the end of the semester most of them do well and up to my expectations.

I not only strive to give students a sense of clarity and insight about the organizing principles of chemistry but also provide them the practice and self-confidence to figure things out on their own. In our technologically driven and highly interdependent society it is essential that students should learn to keep up with change by knowing how to teach themselves. I do so by sharing my own thought processes with my students and by offering stimulating problems and open-ended writing assignments or projects. I am enthusiastic, inspired and excited about my subject, I care about the students and always make myself available to their needs, and I put energy and ingenuity into my teaching.