Lecturer
Dr. Jesse Morin joined the Department of Chemistry as a lecturer in Fall 2019 after writing the curriculum for and serving as the department head of the Biotechnology trade program at Norwich Technical High School in Norwich, CT for 5 years. Before this, she was a USDA NIFA postdoctoral fellow in the lab of Prof. Jo Handelsman in the Department of Molecular, Cell, and Developmental Biology at Yale University working at the intersection of organic chemistry, microbiology, and biochemistry. She completed her PhD in Chemistry with Prof. Jason Sello at Brown, where she developed syntheses of small molecule regulators of antibiotic biosynthesis in Actinomycetes. Jesse earned her B.A. in Chemistry at Clark University in Worcester, MA. Her research has the ultimate goal of developing, implementing, and evaluating inquiry and research-based laboratory pedagogy that promotes student retention in STEM careers, particularly for students historically under-represented in STEM. The efficacy of different models is evaluated based on students’ development of self-efficacy and science identity, both of which are thought to be key predictors of persistence in STEM fields. As part of this work, she also develops greener reaction conditions for common chemical transformations that have applications in teaching settings and more broadly in synthetic organic chemistry.
