Biography
My professional passion is teaching young engineers. At Calvin, I join with students in discovering how our interests in engineering work fit within a whole life lived in service to God’s kingdom. I job-share with my husband who is also a chemical engineering professor. This unconventional arrangement has allowed us to each pursue our professions while raising our five children.
Teaching
Much of engineering education is about teaching students how to think like an engineer: How do I frame a problem? What are the real goals of this project? What are the constraints or trade-offs that I must consider? What might be the unintended consequences of this approach? What, exactly, are the steps required to get from here to there – and who will do them, how long will it take, and how much will it cost? Learning this mindset serves graduates well in many future activities, not just engineering work!
I also invite students to study the culture of engineering. I want Calvin alumni to join that culture, but also to radically transform that culture. I ask students to think about how their own behaviors impact their study or work environment: How do I allow each colleague to be more included and better able to contribute to the success of a project? How do I spread God’s light in all my actions? How do I ensure that everyone is treated with dignity and respect? How do my actions and my engineering products reinforce that each person is made in the image of God?
Education
- Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1999 - M.S. in Chemical Engineering
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 1997 - B.S. in Chemical Engineering
Michigan State University, 1994
Professional Experience
Chemical engineering is a very broad discipline, and as such, I have professional work experience in four very different industries. My work bridging biology and engineering was continued while consulting in both pharmaceuticals and environmental engineering. I have also worked as an engineering intern at IBM (semiconductor chip manufacturing) and at Amway (personal and home care product manufacturing).
Research
The goal of my research program is to change the culture within engineering, so that the future engineering workplace will allow everyone to thrive. As such, I have published in the areas of sense of belonging, motivation, and structural barriers, each as related to persistence and flourishing within engineering.
My doctoral research was in protein engineering. Results published in my early research career, related to yeast-surface display, have been applied in various fields. One example is improved antibody binding affinity, which has supported medical applications including the development of more effective chemotherapeutics.
External Links
- LinkedIn profile
- Google Scholar profile
- ResearchGate profile
- ORCiD
