Report Period
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Introduction
Committee on Computers in Chemical Education seeks to encourage and support the development, implementation, and assessment of computing technologies in chemical education. We try to support topical symposia and workshops at ACS meetings and oversee the long running ConfChems and periodic Online Chemistry Classes (OLCC, recent example on Cheminformatics).
Information Since Last Report
- We organized and oversaw a Computers in Chemical Education symposium at the 2024 BCCE.
- We held our usual closed and open meetings during the 2024 BCCE, at which there was much discussion of future directions for the committee (see below).
- Produced a list of recommendations on website hosting for DivCHED as it works to update its web presence to better support the DivCHED membership and committees.
- We are currently planning a new OLCC for 2025 on Data Chemistry and Machine Learning (R. Belford coordinating).
- We have proposed a symposium in collaboration with COMP and CINF for the Spring 2025 meeting and organized funds to defray the cost of a committee member attending the Spring 2025 meeting to help host the symposium.
- Because of the intense interest expressed by DivCHED members and CCCE members, we began investigating how we can help at the Fall 2024 ACS meeting in developing recommendations of best practices for using AI in education and chemical education. This would supplement or grow out of the ACS Presidential Event (posters and panel discussion) entitled "Scaling New Heights of Chemistry Education with Artificial Intelligence Tools", with the goal of producing a widely available (not behind a pay wall) published document of recommendations.
Future Plans
- Continue to work on the idea for generating a best practices for using AI document.
- Continue looking into hosting ConfChem type discussion of papers through ChemXriv.org.
- Work on hosting and sponsoring symposia at the Fall 2025 ACS meeting (topics to be determined).
- Continue discussions with MolSSI and other communities of interest on sponsoring short courses related to computers in chemical education.
- Flesh out ideas for best current ways to reach out to the ChemEd community, especially to encourage them to create symposia broadly related to computing in chemical education (E. Bucholz has agreed to spearhead this effort).
- Tap into the DivCHED (and possibly the AACT) contact list(s) to survey the community on which issues related to computing in chemical education we should be focusing on. The idea is that there may be some areas where we could lead efforts to develop some best practices guides in collaboration with the Committee on Professional Training. Many possible areas have been suggested, but we need to prioritize based on the needs of the community.
- Next Meeting: will be virtual when requested by a committee member or the co-chairs decide we have items that need to be discussed synchronously. The committee attempts to do as much of its business as possible asynchronously. The next in-person meetings will be held at the 2026 BCCE. Generally, national ACS meetings are so expensive that we do not get a quorum of committee members attending.
Did your committee request funding from DivCHED in the past budget year?
No
NO: add comments here.
$3000 from DivCHED for FY2025.