RIT student presents research on Capitol Hill

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RIT biomedical sciences student William Marmor will present his undergraduate research at the Posters on the Hill event in Washington, D.C., April 25-26.

Rochester Institute of Technology student William Marmor will present his undergraduate research at the Posters on the Hill event in Washington, D.C., April 25-26.

Marmor, of Sugar Loaf, N.Y., is senior biomedical sciences major in RIT’s College of Health Sciences and Technology. His poster, “Transforming the Undergraduate Lab Experience at Two- and Four-year Institutions: Reformed Experimental Activities (REActivities),” summarizes research he conducted with Christina Goudreau Collison, associate professor in the School of Chemistry and Materials Sciences in RIT’s College of Science.

Marmor is one of 60 top undergraduate researchers in the nation selected to present their work. The Council on Undergraduate Research sponsors the competitive event for students to share their research with congressional members, meet with their representatives and learn about advocacy for undergraduate research.

Marmor has been a member of the Goudreau Collison Research Group since his sophomore year at RIT. He has contributed to Collison’s National Science Foundation-funded research that seeks to reinvent the delivery of undergraduate organic chemistry labs. He helped design experiments, identify learning objectives for students in a traditional organic lab course and evaluate the developed materials.

“Our goal is to revamp organic chemistry labs to provide more value to students,” Marmor said. “The idea is to increase critical thinking skills, team work and provide a better educational environment for students looking to go into STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) fields.”

Recently published by Pearson Custom Publishing, the new experimental lab materials are available to other higher-education institutions. Six universities have already adopted Collison’s REActivities: Organic Chemistry Lab Workbook for their organic chemistry labs.

“Reinventing the way in which a lab curriculum is traditionally delivered is a vast undertaking few institutions have the time and energy to pursue,” Collison said. “It requires more than implementing an amalgam of independently constructed experiments. REActivities take a holistic approach to the delivery of a lab all while keeping cost and sustainability in mind.”

Marmor’s research poster won awards at the 2015 American Chemical Society conference in Boston and at the 2016 local chapter conference in Rochester, N.Y. He also presented the poster at the national society’s 2016 conference in Philadelphia.

Marmor graduates from RIT this May and plans to go to medical school.