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The Ceramic Leadership Summit opened with an audience-driven discussion on business opportunities featuring, from left, Rod Lanthorne (Kyocera), Joel Moskowitz (Ceradyne) and David Morse (Corning).

For two students who are used to attending technical conferences like MS&T and ICACC, the experience at the first Ceramic Leadership Summit was an exciting departure from the conference norm.

The Summit, held June 21-22, 2010 in Baltimore, Md., replaced the typical research presentation sessions with content that was far more global in its perspective. Discussions focused on technologies and materials that could shape the future, from energy, to medical, to military technology. A session on global business trends gave insight into the predicted growth of a large number of aspects of the ceramics/materials industry, and even the products that were driving those areas of the market. For example, the growth of the lithium-ion battery market was surprisingly traced to a recent surge in sales of electric bikes in Asia.

Of particular interest, though, was the education session, directed by Doreen Edwards (Alfred University) and Wayne Huebner (Missouri S&T). Edwards’ talk on education curricula led to a discussion amongst the roughly 200 attendees (nearly 60% of whom were from industry) about subjects that should be included in undergraduate coursework. Some of the subjects mentioned were energy materials and technology, coatings, and even proper usage of analytical and processing equipment.

Huebner delivered a passionate call-to-arms for members of industry and academia alike, to actively support university ceramics and materials programs across the country, thereby ensuring the graduation of competent engineers able to find jobs in the ceramics industry. Talking with a number of different Summit attendees revealed similar concern for the well-being of today’s students, which is always exciting for those who are currently students to hear.

On the topic of talking with different people, arguably the networking opportunities that came from attending the Summit represented the most exciting part of the two-day event. We met all sorts of people, including alumni from our current schools, researchers and industry representatives. Learning about the different career paths available to students after graduation was a highlight of the event. We found out that graduates could go on to be Congressional fellows charged with bringing materials expertise to legislation passed on Capitol Hill; or they could become 50% of a company’s research and development staff; or they could even go on to become vice-presidents, presidents or CEOs of multimillion dollar corporations such as Ceradyne or Corning.

We were also invited into the Future Leaders Program for members of ACerS’ Young Professionals Network, which meant waking up rather early in the morning to enjoy a pre-conference breakfast, served with a side of leadership training, with young graduates of our field. Friendships were quickly developed during those mornings as we got to know some of the people that would be our coworkers and fellow leaders after we graduated from university life and moved on to our careers.

All of the different aspects of the Leadership Summit came together into a fantastic experience. Over the course of just two days, we learned about some key trends in industry and education that will shape the future that we will step into after graduation. The variety of conversations we participated in also gave us a unique perspective on the ceramics community that cannot be easily gained at a technical conference. Our experience was one that we sincerely hope other undergraduate and graduate students will choose to share through participation in future Summits.

David Shahin is the council chair of ACerS’ President’s Council of Student Advisors at Missouri S&T. Chris Dosch is the recruitment chair of PCSA at the University of Florida.

(Editor’s note: We will be posting videos from the Summit over the next few weeks.)

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What’s on minds of the current group of ceramic and materials science students? The American Ceramic Society wanted to know, so we recruited the ACerS President’s Council of Student Advisors to organize the first student-edited issue of the Society’s Bulletin membership magazine.

They did a great job! This issue of the Bulletin – now available in print and online – contains insightful, student-written articles that cover an impressive array of their concerns and advice. The topics include:

• Choosing between getting a job or going to grad school
• Studying science abroad
• The difference between M.S. and Ph.D degree paths
• Graduate school research
• Undergraduate publishing opportunities
  
• Choosing between interdisciplinary programs versus and specialty programs

The issue also provides outstanding samples of current student research efforts.

The only feature stories not written by students is a report by ACerS member Ed Sabolsky describing the successful efforts tat launching West Virginia’s first materials science and engineering program, and a column from two advisors to ACerS student programs, Geoff Brennecka and Bil Fahrenholtz, who discuss the evolution of the strategies within the Society to engage and support students and young professionals.

Kudos to PSCA and especially to Eric Patterson, the council’s communications chair, for recruiting and managing the student authors. Thanks also to Tricial Nicol, ACerS staff student liaison, and Ann Spence, assistant Bulletin editor, for providing encouragement and advice to the PCSA editorial group.

Continuing on the education theme, I also want to recommend a story on the Berkeley Lab’s website that underscores the importance to introducing materials science in high schools, and, in particular, through summer internships for high school students, such as LBL’s Nano*High program:

Emily Chen still vividly remembers the lecture on gecko feet. She was an eighth grader attending Berkeley Lab’s Nano*High program to hear materials scientist Arun Majumdar explain how what he was learning about gecko feet might translate into a new adhesive product based on carbon nanotubes.

“It never occurred to me how much we look to nature to do things in science,” Chen says. “It was also my first encounter with materials science; he talked a little about other fields in materials science, and what he does, like studying breakage, and it never really occurred to me that people did that.”

Majumdar, then a Berkeley Lab senior scientist, went on to become director of the Department of Energy’s Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy (ARPA-E), but perhaps more remarkably, Chen went on to graduate high school while attending almost every single Saturday morning lecture of the Nano*High program, then decided to attend MIT, where she declared a major in materials science and engineering.

 

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