Faculty Focus

Claudia Tanaskovic

Assistant Teaching Professor, Chemistry

Office Location: Penn State Beaver Campus

B.S. Polytechnic Institute of Bucharest

M.S. Polytechnic Institute of Bucharest

In the global world today employers expect for graduate students to be able to work in intercultural environment, to work in teams, and to communicate via technology.

~Claudia

EDGE Spring 2018 and Spring 2019

CHEM 218: Organic Chemistry Lab

This course is designed to give students an introductory organic chemistry laboratory experience. During this course, groups of 2 students from both Penn State Beaver and the University of Split, Croatia collaborated for 6 weeks. Each group performed the same experiment and used WhatsApp to communicate in real time to discuss the experiment and their results.

The class project involved laboratory-scale production of soap and the extraction of different essences. Both participating class groups synthesized soap and infused it with scented oils.

Our class at Beaver worked with Biology class BIOL 120 – “Plans, People, Places” – to distill the essential oils of lavender, orange and mint for the infusion. Art class students from Beaver (ART 10, 30 or 102) designed the packaging for the soap, so that the effort become a multidisciplinary process with an end product.

By the end of the semester the students shared a group presentation about chemistry in industry in the local region and around Split. The final task for students was the preparation of industry research in their region. They were able to present the results of their work to each other via Adobe Connect.

Student Projects

This project improved the online communication skills of the participating students and professors. In the global world today employers expect graduate student to be able to work in an intercultural environment, to work as part of a team and to communicate using technology. Next semester I will try a different experiment (making hand cream) for the class, as long as my Split partner agrees.

~Claudia Tanaskovich

Background and Interest In EDGE

I wanted to improve communication skills by preparing and collaborating with team members from Split University, and I was interested in providing a unique opportunity for students to learn about different cultures.

Connecting and Collaborating

Dr. Cushman introduced me to Dr. Nataša Vrandečić, Faculty of Chemistry and Technology, from Split University. She was a part of the delegation that traveled to Pittsburgh in June 2017. I met her again when the Beaver delegation went to Split few weeks later.

Dr. Nataša Vrandečić and I were in constant contact for the entire semester. We shared laboratory procedures and chose the right experiments for both classes.

Traveling and Visitation

I have had the opportunity to travel and meet my faculty partner, and I have also been able to host her at Penn State Beaver when she visited this past Spring. We shared a presentation of our EDGE collaboration with the EDGE faculty during one of our monthly meetings.