Members of the Outreach and High School Committee, including Aya Sayaka, Madeline Gerbig, Barb Morra, and John De Backere, along with several undergraduate and graduate student volunteers, hosted their annual Chemistry Scholar’s Day in the department on May 1, 2025. The event brought in over 60 grade 11 students from across the GTHA to explore the Department of Chemistry. During this full-day event, students heard a talk by Professor Haissi Cui, engaged in small group discussions with undergraduate student, and attended a panel of graduate students discussing their educational journeys.
Visiting students also got a taste of chemistry’s power in a demo where Prof. Aya Sakaya and Laboratory Technician Dr. Charlie Kivi made ice cream using liquid nitrogen.
Another demo walked participants through the simple steps required to make a squishy pod of hydrogel that was not only sustainable but, like the ice cream, edible. (While many hydrogels are made from non-renewable petroleum starting materials, sustainable versions can be made from carbohydrate-based feedstocks that are natural and renewable.)
In addition to the talks, students toured the NMR lab the cell culture facility and an array of labs run by Professors Aspuru-Guzik, Cui, Rousseaux, Walker and Wilson.
Amid this action-packed experience, one of the undergraduate student volunteers conducting tours for the event was someone who has seen the event from both sides. Lila Lowe attended CSD herself in 2023, and answered a few questions for Chemistry Stories:
Thank you for volunteering at Chemistry Scholars Day... and for sharing the experience with us! Can you start by telling us a little about yourself?
I currently just finished first year, so I’m going to my second year at the St. George campus. I was admitted into the Mathematical and Physical Sciences stream, and I hope to be accepted into the Chemistry Specialist Program of Studies. I am not with a lab yet, but hopefully that will change either next year or the year after! I am currently very interested in any physical or inorganic chemistry labs, such as the NMR one.
You attended CSD a few years ago, isn’t that right?
I attended CSD in 2023 as a grade 11 student from Etobicoke Collegiate Institute. The day looked very similar to how it was run this year, with a few main exceptions being the order of the events and the addition of the nitrogen ice cream.
When I went to CSD, I had no plans to pursue Chemistry at all, let alone at UofT. I wanted to do biology at McMaster, which was a common theme amongst many of the other students attending. I found that this year a lot of high school students I spoke to also did not want to pursue Chemistry as a degree, and even fewer wanted to do it at UofT. I am confident that CSD will influence many students to pursue chemistry.
What changed your mind that day two years ago?
While the tours of the lab were very interesting (it was my first time seeing the NMR lab, which honestly, I have seen 5 times alone this year), the thing that influenced me was discussion with the undergrads. I remember very distinctly a third-year student telling me to take “CHM151 over CHM135/136, as CHM151 is for people who really love chemistry” and it stuck with me. In grade 12, when applying to schools, I considered what the undergraduate student had said. I loved chemistry, and I had no desire to pursue biology as I initially thought.
The logical step was a degree in Chemistry, and since I already had exposure to UofT through the event, I decided to come here, and take the class the third year recommended.
What was it like on the other side, giving tours during the same event?
Going into volunteering this year, I kept my own experiences in mind: while the tours are fun, every university has labs. This is not necessarily a driving factor for students when choosing a place of study. I tried to do what that third year had done for me; I recommended the Chemistry program here, specifically classes like CHM151, as something for people who love chemistry. All of them, even though most wanted to go elsewhere, love chemistry. Even if they didn’t want to go to UofT, my goal was to convince them that if they did, they would take CHM151. It was the small conversations that convinced me to go to UofT, and so I tried to emulate that this year.
I think that having different groups see different labs was a great choice. It was a little surreal to finally be the one giving the tour, because as a student, you will always look up to those older students who seem to have “made it”, such as tour guides. It was a full circle moment to finally be the one explaining what first year at UofT with the chem department is like to a bunch of potential students.
Basically, I believe that while the tours and experiments are important, the undergraduate talks are essential to what makes CSD so successful. High school students are always worried that they won't be talented or smart enough to pursue Chemistry or honestly STEM in general; encouragement from a slightly older peer with similar experiences is useful to assuage these fears and worries.
I was very glad to be a part of this from the undergraduate side because it's worth it if at least one student changes their mind like I did!
High school students are always worried that they won't be talented or smart enough to pursue Chemistry or honestly STEM in general; encouragement from a slightly older peer with similar experiences is useful to assuage these fears and worries. —Lila Lowe