Cathy Middlecamp
Professor | The Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies |
Chemistry Department
Middlecamp works hard, plays hard, and enjoys doing both. She notes that in the ILS Program, “work and play can be seamless!” With exactly this in mind, she teaches ILS 251, "The Radium Girls and the Firecracker Boys." The course is a merry romp across our planet, seeking the places where people and radioactive substances have come in close contact. The course is playful in spirit, as she and her students tell story after story. But it also is work, in that the consequences of our 100+ year history with radioactive substances have left us with challenges that will last not only our lifetime, but the lifetimes of our children's children.
Middlecamp also teaches ILS 400, the senior capstone course, that weaves the themes of education, leadership, and character. Students in the capstone all have the opportunity to lead the seminar, asking each other that pivotal philosophical question, “For what, how, and why shall we live?”
In her teaching and scholarship, Middlecamp works with the challenges of our planet that cross geographical boundaries and intellectual disciplines. She writes and speaks on air quality, global climate change, and our love-hate affair with uranium. She is the Editor-in-Chief of Chemistry in Context, a project of the American Chemical Society. She is a Fellow of the American Chemical Society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and of the Association for Women in Science. When not in the Meiklejohn House, you'll find her up in the Baraboo Hills watching her garden grow (or skiing the countryside). She also plays on the mat whenever she gets a chance, having trained in the art of aikido for 25 years.
Cathy Middlecamp teaches the following courses:
