Who Speaks For Industrial Chemists?

SOME 54% of American Chemical Society members identify themselves as industrial chemists; ACS’s Corporation Associates (CA) committee is the formal link between these chemists and the society.

CA has worked to make a positive impact by advising and influencing ACS to ensure that the society provides valuable products and services to industrial members and their companies. More than 30 companies of various sizes and global footprints actively support the profession and science through membership and participation in CA. We give industry a voice that’s heard at all levels of society governance, including the ACS Board of Directors.

The committee initiates and promotes ACS programs relevant to industrial chemists, including programs that aim to shape the workforce, influence public policy, recognize and reward excellence in industrial research, and continually enhance the public perception of chemistry and science. The specific activities of CA change over time and are dependent on the needs and priorities of our companies and industrial members; what follows is an overview of our current focus areas.

Safety is paramount to an industrial chemist’s existence, and we wholeheartedly support training in this area. CA has partnered with the Committee on Chemical Safety and the Division of Chemical Health & Safety to support safety education. CA supports the ACS Task Force for Safety Education Guidelines, which will develop guidelines for laboratory safety education for primary, secondary, undergraduate, and graduate education. These guidelines will identify safety topics that should be taught and competencies that should be tested at various levels throughout the entire educational process. CA is also funding a pilot e-learning project aimed at providing safety training at a time chosen by individual users. The training is aimed at chemists in settings such as small industrial or academic labs who lack access to formal safety programs.

CA has teamed with the ACS Office of Public Affairs to influence national funding decisions through cosponsoring ACS’s Science & the Congress Project. The program educates and provides a venue to present an industrial perspective to U.S. congressional representatives and their staffers on specific scientific issues. In November 2013, CA cosponsored the 201st installment of the briefing series with Technology Transfer Caucus cochairs Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-Fla.) and Rep. Ben Ray Luján (D-N.M.). The briefing addressed “Leak-Proofing the Innovation Pipeline,” outlining the necessity to facilitate technology transfer from industrial and academic labs to commercial products and presenting models on how to achieve this successfully.

CA works with the Committee on Public Affairs & Public Relations to ensure that an industrial voice is heard in key ACS policy statements. Statements that CA will comment on this year include those on business climate, funding for science and technology, sustainability of the chemical enterprise, scientific insight and integrity, and hydraulic fracturing.

All CA members are passionate about educational outreach. We have worked with ACS Industry Member Programs to provide content for interactive workshops for students interested in careers in the chemical industry. We also participate in student speed-networking events at ACS national meetings and are working with the society’s higher education office to enhance the ACS College to Career website with career profiles covering various sub-disciplines of chemistry.

Recently, CA collaborated with the Committee on Economic & Professional Affairs to cosponsor the Entrepreneurial Advisory Board. This board will screen applications and provide guidance for the ACS Entrepreneurial Resources Center, which helps chemistry-based start-ups bring their innovations to market. We hope that these efforts will spur new chemical companies and thus opportunities for industrial members.

Last, but not least, CA supports the recognition of industrial chemists and chemistry through sponsorship of local section grants, seed grants, two national awards, and the Heroes of Chemistry program.

The local section grants provide funding for ACS local sections to organize industry-focused events. Seed grants are onetime awards for projects that further CA’s role in areas agreed to by the committee.

The ACS Award for Creative Invention recognizes a single inventor for the successful application of research in chemistry and/or chemical engineering that contributes to the material prosperity and happiness of people; the ACS Award for Team Innovation highlights the value of teamwork to the chemical and allied industries by recognizing a multidisciplinary team for successfully moving an innovative idea to a product now in commercial use.

The ACS Heroes of Chemistry Award recognizes industrial chemical scientists and their companies for improving human welfare through development of successful commercial innovations and products. For this award, commercial success in the marketplace is an important criterion, emphasizing that good business results follow good science.

We don’t do this work in a vacuum and are appreciative of all the other committees we team with to accomplish our common goals. We continuously strive to improve ACS’s ability to address the needs of its industrial members. If you have ideas or have identified unmet needs for our industrial members, please send them to industry@acs.org.