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Professor of Chemistry Dave Finster in a lab in Wittenberg's Barbara Deer Kuss Science Center. |
In January 2010, for example, a graduate student at Texas Tech University "lost three digits on his left hand, severely lacerated his right hand, perforated his left eye, scratched his right eye and had superficial cuts to the parts of his body that were exposed," following a lab accident while working with nickel hydrazine perchlorate, according to the post-incident investigation report. A year earlier, a research assistant at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) tragically died from injuries sustained while working with t-butyl lithium, a pyrophoric chemical, prompting the university to review its lab safety procedures.
"We know about all these tragic accidents," Finster said, "and we have seen for decades chemistry graduates enter labs with very poor safety education."
A leading expert in the field of lab safety who has presented at several conferences on the topic, including the 21st Biennial Conference on Chemical Education this past summer in Denton, Texas, and at national meetings of the American Chemical Society, Finster has now taken his expertise a step further to prevent future tragedies in university labs.
Partnering with Robert H. Hill, who has worked with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention for about three decades as a safety officer, Finster has recently co-authored Laboratory Safety for Chemistry Students.
"We felt that writing a textbook about laboratory safety would provide an important resource (and remove one excuse) from chemistry faculty as they educate their students about chemical safety," Finster said.
Uniquely designed to accompany students throughout their four-year undergraduate education and beyond, progressively teaching them the skills and knowledge they need to learn their science and stay safe while working in any lab, the book uses a principles-based approach as it treats lab safety as a distinct, essential discipline of chemistry.
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In addition to reinforcing and building safety knowledge and a culture of safety in the lab, the book also makes the teaching of lab safety easy.
"We all know that safety is of the utmost importance; however, instructors continue to struggle with finding ways to incorporate safety into their curricula," notes the book.
As a result, Laboratory Safety for Chemistry Students is divided into easily understood sections that can serve as pre-lab assignments, thus decreasing the amount of time needed to ensure safety. The book also highlights incidents to stress the topic's importance as well as helpful references and special sections that explore other relevant safety issues.
"Throughout the 2009-2010 academic year, we piloted the use of many sections of the book in various chemistry courses at Wittenberg," Finster said. "In 2010-2011 we have 'assigned' each of the 70 sections of the book to chemistry courses. Ultimately, Wittenberg chemistry majors will have read the entire book by the end of the senior year and likely be some of the best-trained safety students in the country."
Hill and Finster worked on the book for two-and-a-half years, a process Finster called rewarding, and one that has opened some new professional opportunities.
"The goal that Bob and I established several years ago has been realized: to write a not-too-expensive textbook that could be used in chemistry courses nationwide to enhance safety education of chemistry and other science students. We believe we've succeeded."
Click here for more information on Laboratory Safety for Chemistry Students, published by Wiley.
Written By: Karen Gerboth
Photo By: Erin Pence
