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The transition from a traditional lecture style method of teaching to the flipped classroom in sophomore-level Organic Chemistry I and II courses at an Historically Black University (HBCU) is described. The process of implementation was explained and the students’ performance was analyzed. The flipped teaching method made a much bigger positive impact to Organic I than Organic II Chemistry course. A higher percentage of A, B or better, and C or better were observed for Organic I Chemistry course. The DFW rate was also significantly lower for the Organic I Chemistry flipped classroom. However, Organic II results were very similar between the students from both teaching methods.

PART V Organic chemistry textbooks. Twenty textbooks of organic chemistry are considered in this part of the review and the organic sections of the syllabuses of three GCE Boards are analysed.

PART VI Practical chemistry textbooks and miscellaneous books. Thirty‐nine practical chemistry textbooks were received from publishers for this part of the review and they have been briefly analyzed under the headings Physical, Inorganic, Organic, Quantitative analysis, and Other features, in Tables 1–4. It has not been possible to examine these in the same detail as the theory books previously considered. A number of other books which are used at ‘A/S’ level were also received and these have been tabulated: problem and calculation books in Table 5, and others in Table 6.

The racial and ethnic representation of individuals in the workforce is not comparable to that in the general population. In 2010, African Americans constituted 12.6% of the US population. However, African Americans represented less than 5% of PhD recipients in 2010; African American women comprised less than 1% of the degrees awarded in that same year. These disappointing statistics have sparked conversations regarding the retention of underrepresented groups with a focus on what helps to ensure these individuals will transition through the science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) pipeline. This chapter provides insight into the elements of the Spelman College learning environment that empower women of African descent to become agents of their success while facilitating their movement through the STEM pipeline. The chapter focuses on interventions and resources developed in the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department to foster student-centered learning. Described herein are cocurricular strategies and course-based interventions are used synergistically to enhance student outcomes. The approach to curricular innovation is framed by theories related to community of inquiry (CoI), metacognition, agency, and self-regulated learning. Strategic institutional investments have underpinned these efforts. In addition to providing a snapshot of student outcomes, the authors discuss lessons learned along with the realities of engaging in this type of intellectual work to elucidate the feasibility of adopting similar strategies at other institutions.

The chemistry librarian has been better served by professional literature than any other subject specialist in the library, except perhaps the medical librarian. A new series of papers on chemical substance searching in Online Review continues this tradition. If the first installment of this series is an indication of what is to come, chemistry librarians and online searchers can look forward to a lot of valuable (and readable) literature on this most important topic. The useful column by Buntrock has, I am sure, already made valuable contributions to more efficient and effective online searching in chemistry.

This paper aims to focus on the most popular technique nowadays, the use of microwave irradiation in organic synthesis; in a few years, most chemists will use microwave energy to heat chemical reactions on a laboratory scale. Also, many scientists use microwave technology in the industry. They have turned to microwave synthesis as a frontline methodology for their projects. Microwave and microwave-assisted organic synthesis (MAOS) has emerged as a new “lead” in organic synthesis.

Using microwave radiation for synthesis and design of fluorescent dyes is of great interest, as it decreases the time required for synthesis and the synthesized dyes can be applied to industrial scale.

The technique offers many advantages, as it is simple, clean, fast, efficient and economical for the synthesis of a large number of organic compounds. These advantages encourage many chemists to switch from the traditional heating method to microwave-assisted chemistry.

This review highlights applications of microwave chemistry in organic synthesis for fluorescent dyes. Fluorescents are a fairly new and very heavily used class of organics. These materials have many applications, as a penetrant liquid for crack detection, synthetic resins, plastics, printing inks, non-destructive testing and sports ball dyeing.

The aim value of this review is to define the scope and limitation of microwave synthesis procedures for the synthesis of novel fluorescent dyes via a simple and economic way.

The paper discusses broadly electronic publishing and types of electronic publications. An attempt has been made to group the select electronic resources of chemical information into portals, patents and dissertations, full‐text files with backfiles and e‐books, abstracting and indexing services, encyclopaedias and handbooks, periodic tables, property databases and specialty databases. The paper concludes that in delivering electronic information two major developments are gaining momentum as archives from major publishers and preprints from academic circles are used as alternative methods of accessing research information. Also, scholarly publication of chemical information in electronic form will continue to grow, adapting to meet changing needs of authors and readers alike.

The First International Congress on Documentation of Applied Chemistry‐was held at the Institut Français, London, S.W. 7 on 22–25 November 1955. It was organized by the Society of Chemical Industry at the request of the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry. Some 300 persons attended, of whom about 100 were from overseas; these numbers included chemists and documentalists.

Sustainability involves a strong interrelationship of ecological, cultural, technological, scientific, economic and social aspects and deserves to undertake a holistic treatment. Abundant evidence has being collected related to the several risks and conflicts derived from unsustainable oil exploitation and fossil fuel energy sources. In the past few years, several environmentally friendly technologies are being developed for oil exploitation in the Argentine Patagonia. The purpose of this paper is to examine them under a holistic prospect to provide an overall outlook for a wide audience and making it attractive for teaching sustainability in higher education.

The environmentally friendly technologies chosen to be examined are Green Chemistry, cleaner production processes and alternative energy sources. Vaca Muerta, located at Neuquén Basin in Argentine Patagonia, is one of the world’s major deposits of tight oil and shale gas. Fracking technology, required for this exploitation, is controversial; it poses critical issues concerning ecological risks such as oil leakage and serious soil damage.

Research results on the germination of a native gramineae in polluted soils are described in this paper under several conditions and show its potential for the phytoremediation of damages aroused from unsustainable oil exploitation. In addition, student’s feedback regarding fracking was examined by a questionnaire presenting different and contradictory perspectives with open and Likert-type items. This study complements previous observation on the open acceptance of the Green Chemistry fundamentals as the contribution of the scientific-technological knowledge to the sustainable development and higher education approaches from Argentina.

A clear result of these experiences is that the immediate impact is stronger that that noted when just scientific and technological aspects are taught; teachers expressed they would try to repeat these exercises in their classes in middle and high schools. This feeling of fear is important for people to understand the severity of climate change, though it is also essential to help people move past fear, to use the urgency of the problem to motivate action. Results of this research suggest that the best way to understand climate risks is interactive learning.

This study describes related scientific, technological and societal research in the fields of soil remediation and sustainable production that are key values in higher education, as scientific and societal communities play an essential role. From a holistic approach to a complex problem, this paper describes research on different aspects that converge into the viewing of the radical change in the society’s behavior that is urgently required for a sustainable development in harmony with the planet. In spite of their importance, there are few publications with an interdisciplinary overview about sustainable development in Latin America. The value and originality of this work is that it focuses on the need of teaching sustainability in different areas of higher education with a holistic prospect.

THE EXTERNAL EXAMINATION is regarded by the majority of students — and many teachers too — as an extremely unfair method of assessing a student's ability to proceed to the next stage of a course. Let it first be said that examinations as they are at present, whether set internally or externally, are not the best possible method for assessing a student's ability; it is possible that they are the best method we have available, since as yet there is no acceptable alternative. For a student's career to depend on a three‐hour examination shows that we have not progressed far in the educational field. There is enormous scope for improvement in this direction; but this is another matter.