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Provost gives presentation at Cottrell Scholar Conference


Last updated July 14, 2018

By News administrator

George Shields, Furman’s vice president for academic affairs and provost, gave the address for the 2018 TREE Award presentations at the Cottrell Scholar Conference in Tucson, Arizona, July 11-13.

The TREE award recognizes the outstanding research and educational accomplishments of the Cottrell Scholars, a group of outstanding scholars in higher education who produce significant research and educational outcomes. The conference is sponsored by the Research Corporation for Scientific Advancement.

Shields, who joined Furman as vice president for academic affairs and provost and professor of chemistry in 2016, is a national leader in undergraduate research. He received the 2015 American Chemical Society (ACS) award for Research at an Undergraduate Institution, and currently serves on the executive board of the Council on Undergraduate Research (CUR).

Since 2000, Shields has served as director of MERCURY, the Molecular Education and Research Consortium in Undergraduate Computational Chemistry, a collaboration of 27 undergraduate research teams at 25 different institutions. He has also taught and served in administrative positions at Bucknell University, Armstrong Atlantic State University and Lake Forest College.

Shields received his bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology. His postdoctoral research on protein-DNA interactions at Yale University and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute was conducted in the laboratory of Professor Thomas Steitz, the 2009 Chemistry Nobel Laureate.

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