Dean's Message
Welcome to the College of Science website – Thanks for visiting! The College of Science mission includes conducting world-class, groundbreaking research and providing excellent education in science and mathematics to all University of Idaho students as well as teachers and adult learners across the state of Idaho and throughout the world. I’m entering my fifth year as dean of the college and I am extremely proud of the accomplishments of our faculty, staff, students, and alumni over this period.
The College of Science has had an outstanding legacy of producing leaders: leaders in academia, leaders in business and industry, leaders in state and federal government agencies, leaders in non-profit organizations, and leaders in local communities. We are a right-sized, student-centered college. Students in our college take courses from and interact directly with our tenure-track faculty as well as a healthy mix of undergraduate and graduate students and post-doctoral researchers. Our faculty and staff are committed to the success of each and every student, and we are leaders in the development of more effective and engaging pedagogies such as our Polya Mathematics Laboratory.
We offer world-class opportunities for involvement in research. We have faculty that could be employed at any university in the nation, but they choose to work here owing to the wonderful sense of community that we have cultivated and the availability of talented colleagues and state-of-the-art facilities and instrumentation. Our faculty and students perform basic research but also work on a range of scientific problems of immediate relevance to the state’s, the nation’s and the world’s economy, health, safety, and welfare. For example, an interdisciplinary group of biologists, mathematicians, and statisticians are conducting research on the ecology of the human microbiome, with particular reference to women’s health issues. Another group, consisting of chemists, physicists and biologists, is developing nanosprings and nanowires as sensors for explosives and as delivery agents for chemotherapeutic drugs. Geographers and other scientists in the university are studying the potential effects of climate variability on regional water supplies. And our geologists are investigating an array of geologic hazards such as volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, and exposure to mineral dusts. Our faculty and students are funded from a variety of sources including the National Institutes of Health, the National Science Foundation, NASA, the Department of Energy, the Department of Defense, the Department of Homeland Security, the American Chemical Society, private industry, and many others.
The College of Science is a connected community. Our faculty and students collaborate with scientists across the nation and around the world. As a student in the College of Science you will benefit from the collaborative relationships we have built with the Center for Advanced Energy Studies and the Idaho National Laboratory, the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, the Idaho Geological Survey, the Washington State Crime Laboratory, the Charles Darwin Foundation, and numerous industrial and academic laboratories world-wide. You may have the opportunity to carry out field research in the Galapagos, Antarctica, Iceland, New Zealand, China, Argentina, and many other exciting locations. You may also have the opportunity to participate in some of our outreach activities within the state of Idaho, such as our Women in Math and Science program and our support of hands-on research activities for high school students.
Please spend some time getting to know us further by exploring our college site, departmental and faculty sites, and meeting the College of Science staff. Also, keep an eye on the College of Science news section for important updates and happenings throughout the college.
Finally, I hope you'll be able to visit our campus. I look forward to getting to know many of you as we work together to maintain the College of Science’s leadership position at the forefront of scientific education, research, and outreach!
Scott A. Wood, Ph.D.