Ball State University had the most chemistry students graduate with an American Chemical Society accreditation in Indiana, according to the society's latest report.
A press release issued Feb. 10 said 44 students graduated with this accreditation in the 2006-07 school year, which was the most recent report.
Nationally, Ball State ranks 57th for total number of students receiving undergraduate chemistry degrees and 38th in producing students with ACS-certified degrees.
"When I graduated from Ball State in 1983, there were only five people in my graduating class for chemistry," Dr. Patricia Lang, chairwoman of the Department of Chemistry, said. "Last year, we graduated 47 students."
Lang said she feels that the program's ranking can only go up from here.
"We have the potential to be in the top 25 very soon," she said.
ACS-approved programs offer a broad-based and rigorous chemistry education that gives students intellectual, experimental and communication skills to become effective scientific professionals, according to the ACS Web site. This includes introductory courses, foundation course work and in-depth course work.
"The chemistry department takes care of the making the curriculum meet ACS standards," senior Eddie Hall said. "I just know that there's more lab time and criteria to meet when you pursue an ACS degree versus a departmental degree."
The Committee for Professional Training at ACS tells chemistry departments how to make their curricula adhere to the program. That includes a certain number of lab hours in each area of chemistry, hours in lecture and available space and faculty.
Often students who double-major or come into the major later than their freshman year do not obtain an ACS degree, Lang said.
"I'm a bio-chemistry major, and I'm not going to get an ACS accreditation," senior Sahba Charkhzarrin said. "But I know it is attractive to students and offers an opportunity for students who want to do chemical research."
The ranking is a point of pride to Ball State's chemistry department.
"It's great to know that Ball State ranked so highly because our program isn't exactly well known on the national scene," Hall said.
Lang said she was pleased to know Ball State ranked higher than Purdue and Indiana universities in the number of chemistry graduates.
"We [the department] are the people who make students that go on to graduate school," Lang said.
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