NJIT’s student newspaper, The Vector, continues making its journalistic voice heard — the paper is the recipient of several awards from U.S. college media contests recently.

The Vector was named the Corbin Gwaltney Award winner for “Best All-Around Student Newspaper” (among large universities) at the Society of Professional Journalists Region 1 Mark of Excellence Awards, beating out competition from the likes of Hofstra University and Boston College. 

With world leaders recently in climate change talks at the COP26 Summit in Glasgow, NJIT students and faculty have been busy getting others to appreciate the value of the environment back home, and their efforts have helped save forest land in Princeton, New Jersey in the process.

This summer, the 2021 Virtual New Jersey Chemistry Olympics (vNJCO) once again became the grounds for a fierce two weeks of competition between young chemists from high schools around the state. By the end, more than 130 attendees joined the competition’s award ceremony live — tuning in from England to California to hear long-time NJCO supporter and CSLA Dean Kevin Belfield give his customary welcome address and celebrate Olympic teams that participated in events following NJCO’s 2021 theme, “Chemistry and Current Events”. 

At NJIT, Sydney Sweet’s success extended beyond the classroom into research labs, cooperative educational experiences, a Goldwater scholarship and the opportunity to study in Australia. 

Remarkably, the chemical engineering major and Albert Dorman Honors College scholar also found time to tutor undergraduates in math and hold leadership roles in chemical engineering honor society Omega Chi Epsilon, the Science and Politics Society and Society of Musical Arts. 

Among the honorees at this year’s College of Science and Liberal Arts Awards at NJIT were seven members of the Class of 2021 who earned the Outstanding Undergraduate Award. We caught up with four of them, who reflected on their unique experiences and accomplishments over the past four years and shared their bright future plans.

Bhoomi Davé, Forensic Science B.S. and Biology B.A.

After four years at NJIT, career prospects for Jaime Felice ’21 are about to take off, and the sky is the limit — literally.

Felice has definitely taken a path less traveled at NJIT, joining four other cadets this year in the graduating class of NJIT’s decorated Air Force Reserve Officers’ Training Corps (AFROTC) Detachment 490. In just a few weeks after Commencement, she’ll be commissioning as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Air Force, and has been selected to become a pilot.

With the spring semester nearly in the rearview, standout students, faculty, staff and alumni of NJIT’s College of Science and Liberal Arts (CSLA) gathered virtually for a night of due recognition and positive reflection at the college’s annual year-end celebration, the 2021 CSLA Awards.

A new NJIT-led project is making learning about the abstract world of organic chemistry a fresher, interactive experience that students can now easily explore in hi-res action through their digital devices. Already, it’s created quite a reaction among young chemists and their teachers around the world. 

The new web project, called Visualize Organic Chemistry (VOC), was launched in March by students in the research group of NJIT Assistant Professor of Chemistry Pier Alexandre Champagne.

After a year layoff, one of NJIT’s standout annual research events returned to the campus community this month — more than 30 of the university’s top student-researchers took to their webcams to present their work for a virtual audience at the 2021 Dana Knox Research Showcase, "A Glimpse Into the Future.” 

NJIT’s Center for Pre-College Programs and Newark College of Engineering this month introduced their first-ever STEM competition for New Jersey’s elementary school students — the eSTEM Competition. Highlighting the marathon-like week of friendly competition was a special solar energy design challenge issued to schools across the state this past February, culminating in unique showcase of bright engineering ingenuity from scores of young innovators.