Joanna Huckins

We are dedicated to maintaining open relationships with our alumni. Joanna Huckins serves as the department's alumni relations coordinator, providing the first point of contact for alumni.

Employment Opportunities:
Learn more >>

Outreach:
The first step towards advancing and strengthening our alumni communications effort is the annual publication of our Alumni Newsletter, which has received an overwhelmingly positive response. We also periodically contact alumni regarding Department news and upcoming events via our alumni e-mail distribution list. If you would like to confirm that you are on our list, please contact Joanna Huckins.

Alumni Newsletter Archives:
Fall 2007  |Spring 2006  | Fall 2005 | Spring 2005

The department also supports events which promote interaction with our alumni, including local AIChE meetings and our bi-annual Alumni Dinner. Our most recent Alumni Dinner took place in May 2007.

We love hearing from our illustrious alumni! If you have news— milestones such as promotions, weddings, births, retirement etc.— or memories of your ChBE experiences that you would like to share with the Department, or would simply like to provide us with updated contact information, please contact us at the address below. Updates and stories may be included in future newsletters (your personal contact information will never be published).

The School of Engineering and Tufts University also provide alumni relation opportunities.

In 2005 the ChBE Department launched the "Alumni Friends of the Department Club," a fundraising initiative which is based on offering alumni an annual “membership” and is intended to complement and strengthen the Department's alumni communications efforts.

We have outlined three membership levels: Sponsor ($200), Patron ($500), and Benefactor ($1,000). Gifts such as these will enable us to increase communications efforts, support novel research and educational activities, improve our undergraduate laboratories, and give alumni the opportunity to shape the education of future engineers. Most importantly, Friends of the Department will receive public recognition for their generosity. The Friends of the Department Club will function as a general fundraising umbrella for specific efforts, such as the Martin V. Sussman Memorial Scholarship and the Gregory Botsaris Lectureship fund, both of which were announced at the Department's May 2005 Symposium.

Alumni Donors Recognized:
Learn more >>

To give to the Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, please send checks made out to "Trustees of Tufts College" to the following address:
Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering
Tufts University
4 Colby Street Room 148
Medford, MA 02155

Alumni Spotlight: David w. Carnell, E41
David retired from Du Pont in 1982. In his own words, "I came to Tufts as an immature boy and graduated on my 20th birthday. My professors in all the departments...were most influential in guiding and counseling me. I was fortunate to receive a Tau Beta Pi fellowship to pursue a M.S. degree at M.I.T., but Tufts was, and is, my home." His fondest memory? David writes: "The most unforgettable moment was the day in freshman chemistry class that Dr. Durkee was demonstrating the properties of carbon dioxide. He taught the section composed of ChE and chemistry majors, seating us with the Jackson girls in the front row and the boys alphabetically in the rows behind. His demonstration was to show that the dense gas could be siphoned from one tall cylinder to another. Sucking on a rubber tube to start the flow his false teeth fell into the cylinder where he could barely reach them. The guys all ducked down to conceal their reaction, but the girls in the front row had no place to hide. Dr. Durkee kept the girls after class and lectured them about their unladylike behavior, while we got off scot-free."

Alumni Spotlight: Ken Spatola, E70
Ken writes: "The excellent foundation Tufts provided held me in good stead for 35+ years in the chemicals and plastics industry: Union Carbide, Rohm & Haas, Ciba and now Image Polymers. Dustin Hoffman was right on track in ‘The Graduate!’ It has provided a good support level for a family of four and I’ve loved the work." His fondest memory of Tufts? "Making what seemed like 10,000 Möbius strips out of polyethylene with classmate and friend, Al Niebanck, for a tower packing efficiency experiment."

Alumni Spotlight: Bess Beikoussis Gorman, E85
Bess is an attorney in private practice, specializing in zoning, permitting and environmental law. Her husband, David, is also an attorney, specializing in construction litigation. Together, they traveled to Russia five times to bring home their three lovely children, Aleksey, Alexander, and Olga. Bess remembers "doing coal water-slurry research with Professor Botsaris. We had to design a system to better measure viscosity of high coal content slurries. We tried all sorts of plastic tubing, but McDonald’s straws worked the best!"