C. Stewart Slater
Rowan University
C. Stewart Slater grew up in Ventnor, New Jersey, a small resort town on the New Jersey shore. He was the younger child in a family with two older sisters, Susan and Elizabeth. Stewarts childhood exposed him to education, since his father was a department head at Atlantic City High School. The Jersey shore was a great laboratory for a young person. Digging in the sand for crabs, the dynamics of the tide, and beach erosion were among the natural phenomena he would observe.
Stewart excelled in elementary and middle school. He loved math, science and history topics. Stewart went to Atlantic City High School and followed a College Prep track. Several teachers influenced him in considering an engineering career. Stewart took physical science, biology and physics classes in his first three years. He took AP chemistry in his senior year and his teacher, John Hale, made the class fun for Stewart with an intense laboratory experience. His math experience was equally engaging, advancing to AP Calculus in his senior year and winning a school award for excellence in mathematics.
During high school, Stewart worked part-time for the various conventions that used Atlantic City hotels and the convention center. One of these would have a dramatic 
impact on his life. In 1971, Stewart worked as a session aide for the AIChE 70th National Meeting in Atlantic City. At this meeting, Stewart got the chance to hear various talks from the sessions he helped with. One of these focused on pilot plants which really excited Stewart because of the concept of how reactions are scaled-up. At the meeting, Stewart met a professor from Rutgers University, Dr. Frank Dittman, who told him about the chemical and biochemical engineering program there.
When Stewart made the decision to go to college to study engineering, he looked at many schools and attended the open house given at Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ in the Spring of 1975. He was impressed mostly with the chemical and biochemical engineering departments equipment demonstrations and talked with Dr. Dittman again. He was convinced that this was the best choice for him.
Stewart excelled at Rutgers. In his Freshman year he got straight As in his Spring term. He enjoyed the camaraderie of other engineering students. In his Junior year he joined AIChE as a student member and ran for office in the AIChE student chapter. He was elected Treasurer in his senior year. Stewart helped the chapter with a fund raising campaign to support student activities such as a Thanksgiving party with turkeys and cider and numerous social events. Before teamwork was popularized as it is today, Stewart recalls the study group that he was a member of and how that helped him succeed by working with other team members on various assignments.
When Stewart graduated in 1979, he interviewed with many of the companies that visited campus. Stewart was more intrigued with non-traditional aspects of chemical engineering so a presentation by Procter & Gamble on chemical engineering in product development excited him. Stewart got a job offer in Product Development for the Toilet Goods Division (now called Personal Products) located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Stewart worked in the dentifrice (toothpaste) process development on a gel-based product to complement the Crest line. Stewart was intrigued when he met scientists and engineers from the Research Division and saw that a career path in research would require an advanced degree. He was also told that his presentations were quite good and that he should consider being a professor since he was able to explain difficult concepts to technicians as and well as other non-ChEs.
Stewart decided to return to graduate school and talked to his former professors at Rutgers who strongly encouraged him to come back. At that time, Dr. Robert Ahlert had secured a major grant from EPA to examine the treatment of hazardous wastes from landfill leachates. Stewart signed on to Ahlerts group and worked on the use of membrane processes, such as ultrafiltration and reverse osmosis, in the treatment of the leachates from a New Jersey Superfund site. One of the aspects Stewart liked the best was when he got the chance to involve undergraduate students in the research he was conducting. This provided a meaningful mentorship opportunity for these students as well as giving Stewart the chance to see how to effectively supervise students. Stewart also enjoyed his teaching duties when he was asked to fill in for a faculty member going to a conference or to assist in helping undergraduates with the class problems and grade homework assignments.
While completing his dissertation, Stewart pondered his future plans. He liked the academic environment and decided to enter the academic ranks. He wanted to go to a smaller school that appreciated teaching while allowing him to develop his expertise in membrane processes further. He accepted a tenure track position at Manhattan College in September 1983. Stewart immersed himself in teaching, scholarship and service, and rose through the ranks to full professor in 1992. During his time at Manhattan, he was very active in developing a laboratory for advanced separation processes with the support of the National Science Foundation and industry.
He was influenced by numerous faculty during his time there. Stewart cites two individuals in particular, Dr. Helen Connie Hollein and Br. Conrad Timothy Burris. Connie Hollein was hired the year before him and he shared many of the issues of new faculty growing pains with her. They also worked together in the areas of educational development and bioseparations research. Br. Burris was Stewarts Chair and provided the support and encouragement necessary for faculty development. Stewart was getting high marks for his teaching, research and service and was recognized by his peers with the New Engineering Educator Excellence Award, Dow Outstanding New Faculty Award, and the John Fluke Award from the American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE).
Stewart continued to expand his research and teaching interest in membrane technology. He examined the separations component of the curriculum and sought out ways to incorporate membrane processes. He focused specifically on experimental development for membrane processes that could be used in undergraduate laboratories. His work resulted in several publications and new approaches which would later earn him the prestigious Chester Carlson award from ASEE.
He sought out industrial support for his research to complement his NSF funding. His research focused on reverse osmosis for industrial waste minimization, modeling and simulation, water recovery and reuse; ultra/microfiltration for protein separation; and pervaporation for separation of various organic-water mixtures. These were supported by industries such as Air Products & Chemicals, ExxonMobil, Pfizer, Joseph E. Seagram & Sons, and United Technologies. In all of these projects Stewart involved undergraduate and masters students. Many of these students have gone on to obtain advanced degrees and are in industry, academia and government.
Stewart attended AIChE, ACS and ASEE conferences and met faculty from other schools. One of the professors Stewart met, Dr. Angelo (Angie) Perna of New Jersey Institute of Technology, encouraged him to get more involved in professional society activities. Stewart began to rise through the ranks of leadership in ASEE, first in the Division for Experimentation and Laboratory-Oriented Studies (DELOS) and then in the Chemical Engineering Division.
In the Spring of 1995, Stewart heard that a new engineering school was being started at Rowan University and was recruiting the start-up faculty. When he interviewed for the Chemical Engineering Chair position, he told Dean James Tracey that he was excited about this opportunity for two reasons. First, there had never been an engineering school in southern New Jersey and the region was underserved for years. And second, he thought there needed to be a change in how engineering was taught and knew there were many like-minded faculty at other schools across the country who agreed, but didn't have a way to implement this change in there own programs. Stewart thought that starting from scratch would provide this opportunity. Thus, Stewart was hired as the Founding Chair of the Chemical Engineering Department in September 1995.
Stewart spent his first year at Rowan splitting time between the following tasks, curriculum development, facilities/lab development, student recruitment and faculty recruitment, each of which had its challenges. While an initial framework had been developed by an external committee, the founding chairs were challenged by Tracey to innovate and create a program that would produce a 21st century engineer. The program was designed so that graduates could communicate effectively, have knowledge of business/entrepreneurship, work in multidisciplinary teams, and have a hands-on, minds-on approach to problem solving. An innovative and forward looking engineering building was also underway. Stewart spent time working with the architectural firm to design a building that could accommodate various types of bench and pilot scale labs for courses and projects. Student recruitment involved visiting high schools and fairs with admissions office staff. Stewarts unique slant on this was to bring his trademarked hand-held reverse osmosis demo to allow high school students to get involved and run an actual chemical engineering process. Faculty recruitment was also of prime importance in the first year as planning to hire the faculty who would teach the first graduating class was already getting underway.
The early years at Rowan seemed to fly by quickly for Stewart. He says it was never boring, and filled with challenges of curriculum development, faculty and staff recruitment, and teaching the many talented students that had been recruited. A lot of these activities were done just-in-time with courses and labs were being developed right before the next class. By the time the first class graduated in May 2000, eight faculty had been hired and the labs were full of equipment and advanced instrumentation for teaching and project work.
Stewart views the single most innovative and unique feature of the Rowan chemical engineering curriculum (as well as that of the other engineering departments) to be the Engineering Clinic sequence. Loosely modeled after medical school approach to teaching, the eight semester sequence starts students with a real engineering experience in day one of their freshman year culminating in a major project experience in their junior and senior years. Development of the multidisciplinary clinic sequence brought faculty together from all disciplines.
Stewart recalls one of the best things about Rowan being the collaborative work with other faculty in the chemical engineering department. Whether it is team teaching a class or partnering in supervising a clinic project, these activities have been quite rewarding. Stewart has worked with every member of the department; Kevin Dahm, Stephanie Farrell, Zenaida Gephardt, Robert Hesketh, Brian Lefebvre, James Newell, Mariano Savelski, on projects at some time. These projects have focused on educational scholarship and technical research. Stewart says the industrial projects have been most interesting especially those with either food or pharmaceutical companies. His involvement in most of these projects has been in his own area of interest of membrane separations, but recently Stewart has gotten green. He has led EPA projects on the development of educational modules in green engineering for the undergraduate curriculum. His current work on green engineering in pharmaceutical development and manufacturing focuses on organic solvent metrics, reduction and recovery and is funded by EPA, Bristol-Myers Squibb and Pfizer.
Stewart has taken his teaching beyond the bounds of Manhattan College and Rowan University through seminars and workshops offered through various venues. He has conducted six NSF-sponsored workshops on novel process science and engineering, membrane technology, and advanced separation processes. He has been a leader in teaching future educators by performing workshops at two ASEE Summer Schools, and EPA-sponsored workshops. He has participated as a lecturer in the NATO Advanced Study Institutes.
Stewart stepped down as chair in 2004 and continues to be an active member of the faculty. Over the years, he has been asked at times to consider industrial and government positions, but always responds to such queries that teaching is in my blood. Both his sisters teach, one in elementary education and the other in high school math. He loves it when a student comes back years after graduation and Stewart can see the impact he has had on their professional career.
Stewart has amassed an impressive record for someone who has taught at primarily undergraduate institutions. He has been principal author or co-author of over 50 journal articles, 75 conference proceedings, 140 conference presentations, 20 invited seminars, and 5 book chapters. He has served as a principal investigator or co-investigator on over $3 Million of projects from industry and government. He has been elected as a Fellow of ASEE and received over ten awards from professional societies. But, he considers his most significant achievement to be the job he did as Founding Chair of the Chemical Engineering Department at Rowan University, which has provided the opportunity for students from South Jersey to receive a first-rate chemical engineering education.
Stewart reminds seniors preparing for graduation that they are the future of chemical engineering and the ambassadors of the profession. Although he thinks that they will remember him primarily for the membrane concepts he teaches in class, he is sure theyll also remember him for the candy his gives out and the bad jokes he often shares (especially the one about using a hollow fiber membrane for a hair piece!). Stewart isnt troubled by this, as long as his students remember the important things in life, such as helping others and using their chemical engineering know-how to serve and improve society.