"Countries that are not communicating at the U.N. are working as teams in a lab at Montclair State to extract DNA."

-Ann Marie DiLorenzo

Ann Marie DiLorenzo is one biologist who thinks outside the petri dish. She dabbles in sociology and psychology, and her work on campus extends beyond Biology and Molecular Biology. She's involved with Great Ideas in Science and the TRUST Program, and she's worked on the Montclair State University Teaching Academy in Paterson summer bridge program. DiLorenzo, who jokingly compares herself to a skittering waterbug, says she's primarily a genetics professor and is here to teach her content.

She may kid about her diverse interests, but the Alumni Association takes DiLorenzo's accomplishments seriously and last week presented her with the 2002 Alumni Association Outstanding Faculty Award.

The 21st faculty member to receive the $1,000 award, DiLorenzo arrived at Montclair State in 1975 from a National Institutes of Health (NIH) post-doctoral fellowship in human genetics at New York University Medical Center. She said she had great research experience at NYU, but coming to Montclair State allowed her to pursue her "genuine love of classroom teaching," she said.

Q: To what do you attribute this award?
A: I'm thrilled to be appreciated for trying to do different things over the years, but I have to thank my students. This campus has a wide spectrum of students with diverse cultural, racial and economic backgrounds, and I've had a lot of fun in changing my teaching style as the student population has changed.

The Alumni Association was one of the first organizations on campus to fund professors to allow us to conduct research with our students. The money I received as part of this honor will allow me to buy supplies, order fertilized chicken eggs, and give students who are conducting research with me a small honorarium for the work they're doing.

Q: What is it about the classroom that most appeals to you?
A: Research is fun, but it's too lonely. Interacting with my students is part of the joy of teaching. There are so many nationalities working together I stand back and observe what appears to be a functioning United Nations. Countries that are not communicating at the U.N. are working as teams in a lab at Montclair State to extract DNA. So there's hope because our young people working together.

Q: How do you involve your students in your research?
A: I am studying the effect of stress on cultured cells as an indicator of the effect on stress in humans. Cells in culture indicate that stress interferes with the normal response of our genetic material to protect us from environmental chemical insults such as lead, drugs or diuretics, or food insults from saccharin or caffeine.

Techniques that reduce or eliminate the use of live animals have become a valuable method of research. Students who share my research projects utilize alternatives to whole animal testing and design projects that study cells or organs grown in culture under normal conditions and stress brought on by serum deprivation.

Q: Discuss your teaching philosophy.
A: Over the past decade the demographic changes in our student population have initiated my interest in new strategies to reach out to different learning styles and diverse cultural styles. I pair my students with one another to bridge cultural and academic ability gaps. I partner weak students with stronger students, then observe the interaction. Sometimes it turns out to be my own little sociological or psychological experiment. I often can get nervous people to blossom because they're communicating and working with other students on successful research projects.

Q: How do your stronger students react to being paired with weaker peers?
A: It is important to me that along with scientific knowledge I show students the need for wisdom in its use. I guide students into a project so that the stronger student will not be held back, and it's rewarding for a bright student who can pull something out of the weaker student. We all have strengths, and sometimes I may find an outgoing personality in a weaker student and a reticent bright person. But they begin to complement each other.

Q: How did you become involved with global education?
A: New Jersey and our student body have a significant Italian-American population, and I'm first generation Italian-American. In 1996 I began work toward an academic liaison with exchange opportunities for our students and those in the Calabria region in Italy, and I coordinated an MSU Global Education tour of Magna Graecia in southern Italy in 1999. UNICO [National] this year approached the University to establish an endowed chair in Italian/Italian-American Studies. I did not bring UNICO here, but I feel I dusted the path. I will continue to seek a better understanding and appreciation of our multi cultural gifts. Every day at Montclair State is an adventure and each student's uniqueness keeps me energized.

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