Congratulations to Professor Shumaker-Parry on being named recipient of the 2024-2025 University of Utah Distinguished Teaching Award!
Dr. Jennifer S. Shumaker-Parry is a Professor of Chemistry at the University of Utah. She joined the Chemistry Department as an Assistant Professor in January 2005 before being promoted to Professor in 2016, and now also serves as the Director of the Biotechnology Track of the Professional Science Master Program at the University of Utah.
Dr. Shumaker-Parry grew up on a small dairy and grain farm in South Dakota, and began doing research in electrochemistry as an undergraduate student. She worked with Prof. Royce Engstrom at the University of South Dakota and spent a summer as a visiting student with Prof. Royce Murray at the University of North Carolina – Chapel Hill. She worked in the Analytical Development Laboratory for Novartis Pharmaceuticals Corporation (formerly Sandoz) in Lincoln, Nebraska for a year before pursuing graduate studies at Colorado State University where she worked on phase behavior of perfluorinated lipids using atomic fore microscopy with Prof. David Grainger and Prof. Bruce Parkinson.
After transferring to the University of Washington, she worked under the guidance of Prof. Charles Campbell in the Chemistry Department. Her doctoral dissertation focused on measuring protein interactions with vesicles and DNA using SPR spectroscopy and microscopy methods, including building one of the early SPR microscopes.
As a National Science Foundation Mathematical and Physical Sciences Directorate Distinguished Post Doctoral Research Fellow, Dr. Shumaker-Parry worked in Prof. Wolfgang Knoll’s group at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research in Mainz, Germany where she focused on the development of plasmonic materials for spectroscopy applications. Now, the research efforts of her group at the U focus on the investigation, development, and application of plasmonic nanomaterials and platforms in spectroscopy, chemical and biological sensing, and catalysis.
She received an NSF CAREER Award in 2009, the ACS PROGRESS/Dreyfus Lectureship and the ADVANCE Young Scientist Lectureship (University of Arizona) in 2008, and the R.W. Parry Teaching Award in 2016. She was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 2022.
In his letter, University of Utah president Taylor Randall noted: “I truly appreciate your example of excellence in teaching and your dedication to the advancement of learning at the University of Utah. I am confident that your students and colleagues will join me in congratulating you for the recognition you have earned as a recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award.”
As a recipient of the Distinguished Teaching Award, Professor Shumaker-Parry will be recognized at the General Commencement ceremonies on Thursday evening, May 1, 2025.
Read more about the Prof. Shumaker-Parry Research Lab.
Read here about the prestigious University of Utah Distinguished Teaching Award and the list of all Distinguished Teaching Award Recipients.
4/7/2025