Peter Mahaffy to Receive 2025 Pimentel Award for Outstanding Contributions to Chemistry Education
Abstract
The King’s University is pleased to announce that chemistry professor Peter Mahaffy is the 2025 recipient of the George C. Pimentel Award in Chemical Education. The award, granted by the American Chemical Society (ACS), recognizes two key areas of Mahaffy’s teaching and research: understanding and relating to chemistry as a human activity and reimagining the teaching and learning of chemistry by using “systems thinking” tools.
“Chemistry is often taught as a set of isolated, disconnected facts,” says Mahaffy. “But facts alone don’t tell students why chemistry matters. Systems thinking looks at the world as an interconnected system—it allows students to see how chemical reactions and processes relate to important things in their lives, and how chemistry can be used responsibly to make a difference in global sustainability challenges.”
Mahaffy’s innovative work as the director of King’s Centre for Visualization in Science (KCVS) is at the forefront of systems thinking. In collaboration with a team of undergraduate student researchers and a network of international and Edmonton-based experts, KCVS has developed an extensive range of digital resources that teach students to consider how chemical systems connect the world. Educators and students can access these interactive models, visualizations, and curriculum materials for free at kcvs.ca.
One interactive model created by Mahaffy and his team is called “Design Our Climate.” It allows users to manipulate humanity’s global energy, greenhouse gas, and land use to discover what changes make it possible to achieve the UN›s 2050 net zero goal. The model also teaches students what chemical processes occur when they make everyday decisions like switching on a light or driving to work. Ultimately, the model shows that hitting net zero isn’t easy, but it is possible, especially when chemists work together to find creative alternatives to replace unsustainable resources.
“We must reimagine the teaching of chemistry,” says Mahaffy. “Doing so will ensure that our students understand how to be sustainability leaders in the face of global climate change.”
©2025 by Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
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Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead - Full issue pdf
- Vice President’s Column
- Reimagining the Scientific Horizons of IUPAC
- Features
- Chemistry’s Role in Malaysia Sustainable Development Progress
- Reusing Chemical Data Across Disciplines: Initiatives and Common Challenges
- IUPAC reflectivity principle for normative work—the case of valence as a quantity
- IUPAC Wire
- Awardees of the IUPAC 2025 Distinguished Women in Chemistry or Chemical Engineering
- Paolo Franzosini Prize and Christo Balarew Award 2024
- Graham Cooks and Anna Regoutz win the 2025 Awards in Analytical Chemistry
- Peter Mahaffy to Receive 2025 Pimentel Award for Outstanding Contributions to Chemistry Education
- Zafra Lerman to Receive Cardozo’s 24th Annual International Advocate for Peace Award
- CIAAW Student Observer Grant 2025
- USNC/IUPAC Announces the 2025 Young Observers and IYCN Delegates
- The Muscat Global Knowledge Dialogue and the 3rd ISC General Assembly: IUPAC’s Role in Shaping Global Science Policy
- In Memoriam
- Project Place
- Setting Standards for Wearable Biochemical Measurement Devices: Defining Nomenclature and Guidelines
- Promoting Chemistry Applied to World Needs
- The isotopic composition of VPDB
- IUPAC Provisional Recommendations
- Radical Copolymerization Reactivity
- Making an imPACt
- Toward a definition of valence as a quantity (IUPAC Technical Report)
- Diffusion in nanoporous materials with special consideration of the measurement of determining parameters (IUPAC Technical Report)
- Thermoplastic Starch with Maltodextrin: Preparation, Morphology, Rheology, and Mechanical Properties
- Glossary of terms for mass and volume in analytical chemistry (IUPAC Recommendations 2024)
- Special CTI
- Conference Call
- Medicinal Chemistry and Drug Discovery & Development India
- Solubility Phenomena and Related Equilibrium Processes
- The Historic Gathering of IUPAC Presidents at the 10th International Conference of Green Chemistry
- Chemistry, a Lever for Sustainable Development of African Countries
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