Dr. Eileen Pérez Obregon

Professor of Chemistry

EDUCATION:
• Ph. D.: Chemistry, University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, March 26, 1999.
• M.B.A.: Management, Universidad del Turabo, Caguas, PR, Dec. 1992.
• B. S. cum laude: Chemistry, Universidad de Puerto Rico, Rio Piedras, PR, June 1984.

EMPLOYMENT:
•August 2007 – Present: VC, Professor of Chemistry
•August 2002 - June 2007: Hillsborough Community College, Brandon, FL. Assistant Professor of Chemistry
•2001-2002: University Of South Florida, Tampa, FL. Visiting Instructor of Chemistry and General Chemistry Laboratory Coordinator.
•1999-2001: Adjunct Chemistry Professor at several Universities and Colleges.
•1995-1999: University Of South Florida, Tampa, FL. Graduate Teaching Assistant.
•1984-1994: Worked at several pharmaceutical industries.



Contact

West Campus
AHS211
407-582-1236
eperez76@valenciacollege.edu

Hours

• Mondays: 12:00 pm – 1:00 pm virtual via Zoom, 3:30 pm – 5:15 pm in AHS211.
• Tuesday: 1:00 pm – 2:15 pm in AHS211 and phone.
• Wednesdays: 12:00 pm – 1:30 pm virtual via Zoom, 3:30 pm – 5:15 pm in AHS211.
• Thursdays 1:00 pm – 2:15 pm in AHS211.
• Fridays: 8:30 am -10:00 am virtual via Zoom.

Teaching Philosophy : I love to teach and I love chemistry. I still feel the same excitement of my first chemistry set each time I open a new chemistry textbook or find a new experiment for the lab. I try to transfer my enthusiasm and passion for chemistry to my students. It’s exciting to see their faces when they get that “aha” expression and become engaged in the material. I view teaching and learning as an inquiry-based process, involving students in the process of thinking, questioning, and problem solving inside the classroom. I try to incorporate different ways of discussing difficult concepts: visual models (for example the use of a cheese-burger to illustrate balancing chemical reactions and wooden props to show orbital regions of probability), manual activities (they use candy and toothpicks to create geometrical models that reduce electron repulsions; ion cutouts to form neutral compounds, to name a few), writing (for example, after working with them to solve several problems of increasing difficulties, they write-out in their own words how they would explain this type of strategy to a 5th grader) discussion questions, polls (I present questions or models and provide multiple-choice answers, they vote on the answers, depending on the votes they are asked to discuss with a neighbor, or read a certain section in their book or notebook then vote again), and video clips with demonstrations (heat two test tubes in a Bunsen burner to discuss physical and chemical changes, add two chemicals in a beaker over a puddle of water to illustrate endothermic reactions , etc.), to name a few. Personal contact is essential to my approach. Students are encouraged to ask questions in and out of the classroom. I hope that my students leave my course with the idea that chemistry is a fascinating subject, chemistry is essential to the progress of society, and it has a direct impact on their life. I also hope that they will leave my course with the proper tools to discriminate and analyze information when they are required to vote or take a position regarding a societal dimension of chemistry in particular and science in general.