juniors support seniors
Senior chemists occasionally find PC applications challenging. Why not seek help from younger people who, unlike older generations, have already grown up with these programmes? Holger Bengs initiated the idea as early as 2007, when the Senior Expert Chemists (SEC) were still in their early stages, and organised the first computer course, "juniors support seniors", which focused on Microsoft's Office suite.
Students from Goethe University Frankfurt play a central role in all the courses: they give up their time – sometimes even on a Saturday – and have the patience to familiarise SEC members with the routines and special tricks of software applications. Four such computer courses have now taken place.
Chem. News 2007, 55, 459
Chem. News. 2008, 56, 70
Under the guidance of Denise Schütz and Julian Scherr, 15 senior chemists learned which pitfalls to look out for when opening a Facebook account and how to use this social medium safely without revealing more about themselves than they wished.
Chem. News 2013, 61, 965
Although every SEC member can create texts and presentations with MS Office, many nevertheless lack a thorough understanding of the principles of styles. Styles are highly efficient tools for designing appealing texts and presentations.
The "Formatting in Word and PowerPoint" workshop took place on 3 Jun 2017 at the Beilstein Computer Center of Goethe University Frankfurt on the Riedberg Campus. The chemistry students Sebastian Balser and Julian Scherr were the instructors. Mr Balser focused on Word, and Mr Scherr on PowerPoint. Both sections were structured in the same way: a short lecture demonstrated the essential functions, after which the course participants had more than an hour to create a Word document and a PowerPoint presentation themselves, using perfectly prepared practice scenarios. Mr Balser and Mr Scherr were always on hand to help.
On behalf of the course participants, the workshop organiser, Wolfgang Gerhartz, warmly thanked the two instructors. Each participant was able to take home plenty of practice material in order to put what they had learned into practice at home. This meant that the aim of the course could be achieved: producing appealing results with Word and PowerPoint effortlessly in everyday work.
A small selection of photographs gives an impression of the course held on Whit Saturday 2017; see below.
