From chemistry sets to classrooms

This interview with Professor Michael Montague-Smith, former organic chemistry professor and associate director of undergraduate studies for the chemistry department, is the first in this volume's series of Oak Room Interviews. The series is designed to shed light on the personalities of noted campus figures in an informal setting. This interview was conducted by Martin Barna, editorial page editor of The Chronicle.

MB: What made you want to study chemistry?

MMS: I don't know-I just always did. I had a chemistry set when I was seven. I always liked putting things together and seeing what they did. When I was a teenager I used to make gunpowder and set it off. I just always liked it from as far back as I can remember.

MB: After you decided you wanted to study chemistry, what made you want to go into teaching?

MMS: When I was in graduate school I had a fellowship from the Department of Education, and one of the requirements of that was I had to teach three quarters a year. This was the West Coast, so we were on the quarter system. I taught organic and general chemistry, and while I was doing it I just found that I really liked it. It was just kind of a fluke thing....

MB: Over your six years at Duke, have you noticed any trends about how students have changed?

MMS: I think that people might be more intense than they used to be, but that's a very qualitative kind of thin. It's just kind of a feel. I am not just saying that they weren't very bright when I started, but somehow it seems that things have just ramped up in the past few years....

MB: Is there a particular reason that you stopped teaching organic chemistry this year?

MMS: No, there were plenty of people on the island, I just can't remember...I can't think of anyone who caused me to be me.

MB: What brought your family to the islands?

MMS: My dad, he was a teacher when we first moved to Guam. He taught elementary school and then high school. But apparently he had a little side job that nobody knew about. My dad worked for the CIA. We weren't allowed to know about it. I asked him about it one time, and he told me he couldn't tell me what he did. I sort of said, "you could tell me but you'd have to kill me." And then he said, "I really can't tell you." That's kind of a strange thing to hear from your dad. That's why we initially moved out there, at least I thought, for him to be a teacher.

MB: Students who have had you for organic have said that their best memories of the class-outside of the chemistry, of course-are your stories of growing up. Can you give us an example?

MMS: When I was about 15 or 16 I think-when we lived in Saipan-one of the things I liked to do was go up in the caves from World War II and scrounge around and find unexploded ordinances and stuff like that. My mother had warned me hundreds of times not to do it, because it was an incredibly stupid thing to do, but I was 15 or 16 and therefore indestructible and so I did it constantly. One thing that was always fun to get a hold of was .50- or .60- caliber machine gun rounds-the big ones-and collect them up and hit them on a rock until the bullet part came off. Then I'd collect up the gun powder.... One time I had maybe a quart of it. We lived in this house down by the beach in Saipan and I ran [the gunpowder] in a big square all the way around the house. I set it off at night-which was really pretty spectacular. And my mom and my dad just about killed me. The reason I tell that story is because when I was a kid I had kind of a freedom to do things that were just amazing in retrospect. You couldn't go anywhere, you couldn't just leave the island-although I did that occasionally. And even though I could get in a lot of trouble, my parents didn't know anything about it, so they didn't have any ability to stop me from doing it. So I had this great freedom to learn things, and it was really a neat time to grow up out there. It was so foreign to the United States that as I look back at it, it's almost amazing. It's like this cultural backwater. There was no TV. There was only transient electricity and water, it was just a very different kind of experience.... It was just a kind of freedom that I had, that you couldn't do here-just because there are too many people, there's too much uncertainty and there's too far you can go. When you live on an island that's only 14 miles long, no matter how lost you get, you're not terribly lost....

MB: Do you tell these stories more to make a point or to entertain?

MMS: Chemistry can be as boring as the instructor chooses to make it.... But if the person teaching chemistry can tell stories about a particular kind of molecule or phenomenon, it makes people in the class go "Oh, that's neat," it could illuminate the concept a bit and it could keep them interested. And I think that's a sizable chunk of the battle-in terms of teaching-keeping kids coming to class saying, "I don't know what he is going to say today, but I want be there when he says it."

MB: How do you feel about being a pre-major advisor at Duke? How do you feel about advising?

MMS: I think it comes down to what a student expects. I don't think its appropriate for pre-major advisors to tell you what classes to take. Because by the time you get to college, you are supposed to be grown up some. I think some people look at pre-major advising and think it is supposed to be some kind of continuation of a guidance counselor, but that's not what it is.... In a lot of ways, pre-major advising's main function is to come up with resources when things go wrong and to help kids figure their way out of a dilemma and helping to navigate the bureaucracy. A lot of people may just see their pre-major adviser a couple times a year, get their pin number and that's it. But those arguably aren't the kids that need that much advising. For some people I think its really valuable. We just try to provide a service as best we can. Some people find it more useful than others.

MB: My pre-major advising was mostly a PIN number.

MMS: I guess I had an adviser when I was an undergraduate, but I never saw that person.

MB: Do you advise major students as well?

MMS: Yes, about a dozen. I like interacting with Duke students and do it whenever I can.

MB: You instituted the 7:30 a.m. organic chemistry exam policy-so all students would take organic chemistry exams at the same time. What was the impetus for that?

MMS: At the time I did it, I was teaching two sections of organic to about 400 students. I wanted to give them the same exam but giving them the same exam on two different days-honor code or no-presents certain problems.... I got a hold of people in the registrar's office and they said, "Oh yes, we do have a block exam, no one's used it for years...." It turned out it was at 7:30 in the morning-I did not pick that time.... When everyone takes the same exam, at the same time, under the same conditions, it's completely fair-and that's really my primary concern.

MB: Are you a believer or supporter of Duke's honor code?

MMS: I think that the concept of an honor code is great, but I don't think Duke's is fully fleshed out. But I did the 7:30 in the morning exams. I didn't want to be here then, trust me.

MB: Do you have any pastimes?

MMS: I like listening to music. I've managed to accumulate a pretty decent stereo.... I listen to a lot of archaic pop and rock and roll that no one listens to anymore. Remember, I graduated from high school in 1974.... [I like] the Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Fleetwood Mac....

MB: Do you have a favorite song by the Stones?

MMS: There's a million of them... "You can't always Get What You Want." I don't know. I think I told my kid that the other day....

MB: Did you ever consider going to medical school instead of getting your Ph.D.?

MMS: Briefly. I think the reality is that when people get sick they tend to get real self-centered and whiny and want somebody to fix them-that's how it is for me anyway. I'm not fun to be around when I'm not feeling well, and at one point I decided, "Why would I want to surround myself with people like that everyday?" And I don't. It's not that I'm not empathetic, but I don't think that I'd be good at it. I would be just as likely to say, "Oh just suck it up and deal with it." I don't think that's a characteristic of a fine physician. I feel really fortunate to be given the opportunity to teach at Duke, because the reality is I get to interact with some of the brightest undergraduates in the country every day. Every once in a while I like to flatter myself by thinking that I've made some positive contribution to some person's life. And when it comes right down to it, that's what the whole deal is about. And I get paid for it! You can't beat that.