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March 22, 1966

Dr. Homer W. Carhart, Chairman
Education Committee
Chemical Society of Washington
Naval Research Laboratory
Washington, D.C.

Dear Mr. Carhart:

Mrs. Elaine M. Kilbourne, chemistry teacher at Anacostia High School, is suggested to your committee as a nominee for the James Bryant Conant Award. Below you will find a summary of her qualifications:

(a) Quality of teaching ability
Graduated from Montclair State Teachers College in 1944 with a major in chemistry and a minor in physics.
Obtained the M.A. degree in student personnel administration from Columbia University in 1947.
She joined the D.C. school system as a chemistry teacher at Anacostia High School in September 1948 where she has been since. Her ratings as a teacher have always been of the highest order. Not only has she shown growth in her knowledge of chemistry but her knowledge of students and her ability to counsel them has developed to an unusual degree. She often has served as a counselor to professional counselors.
She has commanded the respect of the three principals under whom she has worked and enjoys our complete confidence in her work and professional growth.
In 1948 she more than met the minimum standards required of high school teachers of chemistry in our system, an achievement that few young people seem to come to us with today.

(b) Caliber of presentation
Mrs. Kilbourne brings to her presentation of chemistry an unusual amount of imaginateion and stimulating planning. She was using an overhead projector with her own and student developed projectuals before they became commercially available. 
Her classes discuss atomic and ionic dimensions and molecular structure from student-constructed models as they (the students) interpret the information presented by charts and textbooks. Materials for these models have been contributed by her students.
She has constructed and uses in her teaching a pin-ball type model that illustrates the order in which electrons fill atomic shells as atomic numbers increase. The theory of orbitals is a standard part of her instructional program.