Smiling young man seated in front of a faded bookshelf, looking relaxed.

Colin Martin Earns Hugh D. Young Graduate Student Teaching Award

By Amy Pavlak Laird Email Amy Pavlak Laird

Heidi Opdyke

Organic Chemistry courses tend to have a bad reputation. Colin Martin was determined to flip the script.

“Students come in with a preconceived notion of what it's going to be like, and it feels really good to just smash that the moment they walk in and hopefully change their mind whenever they leave,” said Martin, a fifth year Ph.D. student in Carnegie Mellon University’s Department of Chemistry.

He set a high bar for himself, and he cleared it.

“Thank you for making me like orgo,” wrote one of his students. “I never thought I would be able to say that.”

“Having such an engaged and effective TA showed me that no matter how difficult a class may seem, there is always a way to understand the content,” added another student.

Mellon College of Science students and faculty recognized his excellence in teaching by awarding him this year's Hugh D. Young Graduate Student Teaching Award.

Martin has been a teaching assistant for several semesters of Organic Chemistry I and II as well as Modern Chemistry. Even though these are some of the largest and most demanding courses, Martin still earned exceptionally high TA evaluations.

“I've found that, for myself, the best way to educate is to be someone that is available to my students and that they can look to and trust,” Martin said. “And the best way to do that is to meet them as a person first.”

This approach resonated with students. They appreciated that Martin was interested in learning about them as people and creating a supportive environment where they felt encouraged to engage actively in the material. Chemistry Teaching Professor Gloria Silva described Martin as having a unique teaching approach and an extraordinary commitment to the students’ success.

“Colin’s dedication to teaching is unmatched. His tireless efforts ensured students had all the tools they needed for success,” Silva said, adding “Not only is he a wonderful teacher but also an amazing human being.”

His gift for teaching extends beyond the classroom to the students he mentors in the lab. His research advisor Chemistry Professor Bruce Armitage said that “Colin is one of the best research mentors to have ever worked in my lab. Undergrads really blossom as researchers under Colin’s guidance.”

In the Armitage lab, Martin conducts research related to peptide nucleic acid synthesis and its applications to human disease therapies. He anticipates wrapping up his Ph.D. work and defending his thesis in the next few months. After graduation, he plans to use his teaching skills in a different environment — as a patent agent for a law firm. Patent agents bring a technical background to the patent process, enabling them to grasp the complex ideas generated by inventors.

“I feel like I have this ability to explain complex topics to a broad audience, and I’ll be able to leverage that experience in what will be my job as a patent agent,” Martin said. “I'm really excited about it.”

Although he won’t be teaching in the more traditional sense, Martin values every moment spent with students at Carnegie Mellon.

“I love teaching. It's been the best part of my experience here at CMU,” Martin said. “I'm very grateful to this community and especially the students who have not only come to class prepared and ready to work hard but were also willing to trust me to be their teacher.”

The Young Award was established in 1995 in honor of Hugh D. Young, a professor of physics at the Mellon College of Science and is presented to one MCS Ph.D. student annually to encourage and recognize effective teaching by graduate students.