Page 7 - CEMS News Winter 2021

CEMS NEWS
Fond farewell continued from page 6
Wieslaw Suszynski
When recalling his first
moments in Amundson Hall,
Bob said, “Aside from the
very welcoming Professor
Chris Macosko, who made
me feel at ease right away,
I remember getting a
surprisingly warm welcome from Professor L.E. “Skip” Scirven. I say surprisingly because I had heard the stories about Skip being so exacting, but I guess he saw early on that I could be an effective ally in increasing collaboration with industry.”
Wieslaw also established industrial connections through his work. “Some of my fondest memories include numerous collaborative projects with industry and related trips to companies, where experiments on pilot coaters were done. One of the most challenging and interesting was research of weeping defects in high-speed paper blade coating in the 1990s. Numerous times I had to bring a unique visualization equipment from the laboratory to Potlach Company in Cloquet, Minnesota and also, I had to ship it and go to Belgium, where there was a pilot coating machine capable to coat paper at speeds exceeding 2000 m/min (about 75 miles/hour). Potlach Company
and China Clay Company from the United Kingdom were joining the University of Minnesota in that research.”
Fond Memories
Mary is a relatively “new” employee among this group
of retirees, but her 23 years of service at the “U” include nine years of service in CEMS. She remarked, “Some of my fondest memories are taking a Latin course, serving on the Certified Approver Advisory Council (CAAC) for one year and attending Sponsored Projects Symposiums. It was wonderful to see the completion of the Gore Annex and to help with numerous alumni events.
I first started as a temporary employee in the College of Natural Resources on the St. Paul campus in 1998, and
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outside wall to the Minnesota winter was a character-building event.”
Finding a Home in CEMS
It is becoming increasingly rare to find long-term employees who dedicate their careers to one location, but CEMS is a special place. For some of the longest-term staff members like Teresa with 36 years of CEMS service and Wieslaw with 34 years, they commented on the appeal.
the interface of academia and industry. Joining the University of Minnesota was the best professional decision I ever made. As I’ve often joked with my friends in industry, it would have to be a pretty big number to get me to go back.”
“When I first started in the department I thought, “O.k., I will stay three to five years here,” said Teresa. “Thirty-six years later, I find that I stayed in the department because of the people. This is my second home, and working with the graduate students and postdocs has been
one of the greatest pleasures I have had here in CEMS. They have kept me young and on my toes. I have seen approximately 1,500 graduate students and post-docs come into the department and leave the department (including Professors Dauenhauer, Ellison, Mahanthappa and Zasadzinski; glad they came back!). It is like watching “my kids” (at first, as a big sister) grow up and leave the nest. I will miss all the events that we have done together, like roundtable, wine and cheese, rib and veggie fest and much more. If we return to normal someday, hopefully Julie (Prince) will let me come back for one or two of these.”
Wieslaw agreed, “I stayed 34 years in the department because of the great work environment. It was a pleasure to work with Coating Program Fundamentals leaders and CEMS faculty members Skip Scriven, Lorraine Francis, and Satish Kumar, very nice and helpful colleagues and coworkers, and always new and challenging research. I found not only a second home here, but also many lasting friendships.”
Technical Advancements & Industrial Connections
Bob Lewis, Executive Director of Industrial Partnership for Research in Interfacial and Materials Engineering (IPRIME), knew that he landed in the right place in 2004 when he started in his position. “After a fairly long career in industry, I really found the perfect job for me at IPRIME, right at
Bob Lewis
CEMSnews Winter 2021 7