{"id":19997,"date":"2018-04-27T18:00:23","date_gmt":"2018-04-27T23:00:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/?p=19997"},"modified":"2018-04-27T17:26:48","modified_gmt":"2018-04-27T22:26:48","slug":"tartan-spotlight-dr-patrick-greco","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/tartan-news\/2018\/04\/27\/tartan-spotlight-dr-patrick-greco\/","title":{"rendered":"Tartan Spotlight: Dr. Patrick Greco"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0On Sept. 1, 2001, Dr. Patrick Greco began teaching full time at Sinclair. Prior to this, Greco was teaching at Miami, where he was working towards completing his PhD.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Greco has taught and lead a variety of classes at Sinclair over the years, including general chemistry 1 and 2, intro to chemistry, organic chemistry lab, and some specialty courses such as forensic chemistry, while also serving on several committees.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Over the years at Sinclair Greco has received many noteworthy awards including the <\/span>\u00a0<\/span>National Award of Teaching and Excellence through the National Institute for Staff and Organizational Development (NISOD), and the Honors faculty member of the year. Additionally, while accomplishing this he finished his PhD in chemistry in 2011.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Aside from these awards, there are a few things that make Greco stand out as a professor at Sinclair College: his teaching style and his character.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0All too often in college students can become numbers, whether it is through the headcount of a class or a student I.D. With how many students a professor must teach, it is very easy to treat them as a conglomerate whole, instead of individual people. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0There have been many experiences like this, where a student will leave at the end of the semester and not even know their professors’ name, and vice versa.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0This is next to impossible in Greco\u2019s class. The first day of class he has everyone make a name tag that they must bring with them to every lecture. On the back of the name card are a few questions about the student, such as where they work and what they are studying, among others. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0At the end of that first class Greco collects all of the name cards, and reads them all before the next lecture. Then, when he personally gives the card back at the start of the follow up lecture, he will talk to the student about something they wrote on their card.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0This might not sound like much, but it adds a huge amount of comfort to the classroom. It is only the second day, and the students have a personal relationship with the teacher and don\u2019t feel like a number. This kind of relationship helps motivate some students who would otherwise be uninterested.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cHe is always interested in what his students are doing,\u201d Maria Bowman, one of his students, said. \u201cHe will listen to you when you talk to him about something, and will even offer to help or a piece of advice. This extended to activities outside of chemistry, such as my involvement in the Sinclair choir.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0This past year Greco got even more involved with students by starting a course called Undergraduate Research in Chemistry. In this course, Greco works with students one on one to complete a chemistry project. One such project was at the Honors Symposium this year, where a student analyzed and made object that people use every day such as soap.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Greco will also take some time to tell students about his life. These little blurbs of info help the student to realize that their professor is just another person, and is not out to make sure anyone gets a bad grade. Additionally, they provide a short break from a rigorous lecture. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cHe is able to laugh and make class fun,\u201d Bowman said, \u201cbut he also makes sure we learn everything.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0This leads into the second thing Greco does exceedingly well, his teaching style.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Walking into a lecture with most professors is a gamble. It\u2019s not a guarantee that they will know the material well, answer any questions, or if the lectures will be engaging instead of just being a slideshow. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Greco has a different way of approaching lecture. At the beginning of class he has all of the students pick up a small whiteboard with a dry erase pen. Then throughout the lecture he will ask a question for the students to answer on their whiteboard. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0This accomplishes two things, first it lets Greco know where everyone stands with learning the material he is covering. If a majority of the answers are wrong he will go back and cover the material again, focusing more on the point of conflict. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0If only a couple students got it wrong, he will still take some time to cover the material, and encourage students around them to help out.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0The second thing this action achieves is breaking up the lecture into smaller manageable chunks, and keeping the class engaged. In a lecture, especially if a student has multiple lectures a day, it is easy for their mind to wander. This bit of engagement helps students stay focused, calling their attention back to the material.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0Students have noticed this, and appreciate it. \u201cAs an older student Patrick made it easy for me to not only succeed in his class but to enjoy it as well.\u201d Stephen Feltoon said.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cI truly love what I do [but] I am not just a chalk and talk professor,\u201d Greco said. By mixing traditional teaching with the whiteboard, occasional discussion and in class presentations Greco has created an engaging learning environment.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0What this all leads up to is the realization the Greco is such a great teacher because he is a person. Greco, a lifelong student, knows how difficult it can be to learn and does everything in his power to work with students. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0For me, Greco has made a huge difference in my life. Two years ago I was skating through most of my classes, just showing up to lectures and completing the minimum amount of work. I really thought I could do anything easily, so I took chemistry. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0What I was expecting to be an easy A turned into a real project. I struggled. With Greco\u2019s help though I was able to understand the material, and came out with a real passion for chemistry.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0 \u00a0\u201cAt a community college, we have the pleasure of teaching small class sizes as well as teaching the labs. These small classes allow for an intimate teaching environment that I thoroughly enjoy.\u201d Greco said.<\/span><\/p>\n

Jake Conger
\n<\/b>Reporter<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u00a0 \u00a0On Sept. 1, 2001, Dr. Patrick Greco began teaching full time at Sinclair. Prior to this, Greco was teaching at Miami, where he was working towards completing his PhD. \u00a0 \u00a0Greco has taught and lead a variety of classes at Sinclair over the years, including general chemistry 1 and 2, intro to chemistry, organic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10416,"featured_media":19998,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2102,2105,3],"tags":[1418,2590,2302,655,836,1419],"class_list":["post-19997","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-campus-life","category-science","category-tartan-news","tag-campus-life","tag-chemistry","tag-jake-conger","tag-professor","tag-science","tag-tartan-spotlight"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"cc_featured_image_caption":{"caption_text":false,"source_text":false,"source_url":false},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/Greco_Patrick-446x640.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p5s3vR-5cx","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19997","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10416"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19997"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19997\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19999,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19997\/revisions\/19999"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19998"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19997"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19997"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.sinclairclarion.com\/home\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19997"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}