Presented in the Honor of the Late Professor Patrick Herley

On this wonderful day when we are gathered to honor our chemistry graduates it is important for us to remember some of the students who are not joining us to day. After all chemistry is a difficult subject and not all students make the final cut.

For example I remember Jason, a student in Professor Hanson’s General Chemistry course. Professor Hanson had found a disturbing similarity between Jason’s final exam and the final exam turned in by Jennifer. And most interesting the seating chart clearly showed that Jason was sitting directly behind Jennifer in the exam room.

Now no faculty member enjoys dealing with such things, so Professor Hanson took a sensible approach. He gave the exam papers to me and left town. Before I could dump the papers on someone else – who appears in my office? Jason no less, declaring his innocence, and proclaiming a vast knowledge of all things chemical.

So with Jason standing there, I looked at the two exam papers for the first time.

“Well Jason let’s look at problem 1. Give an example of a strong base. Jennifer wrote acetic acid, and …. I see that you also wrote acetic acid. How can you explain that?”

“But Professor Kerber, everyone knows that is the right answer. Professor Hanson kept saying over and over that acetic acid wasn’t a strong acid. So it has to be a strong base.”

“Now on question two. Jennifer say’s that aspirin is a pharmaceutical, a correct answer, but she spells the word wrong and I must note that you have the same misspelling.”

“But Professor Kerber – it is not misspelled. I have known how to spell farm ever since I was a kid. F A R M”

“Ok lets move on. Question 3. Name the compound FeCl3. Jennifer wrote “ironic chloride.” And once again you have the same answer.”

“Professor Kerber – why are your persecuting me. Everyone knows that is correct. Only a fool would call FeCl3 ironous chloride. How can you accuse me of cheating when all I do is put down the correct answers. After all Jennifer and I study together, we both know our chemistry. Together we are a good study team.”

“I then looked at question 4. “Explain the difference between enthalpy and entropy.” I saw that Jason was correct. Together they are a good team. Jennifer answered “I don’t have a clue.” While Jason responded, “Me neither.”