Senior Michelle Okonowicz is a driving force in the science department, motivated by her passion for chemistry that has led her past the classroom with her research.
“Michelle is engaged, she’s dedicated, she’s very curious, extremely intelligent, and I think she is a remarkable student,” said Kimberly King, Michelle’s former chemistry teacher.
As a child, Michelle would create her own recipes in the kitchen when her mother was not home, purely through trial and error.
“I tried to figure out why everything works and how I could make a good recipe right now without really having to experiment much, so I started looking into these small things,” said Okonowicz.
Michelle’s curiosity for the unknown was aided by the technology accessible to her in her childhood.
“I started with a baking chemistry video made for kids on YouTube, and that stemmed into a spiraling research into chemistry and how everything works [and] interacts with itself, and therefore has conglomerated into this new, scaffolding love for chemistry,” said Okonowicz.
From the kitchen to the lab, her whimsical curiosity bridged the gap between baking and chemistry.
“My favorite part about chemistry [is] probably its applications, and I think it’s really fun. The drawing part is actually very fun. And then you get to explain to people like, oh my god, this ligand does this. So therefore I predicted to do this. And then you could be completely wrong. […]I love just being able to understand the world around me through a very chemical perspective, and I really want to make new stuff, and I really like food, and the food has a lot of chemistry in it,” said Okonowicz.
Michelle is currently working in the Stony Brook Chemistry Teaching Laboratory to continue her research beyond the capabilities of the typical high school lab.
“She was looking to do something beyond the scope of what we can do in our high school lab and I have connections over at Stony Brook University within the chemistry community. I reached out to people who I knew to see if there were others who might be able to help her,” said Dr. Daniel Kramer, her research and chemistry teacher.
Michelle explained that the intended outcome for her research is to provide a more cost effective solution to manufacturing solar panels with cheaper–but equally effective–materials.
“We are using a cheap transition metal, iron, to try to substitute these molecules into dye-sensitized solar cells. Solar cells are smaller and more compact than the usual silicon solar cells,” said Okonowicz.
Coinciding with her accomplishment of conducting research in the Stony Brook laboratory, she is also publishing two scientific research papers with Paul Griffin, Michelle’s mentor, and Kevin Schulman, a graduate rotator.
“[I love chemistry because] I love being able to understand the world around me through a very chemical perspective. I really want to make new stuff, I really like food, and the food has a lot of chemistry in it,” said Okonowicz.
With her curiosity as her compass, and determination as her catalyst, her pursuit of knowledge is demonstrated beyond the walls of the classroom. ◼️
