ACTC chemistry professor retires

Published on Jun 19, 2017

Dr. James Schmidt, a long-time Ashland resident, has retired after teaching chemistry for 26 years at Ashland Community and Technical College. A native of Maysville, KY, he earned a Bachelor's Degree in Chemistry at Thomas More College and a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry at the University of Cincinnati. He pursued post-doctoral research at the University of Virginia.

He was a research chemist for A.E. Staley Manufacturing Co. and Henkel Corp. before starting at ACTC in 1991. Since then, he received numerous Teaching Excellence Recognition Awards and the prestigious Gussler Family Endowed Chair Award in 2009. He was known on campus for "doing everything possible to be available to his students," according to one of his Gussler Award nominators.

In addition to encouraging and supporting students in his classrooms and labs, Dr. Schmidt helped develop Portal courses for struggling students who need to acquire math and language skills for college success. He helped develop a pre-engineering curriculum for students who wanted to take classes at ACTC for transfer to a university bachelor's degree engineering program.

Dedicated to science for all ages, he taught Hands-on Chemistry lab classes for many years for Ashland sixth grade ALP students.

"I have spent 26 very fulfilling years at this college," Schmidt said. "I have found everyone at the college to be consistently positive and pleasant, working together as a team to advance the learning of the students we serve." He may teach chemistry classes part-time at the college in the future.