Jamy Lee was born and raised in Tigard, Oregon.  She attended Tigard High School, home of the Tigard Tigers, and credits her Chemistry teacher, Mr. Massey with why she chose chemistry for her college major.  “He just kept telling me all the cool things I could do and that I could definitely get a job in the field.”
She chose Oregon State University because of the low tuition rates and the proximity to her hometown.  Her brother also attended OSU, so she said, “at least I knew someone.”  She said when she started, she was really bored with General Chemistry because she’d seen it all in high school, so she went to see her advisor, Dr. Neal Sleszynski.  Not only did he talk her into taking CH 324, Quantitative Analysis, a class she maintains to this day as one of her favorite college experiences, but he also introduced her to undergraduate research.
Jamy was awarded the URISC (Undergraduate Research, Innovation, Scholarship and Creativity) Start for the summer of her freshman year and took that opportunity to start undergraduate research with Dr. Vince Remcho.  The summer of her sophomore year, she participated in the Center for Sustainable Materials Chemistry’s Undergraduate Research Program at UC Davis.  While there, she worked with Dr. Kacey analyzing aluminum and gallium clusters; Jamy said, “it was really cool.”  The summer of her junior year, she was back in Dr. Remcho’s lab working in conjunction with the Sure Science program and focusing on different research topics.
In her spare time, Jamy is the Academic Success Officer for the science sorority, Sigma Delta Omega, the Vice President of the Chemistry Club and a member of the College of Science Student Advisory Council (COSSAC). Their focus this year has been to integrate more graduate student involvement, mainly by helping the Chemistry Undergraduate Mentoring and Empowerment (ChUME) group reach more undergraduates.   She is also a member of several cooking clubs:  “Most of my activities outside chemistry involve food.”
Jamy has already been accepted to the University of Illinois where she will be working on her PhD is Analytical Chemistry.  She hopes to work in industry doing pharmaceutical chemistry research.  She says she’s a little nervous about leaving Oregon for the first time, but excited about the opportunity to work for such a great program.  We’re proud to have students like Jamy in our department and wish her all the luck in her future endeavors.