Welcome to the Division of Science at Penn State Berks. We guarantee an exciting academic journey for you toward your science related career goals. At our campus, you will have the opportunity to complete four-year undergraduate science degrees in Biology, Biochemistry & Molecular Biology, Kinesiology, and Science, as well as a two-year Occupational Therapy Assistant associate degree. Each of these degrees will prepare you as a life-long learner of science no matter what you choose to pursue after graduation. More and more, students who arrive at our campus often decide to complete their science degrees while staying at our campus during the entire duration of their chosen degree program. You could also spend your first two-years at our campus for most baccalaureate science degrees offered by Penn State and complete the Junior-Senior sequence at the University Park (The Eberly College of Science, College of Health and Human Development) campus or at other institutions as appropriate.
Our science faculty play a key role in ensuring the divisional excellence. They are passionate about their own disciplines, and solely committed to help you learn, whether in the classroom, laboratories, undergraduate research, or in any other academic settings. Always adopting the best practices for teaching, they will actively engage you at every step of your academic journey in a learning centered environment. Their excellence as a teacher-scholar is indeed unparalleled.
I am also pleased to share with you the completion of the renovation of our science facilities in spring 2015. The state of the art Luerssen Science Building now enables us to enhance student learning in a number of ways. During the planning phase of the renovation, program enhancement was our top priority that ultimately led to the development of state-of-the-art teaching and research laboratories exhibiting a marked difference from those in the past.
In addition to your classroom experience, you will have exciting opportunities to be engaged with our science faculty in pursuing undergraduate research. The faculty at the Division of Science are actively engaged in carrying out research in myriads of topics encompassing the fields of Biology, Chemistry, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, Kinesiology, Mathematics, and Physics. Their teaching and research efforts have truly made our campus a thriving intellectual meeting place. The high quality of research is reflected in so many ways including national and international recognition, publications in refereed journals, presentations at professional conferences, success in securing external research funding including those from the National Science Foundation, National Institutes of Health, and the Department of Energy. Quite often, our faculty take students under their wings in the exciting journey of seeking new knowledge. This form of engaged scholarship leads to an invaluable high-impact learning experience for our students. In addition, internship opportunities are also available to our students.
I invite you to visit the web pages for our science degree programs to explore the opportunities offered by each program. Students graduating from our science programs are well positioned to secure employment in public and private sectors or continue further studies at the appropriate graduate and professional schools. Please consult each program page for details.
Thank you. I look forward to meeting you during your visit to our beautiful campus.
Cheers!
Dr. Pradip K. Bandyopadhyay
Professor of Physics
Head of the Division of Science