Seven years after leaving Hibbing, Minnesota to pursue his education, Eric Fort still feels strongly connected to the town where the values and support system in which he was raised has continued to inspire him to share his expanding knowledge with others.

“As a child I was always curious about everything,” Eric recalled. “I was that kid who was continuously asking why.”

To fulfill some of this curiosity, he joined Boy Scouts. It allowed him to follow his variety of interests by earning badges. It was also a means through which he could positively impact his community.

“As a Bluejacket at Hibbing High School, his curiosity and compassion continued. As a member of a number of academic and social groups he filled his time with challenges.

“High school was a testing ground for my limits of involvement,” he mused. “In high school you have the free time — you don’t have to pay rent or tuition.”

Eric’s first step away from home was going to school in St. Paul at the College of St. Thomas.  He earned his undergraduate degree in Chemistry while keeping up with his interests, including being the leader of a troop of boy scouts.  He also found time to get involved with the college’s chemistry club.

During the first couple of years of college, Eric began to see a disconnect between high school preparation for college chemistry and the expectations of college professors for incoming students studying chemistry.  Realizing that high school teachers struggled with planning a curriculum that would effectively prepare students for college level work, Eric and the chemistry club on campus organized a conference during his junior year for high school chemistry teachers and college professors. 

Eric was pleased with the results.  Both groups worked together to craft a solution for the knowledge gap.  And, in November 2006, Chemistry Magazine published an article Eric wrote about the conference.  The College of St. Thomas continues to offer this fruitful collaboration, bridging high school and college experiences.

A summer internship at 3M gave Eric the opportunity to work with other chemists and develop formidable research skills. “I started at 3M as a data collecting robot,” he said with a laugh.  “But, by the end, I felt like I was owning my own information.”

Eric went through another transformation at the end of his undergraduate program.  Now a student at Boston College, teaching became an important part of his graduate school experience.  He has taught organic chemistry labs for both sophomore organic chemistry students and those in the chemistry honors program.  He sees his work at Boston College important in his goal to become a professor.  Based on the recommendations of faculty and students, Eric was the 2006 recipient of the Donald J. White Teaching Excellence Award.

Eric’s Ph.D. program brings him into the realm of making a significant impact on the world around him.  Working with carbon management, he is part of the process that will determine whether power lines currently made of copper could be a hundred times more conducive and powerful if made of carbon.

“Chemistry is a diverse field,” he said. “All of these researchers are adding puzzle pieces. Whatever the field, they are adding bit by bit. And even though you can see the puzzle now, you are making the pieces fit better.”

The values of small town Minnesota have traveled well with Eric, who has continued to be willing to use his knowledge and share his inspiration with others.