Schwartz, salutatorian, to pursue science in D.C.

Mollie Schwartz, this year’s Columbia College salutatorian, prepares to address her class at graduation, but still doesn’t know what she will say.

“I don’t think I really have words of wisdom. I’m so impressed by everyone in my class,” she said.

Schwartz, a chemical physics major, said that her academic success comes from her interest in understanding her studies. “I’ve always just done what was interesting to me, and because I’m interested in it, I’m motivated to get to the heart of it,” she said.

“I’ve just always made a point of doing what I wanted to do and doing well because I didn’t want to sell myself short,” she said. “I’m not ready to ... pick one thing. I still want to do everything.”

Her father, Jan Schwartz, CC ’71 wrote in an e-mail, “It’s hard to imagine that school work might be construed to be at all recreational but we think that Mollie has been doing things at Columbia that she really loves to do. She’s very lucky.”

Schwartz’s friend Emily Glass, CC ’09 attributes some of Schwartz’s success to her connection to family and heritage. “She [Schwartz] also has a really strong tie to her community, and her roots, and Jewish culture, which I think really makes her stand tall.” Glass added, “She has an incredibly supportive family.”

Schwartz’s research co-adviser, Nobel Laureate, I.I. Rabi Professor of Physics, and Professor of Applied Physics Horst Stormer wrote in an e-mail, “She is ... great in the lab and, most importantly, very enthusiastic about science; almost contagiously so.”

During her time at Columbia, Schwartz has excelled in physical research, traveled to speak at science conventions, and published her research on chemical reactions that occur in flowing fluids in the Physical Review Letters, a prestigious scientific journal of the American Physical Society.

Right now, Schwartz’s research deals with graphene. “Mollie is working on the fascinating electrical properties of thin sheets of [graphite] material, only one atomic layer thick. She has been able to suspend such sheets in ‘mid-air,’ like an ‘atomic hammock,’” Stormer explained.

Schwartz said her research group’s findings could become useful in creating faster transistors for better super computers. “Graphene has the potential to have even better electronic properties than silicon, and is also potentially much cheaper of a material,” she said.

Schwartz said her research group’s findings could become useful in electronics, especially when the Earth’s silicon has been depleted.

After she graduates in May, Schwartz will move to Washington, D.C. to work at the Science and Technology Policy Institute, a non-partisan, scientific consulting firm that works for the executive branch to inform policy makers on the science behind their decisions. The institute also does research and data analysis with the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

Schwartz grew up in the small town of Danville, PA, “in the heart of ‘Pennsyltucky’—basically a little bit of the Bible belt, transposed,” she said. Danville has a population of around 3000 people.

“A beautiful, smart, gifted girl growing up in a conservative, homogenous rural farming community in central Pennsylvania is at a great social disadvantage. I believe that Mollie often felt very isolated from peers. We hope that this was offset by the closeness she developed with her family,” Jan Schwartz wrote of his daughter.

But Mollie Schwartz noted several benefits of being raised in Danville. The town’s pace is slower than that of New York, she said, which Schwartz thinks has its advantages. She also appreciated that growing up in such a conservative milieu forced her to really defend her liberal ideas. This ability to clearly defend her point of view, Schwartz said, is something she was able to bring to Columbia.

When she graduates, Schwartz will miss Columbia which she said, “has been a really great place to grow up.”

“Everyone here is just so interesting and so difficult to typecast, and is involved in so many different things. ... I’m going to miss the atmosphere because I don’t think it ... exists anywhere else,” Schwartz said.

Outside of class, Schwartz holds a black belt in Tae-Kwon-Do. She also enjoys dancing ballet, playing the piano and singing in the Bach Society. She said that each term, she makes a point of earning a couple of credits in something less academic. “I’ve always fought having to make choices and not doing what I want to do because there’s something else that I had to do,” she said.

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