Penny Le Couteur

Visiting Tutor for "Energy and Matter"

Before coming to Quest, Penny Le Couteur was a founding faculty member in the Chemistry Department of Capilano College (now Capilano University) in North Vancouver from where she retired (2008) as Dean of Arts and Sciences. She has a B.Sc. and M.Sc. from the University of Auckland in New Zealand and a Ph.D. from the University of California at Santa Barbara. Penny served as an adviser for chemistry curriculum development and pedagogy with the Eastern Indonesian Universities Development Project, wrote the first and second year chemistry courses for B.C.'s Open University and is co-author of a Canadian Grade 12 Chemistry Textbook. Her book "Napoleon's Buttons: Seventeen Molecules That Changed History", selected as a finalist for the National Academies of Science, Engineering and Medicine 2003 Award, was described by Entertainment Weekly as "a splendid example of better reading through chemistry." It has now been published in six languages.