In 2011, 4,473 Americans earned master’s degrees in physical sciences. Of them, only 1,657 (37 percent) were women, according to The National Academies. Women who hold degrees in science are rarities, and in that sense, LHS is fortunate to have an AP and Honors Chemistry teacher who is a member of this small percentage of the scientific workforce. Ms. Sherri Rukes, perhaps one of LHS’s most well-known and beloved faculty members, is a beacon for girls and women interested in science.

Everyone’s been there; at some time or another, faded pictures of toddlers clutching toy stethoscopes or dressed as firemen in plastic hats have surfaced, only to find that the grown-up versions of themselves haven’t chased that temporary passion for some career they’d presently never consider. Ms. Rukes wasn’t one of those kids. “I wanted to a be a teacher, I would say, since I was a little girl,” she said. “I taught my stuffed animals, okay? I had a chalkboard and my dolls and stuffed animals, and I would teach them.”

Unlike the vast majority of her classmates at the University of Illinois, Ms. Rukes harnessed her longtime affinity and natural inclination for teaching and geared it toward chemistry. However, unlike her desire to teach, Ms. Rukes’ knack for chemistry developed over time. Like many, she was inspired by a teacher who pointed her in the right direction. Ms. Rukes attributes her interest in the field to her high school chemistry teacher, Mr. Thorne.

“He was my second dad,” she recalled. “He pushed me, like, ‘Oh, have you seen this?’ or ‘Have you tried this?’ That’s what then gave me the glimmer that maybe chemistry was something I could do, because someone was noticing that I was good at it and wanted me to do more…I think it’s that connection with the teacher that is the deciding factor.”

Ms. Rukes’ belief that connecting with students makes a difference in who they become and their attitude toward learning is no strange concept to her own students. LHS senior and Ms. Rukes’ former AP and Honors Chemistry student Cameron Cuzmanko can attest to the importance of being inspired by and able to relate to teachers.

“She really gets down to knowing the kids on a personal level,” he said of Ms. Rukes. “For instance… when I worked at Sunset, she visited me, and she visited some other kids at their work too… and she’s just a genius at science. She knows everything, I swear.”

Cuzmanko also acknowledges Ms. Rukes’ place in his choice of career.

“I’ve always been a science-y guy, and having her for two years, she’s been a big deal in my wanting to pursue chemistry as a career, like chemical engineering. [Even] though it’s just a grueling topic, she’s a major reason as to why I would pursue a future career in that field.”

According to Cuzmanko, the other aspect that makes Ms. Rukes an incomparable teacher is her innate ability to engage audiences. Her charismatic personality carries over into wild, unforgettable experiments that leave her students buzzing for days afterward.

“I brought in a gummy bear, and if you drop it into [potassium chlorate] it just starts flaming and flaring colors, and it just starts screeching, and it’s the funniest thing,” he remembers.

Despite all she does here at LHS (like arriving at LHS by 5 a.m. to make herself available even for students with zero hour and early bird for other AP sciences), Ms. Rukes still makes time to promote science outside LHS. Her winning personality and very prevalent passion for science have driven her to propagate the field and promote it amongst young minds nationwide.

“I do a lot of outreach. I really enjoy going out and doing outreach to elementary school and middle school kids to get them excited for science and for chemistry,” she said, also recalling and smiling at the memory of emails from scientist parents of middle schoolers wondering how she engaged their children with science if they couldn’t. “Convention wise, I have spoken at many, many conventions, and I think the two most notable, recently, were a couple of years ago, it was for Alabama, and I spoke at a convention somewhere, and there were people from Alabama there that really liked my idea, and I actually worked with them on developing a state curriculum.”

But Ms. Rukes’ path to success and a career she loves didn’t come without obstacles. In college, Ms. Rukes remembers often being the only woman, or one of very few women, in all of her classes. “There were very few girls… I had a lot of friends that were engineers, and when I was done with my classes, and I’d hang out with [them] in their engineering classes, and they would always laugh at me because I wasn’t enrolled in the class, but the professor knew who I was… because we were in a sea of men, and then there was me, and the same type of thing happened in a lot of my chemistry classes.”

In addition to being a unique teacher who wholeheartedly invests herself in her students’ well being, Ms. Rukes is an active and invaluable contributor to the science department.

“She has by far the most background in the subject matter and teaching methodology of anyone in the department,” said Mr. Greg Herman, LHS Human Physiology teacher and science department supervisor. “She’s done it all, she’s creative, she’s innovative, she’s thoughtful and willing to share, so… she just brings a whole new level of expertise to what we do.”

It’s obvious to anyone who knows Ms. Rukes that she stands for what universities, STEM companies, and science teachers vehemently approve of and do their best to promote. She’s a passionate and insatiably curious scientist who strives to encourage everyone, regardless of gender, to take interest in STEM fields. To female students who want to pursue science, she says there’s no reason to hesitate. “I say go for it,” she said. “I had the support of my parents and now my students, too. I think that if people are backing you, anything can happen.”