by Willy Franzen on August 2, 2009
Whether or not we’re really going through a green revolution is up for debate, but I can assure you that Marketing departments across the world are taking advantage of the public’s appetite for “green” products. Unfortunately, “green” doesn’t really mean anything. To you it might mean one thing, and to me it might mean another. We assume that something that is labeled or advertised as green will be better for the environment, but how do we really know? That’s where Green Seal comes in. They are Washington, DC based “independent non-profit organization dedicated to safeguarding the environment and transforming the marketplace by promoting the manufacture, purchase, and use of environmentally responsible products and service.” They do this by certifying products that meet their Green Seal standards. By having an independent third party set standards, consumers can actually make informed choices about the products they buy (as long as they’re Green Seal certified, of course).
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Tagged as:
biology,
certification,
chemistry,
conservation,
consumer products,
entry-level jobs,
green,
research,
science,
Washington DC
by Willy Franzen on February 16, 2009
I love writing these holiday posts. It’s always fun to think of holiday related jobs, and since today is President’s Day, I had a lot of options. I could have looked at car dealerships or retailers that celebrate with a President’s Day sale, but I wanted to feature some jobs that honor our past presidents. Since Washington and Lincoln are all over our money, we’re going to check out jobs with the Bureau of Engraving and Printing. If you’re not familiar with them, they’re responsible for printing all of our paper money, but that’s not all that they do. The BEP is also the country’s largest producer of security documents, which includes “U.S. passports, materials for Homeland Security, military identification cards, and Immigration and Naturalization Certificates.” They don’t produce our coinage – that’s the United States Mint, but they do have the coolest domain name in the government – MoneyFactory.gov – even though it kind of sounds like a get rich quick scheme’s web site. And last but not least, they must be pretty busy because the current low interest rates mean that the government is printing a lot of new money.
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Tagged as:
chemistry,
design,
engineering,
government,
holiday,
human resources,
quality assurance,
research,
Texas,
Washington DC
by Willy Franzen on April 19, 2008
When I was in college, the only studying of proteins that I did was in a class called Intro to Meat Science. Don’t believe me? Here’s the course listing. Learning how meat proteins react to salt or heat is extremely useful (and delicious) but not at all relevant to the non-profit organization that we’re featuring today (or if it is, I’ll be shocked). Unfortunately, I know absolutely nothing about biomedical research or cell biophysics, so all I can do is tell you a little bit about the New York Structural Biology Center and the entry-level jobs that they’re offering for new grads.
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Tagged as:
biology,
biotechnology,
chemistry,
entry-level jobs,
New York,
non-profit,
physics,
research
by Willy Franzen on April 2, 2008
It always seems like you never have Chapstik – er, lip balm – when you really need it. Even Napoleon Dynamite was plagued by that little tube’s ability to disappear from his pocket and end up sitting on his desk at home. Some will argue that they never use lip balm because it just makes the problem of chapped lips worse, but I know for a fact that those people give in as soon as their “lips hurt real bad.” As life saving as lip balm can be at the right time, you’d still never expect it to allow a guy who lived in a turkey coop to be the face of a billion dollar business. Yes, Burt’s Bees was sold last year to Clorox for just shy of a billion dollars.
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Tagged as:
chemistry,
consumer products,
entry-level jobs,
North Carolina,
organic
is the funniest, most in-your-face career guide on the market.