Pendergast, and other professionals-in-residence, bring industry know-how to LSU Engineering

John Pendergast had a good, long run at Dow Chemical – 40 years. During those four decades, in vast factories in Louisiana and Texas and Europe, he made things.

Pendergast designed processes to produce chemicals needed for plastics and paints, detergents, and drugs. He was the lead process engineer for the first Dow polypropylene plant in North America and the company’s first plant for making EPDM, a synthetic rubber, in a joint venture with DuPont. He had a knack for creating new and better ways to make chemicals. He improved a process for making plastics and ethylene oxide, a highly flammable substance used to make antifreeze. He developed a special knack for separating crude products into pure products like hydrocarbons and solvents. This process, known as distillation, is the backbone of the chemical industry.

During the course of his career, Pendergast secured 23 patents and was elected as a fellow of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers – the highest honor for a chemical engineer. Recently, he was elected to the institute’s fellows council, a leadership group responsible for future growth of the profession.

Back in 2018, Pendergast’s deep industry experience helped land him a position as a professional-in-residence at the college. LSU Engineering boasts 14 professionals-in-residence, who play an important role in providing the real-world experience the college is known for. Professionals-in-residence give students workplace insights, career advice, and can talk – firsthand – about how the concepts and skills they’re learning in class apply in business.

Mike Benton, chair of the Cain Department of Chemical Engineering, has five professionals-in-residence in his department. Benton said they’re indispensable – and exceptionally valuable.“They bring our students something academic faculty can’t,” Benton said. “They can talk, in great professional and technical detail, what it’s like to build a career as a chemical engineer in the business world. Many faculty members, who’ve built their careers as researchers in universities, don’t have this perspective. Industry experience adds a whole other dimension to our classroom teaching and to our laboratory research.”

Chuck Berryman, chair of the Bert S. Turner Department of Construction Management, agrees. Berryman has six professionals-in-residence in his department, more than any other in the college, and said they’re not only valuable to students but to faculty, as well. By teaching large introductory courses, they free up researchers so they can spend more time in the lab and in the field.

“We couldn’t run the department without them,” Berryman said. “Their industry experience is a positive influence on our students, and on a lot of our work, from grant ideas to course materials. They are an important part of the team.”

Pendergast has made a particularly big impact on chemical engineering at LSU. He is responsible for the 2021 installation of the state-of-the-art distillation facility in the Dow Unit Operations Laboratory in Patrick F. Taylor Hall. Pendergast designed and oversaw the installation of two 20-foot-tall, glass-wall columns in the Dow lab, giving students and researchers the chance to learn and work on a piece of commercial-grade equipment without leaving campus.

Distillation is a key process in chemical engineering and purifies or separates components in a liquid mixture. The process is used in industries from food and beverage processing to pharmaceutical production to petroleum processing. Donors made the project possible, including funds from the Bert S. Turner Endowment for Excellence in Engineering Education fund and from companies like Valero.

The distillation column project brought Pendergast to the college, thanks to an invitation from John Flake, the Jesse Coates Professor and Jay Affolter Endowed Professor. As part of the assignment, Pendergast developed a course on chemical separations – and still teaches it eight years later. He stays because he finds teaching meaningful.

“A wise man once said you don’t wake up in the morning to go fishing,” Pendergast said. “You want to make a difference in the world. Teaching is a great way to give back.”

Pendergast said he can often draw on his industry experience with students in design classes, where he can talk about his work designing products, processes, and plants at Dow. He says he talks to students a lot about ethics and expectations.

“I tell them to follow regulations, never falsify data, never lie,” he said. “These things will haunt you for the rest of your career. Your name is everything, and your relationships are important.

“Students also think they will enjoy 100% of their job, but that is not true. If you are called out on Christmas Day to oversee the loading of a ship, you don’t do it because it’s fun. You do that because it’s part of the job. I tell them: ‘If you enjoy 80% of your work, you are a big-time winner.’”

 

---

---

Like the College of Engineering on Facebook or follow us on LinkedIn, and Instagram.