Alumni
Dr. Morgan Balabanoff
Dr. Morgan Balabanoff worked as a postdoctoral researcher in the Moon group from 2020 until January of 2022. During her time with the group, she investigated students' understanding of light-matter interactions and developed the Water Instrument, a comprehensive measurement of student's foundational general chemistry concepts.
Dr. Balabanoff is now a faculty member the University of Louisville, where her research group works to develop assessment instruments and qualitatively investigate students' understanding of atomic structure.
Dr. Stephanie Berg
Dr. Stephanie Berg completed her PhD studies with the Moon group in May of 2024. Her dissertation work was focused on characterizing and developing chemistry students' data analysis and interpretation competencies in post-secondary contexts. Upon completion of her PhD, Dr. Berg was awarded a NSF STEMEdIPRF to investigate science identities of disabled STEM graduate students. She is now an assistant professor at Northern Illinois University.
Dr. John Zhou
Dr. John Zhou graduated with a BA in Psychology from Washington University in St. Louis and a BA in Chemistry from University of Missouri in St. Louis. He joined the Moon group after completing his MS degree in Chemistry at University of Missouri in Kansas City. Dr. Zhou then joined the Moon group in 2021, where he investigated organic chemistry students' science practice competencies and epistemologies. Dr. Zhou defended his dissertation in 2025 and is now a lecturer at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln.
Dr. Mary Tess Urbanek
Dr. Mary Tess Urbanek completed her PhD with the Moon group in May of 2026. Her dissertation work focused on characterizing how undergraduate chemistry students manage epistemic uncertainty both individually and collaboratively. She is now a postdoctoral fellow at North Carolina State University as part of the university's Integrative Sciences Initiative.
Undergraduate Alumni
Archer Harrold
Archer was a member of the Moon Group from 2018 to 2022, where he worked with to investigate students' understanding of various light-matter interactions with Dr. Moon and Dr. Balabanoff. Specifically, his work focused on understanding how students reasoned about the double-slit experiment and photoelectric effect.
Currently, Archer is at the University of Michigan working with Dr. Ginger Shultz to investigate POGIL activities in a general chemistry setting and Culturally Responsive Teaching practices in local contexts.
Rachael Mayhew
Rachael was a previous NSF REU student in the Moon Group in the summer of 2021. During her time with the group, Rachael worked on developing novel tasks to elicit student's science practice competencies and developed coding schemes for analyzing student responses to such tasks.
She is now at Portland State University, where she works with Jack Barbera to explore connections between students' goals and engagement and use of online homework systems.
Shikshya Bhusal
Shikshya worked as an undergraduate researcher at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln with the Moon group. During her time with the group, she assessed students' scientific argumentation and evaluated their peer review comments and revisions. Additionally, she conducted qualitative and quantitative studies to investigate students' understanding of the photoelectric effect.
Shikshya is now at the University of North Texas where she is pursuing her PhD in computational chemistry. Her research focuses on targeted protein degradation (TPD), utilizing advanced computational tools and enhanced sampling methods to explore the conformational dynamics of TPD systems.
Amelie Cole
Amelie joined the Moon group in the Spring of 2022, where she worked on the light-matter interaction project, specifically focusing on how students understand UV/Vis Spectroscopy. After this project, Amelie then moved to looking at how students manage epistemic uncertainty when engaging in group argumentation.
During her time with the group, Amelie earned authorship on multiple projects and received the University of Nebraska - Lincoln's Undergraduate Researcher Award. She now works at a chemical and materials producer company in Lincoln where she focuses on sustainability.
Danny Vinton
Danny Vinton joined the Moon group in the Spring of 2023, where he worked to investigate how students engage with feedback that is received from other students during peer review. During his time with the group, Danny worked to clean and organize interview transcripts and qualitatively analyze said interview transcripts.
Danny is now a senior undergraduate student at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln. In addition to his studies, he also works with international graduate TA's to help prepare and support their teaching practices across the university.
Ashlyn Torneten
Ashlyn joined the Moon group in the Spring of 2023, where she worked to investigate how students engaged with and navigated peer work and peer feedback during peer review. In her time with the group, Ashlyn cleaned, organized, and qualitatively analyzed students' written work alongside fellow undergraduate researcher, Olivia.
She now works at Phibro Animal Health in Omaha.
Olivia Pereira
Olivia joined the Moon group in the Fall of 2023, where she worked to investigate how students engaged with and navigated peer work and peer feedback during peer review. In her time with the group, Olivia organized and qualitatively analyzed students' written work alongside her fellow undergraduate researcher, Ashlyn.
She is now a senior undergraduate student at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln and will start medical school soon after graduation.
Ben Moritz
Ben joined the Moon group in the summer of 2022 as a NSF REU student from Benedictine College. During that summer, he worked on developing a rubric to characterize students' engagement with epistemic uncertainty and earned his first research publication. He was also awarded one of the top research presentation awards during the research symposium held at the end of the summer.
Ben now works as a science teacher in Minnesota.
Moses Liong
Moses joined the research lab in the Spring of 2024 as an undergraduate researcher. During his time in the group, Moses worked to investigate how students manage uncertainty in their scientific learning. While at the University of Nebraska - Lincoln, he majored in chemistry and secondary education in biology. He aspires to become a science teacher and is also interested in pursuing research in science education.
Moses now attends the University of Michigan, where he is working on his master's in Chemistry.
Pet Alumni
Khloe & Bruce
Khloe is a 13 year old Shih Tzu enjoying her retirement years in the suburbs of Omaha. She enjoys morning and afternoon snoozes in the sunshine and likes to scavenge for fallen food from her two year old human. Bruce is a 7 year old Boston Terrier who loves zoomies on any lawn. He enjoys squirrel and bird watching in his fenced in backyard when he is not snoring loudly on one of his seven dog beds in the house. These pair of furbabies' favorite treats are baby carrots.
Jade
Jade is the newest Shih Tzu puppy member of the Zhou family. When she is not chewing on anything she can get her mouth on, she loves to run around the house and the backyard. She is currently doing an adorable job of learning how to dog.
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Ruby
Ruby is a 9 year old tortoiseshell kitty from Iowa who, despite having half a tail, has a big personality. Some would describe Ruby as having "tortitude", but she would describe it as just having a low tolerance for people.
Despite enjoying her alone time, Ruby does have a soft spot for her human, Mary Tess, and her younger sister Rory. She enjoys soft blankets and curling up next to Mary Tess on one while she's working to supervise. Her other favorite activities include getting zoomies, climbing onto things so she can be up high, eating canned cat food, and rolling in catnip.
Rory
Rory is a five year old long-haired tabby cat from a tiny town in Kansas. She is far more friendly than her older sister, Ruby, but she still needs some time to warm up to new people. Rory loves her big sister, Ruby, and often spends her days following Ruby and trying to play and cuddle with her. Her favorite past times include following Ruby, touching Ruby, doing whatever Ruby is doing, and looking out the windows.
Rory hates to miss out on what's going on around her, so she tries very hard not to blink. This lack of blinking and her crazy hair days give her an alien-like appearance, making some wonder if she really is from Kansas.
Mabel
Mabel is a bubbly English Springer Spaniel puppy who brings joy and a little chaos to Mary Tess's life. Her favorite activities include getting attention from people, chasing her feline sisters, chewing, and being adorable. In her free time, Mabel can often be found rolling in the grass, collecting sticks, and eating snap peas. She also likes to visit all her best friends at the dog park and dig holes wherever she can.
Mabel's personality can be described as friendly, affectionate, and a little spoiled. She believes she should always be the center of attention (and rightfully so!). When she is not busy getting into puppy mischief, she loves to cuddle and watch bad reality TV with her human.