Dr. Nina McClelland Laboratory for Water Chemistry and Environmental Analysis

Biography

Dr. Nina McClellandDr. Nina I. McClelland received her BS (1951), MS (1963) and Honorary Doctorate (2003) from The University of Toledo, and her MPH (1964) and Ph.D. (1968) from the University of Michigan. Dr. McClelland began her career with the City of Toledo as a chemist and bacteriologist in the Department of Health at the Wastewater Reclamation Facility (1951-1956) and served as Chief Chemist from 1956-1963. She became the first woman in Ohio to earn a Class A license for wastewater treatment. After receiving her Ph.D., she joined NSF International, formally the National Sanitation Foundation, in Ann Arbor, MI in 1968, and rose through the ranks to become Chairman of the Board of Directors and Executive Committee, President and Chief Executive Officer from 1980 to 1995. In 1995, she founded and was President of Nina I. McClelland, LLC, Consulting Services providing her expertise to organizations throughout the world. Dr. McClelland returned to the University of Toledo in 2003 and was the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences until 2011. Her faculty appointment was in the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry. She also held titles of Chairman Emeritus at NSF International, and Dean Emerita and Executive-In-Residence, College of Business and Innovation at The University of Toledo.

Dr. McClelland was a highly respected world leader in chemistry, an expert in standardized testing and certification procedures to ensure water quality, and an authority on issues related to the environment. She championed public health initiatives to raise the quality of public drinking water supplies and thus, improved the quality of people’s lives worldwide. She served on the Board of Directors of numerous organizations and universities, and was appointed to influential committees with the US Environmental Protection Agency, the US Department of Commerce, the National Academy of Science, the Centers for Disease Control, the American Institute of Standards, and the Governor’s Council of Environmental Quality for the State of Michigan. Dr. McClelland was active in various governance roles in the American Chemical Society (ACS)-the world’s largest scientific organization with more than 169,000 members worldwide. For nine years, Dr. McClelland served the ACS as an elected Director-at-Large; for three of these years, she was the elected Chair of the Board of Directors.

Her awards were numerous and included being named one of Detroit’s Most Influential Women (1997), a Fellow of the American Chemical Society (2011) and an Outstanding Alumnus of the Department of Chemistry (1993) and the College of Arts and Sciences at The University of Toledo (2004). She also received the University’s Gold-T award-the highest award given to UToledo alumni (2014), the Alice H. Skeens Outstanding Women Award (2017) and was included in the publication Nine UT Alumni Who Changed the World (2004). Dr. McClelland was recognized as a Legend of Environmental Chemistry by the Division of Environmental Scientists of the ACS and received the American National Standards Institute George S. Wham Leadership Medal (2005), the Women in Conservation Award from the National Wildlife Federation (2016), the Key to the City of Toledo (2017), and the Henry Hill Award for professional service from the American Chemical Society (2017).


View the information on Dr. Nina McClelland compiled from the booklet, "Alumni Who Have Changed the World", UToledo Alumni Association.


Video courtesy of the UToledo Alumni Association.

Video courtesy of ACS Chemistry for Life.

Last Updated: 6/27/22