Benjamin Rycraft, a 2011 graduate of Homewood-Flossmoor High School, is now working at Pfizer’s Michigan headquarters on the COVID-19 vaccine team.

Rycraft received his bachelor’s in chemistry in May 2020 from Governors State University and accepted a biological operations operator position with Pfizer shortly afterward. He said GSU’s American Chemical Society’s certified program, as well as hands-on learning, prepared him for his work on the Pfizer production team.

“Some days it does still feel surreal that I am a part of something this monumental,” Rycraft said. 

Chemistry professor Walter Henne said he assumed Rycraft would go on to do important work, adding: “But who knew (he) would be involved in one of the most significant scientific events of the last 100 years?’’