Rowan University: Jose Antonio Calves of West Windsor graduated with majors of history and education. Melanie Rachel Pauker of West Windsor graduated with majors of English and education.
Towson University: Amy Procaccini of West Windsor has accepted membership in the National Society of Collegiate Scholars. A sophomore at Towson, she is majoring in journalism and mass communications. She is the public relations coordinator for the Alpha Gamma Delta Zeta Delta sorority. She graduated from High School South in 2011.
University of Vermont: Ryan Sleeper, a 2009 graduate of High School North, graduated from the Rubenstein School of the Environment and Natural Resources.
“Coming into UVM I decided to pursue environmental science in the Rubenstein School realizing that the major would likely provide me ample field and laboratory experience,” he wrote in his internship profile. “However, I never imagined that it would provide me with the experience I had this past summer.”
He worked as an assistant lab technician for the first half of the summer, running experiments and analyzing water samples within the Rubenstein Ecosystem Science Laboratory in Burlington. For the second half of the summer he traveled to the remote Toolik Field Station in northern Alaska, where he helped with field work and provided laboratory assistance for the Changing Seasonality in Arctic Stream Networks (CSASN) project.
Sleeper worked with William Bowden, a bio-geochemist whose current research deals with studying nutrient cycling dynamics in arctic stream networks. “Characterizing the cycling of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphate in arctic stream networks will help further the understanding of arctic ecology as a whole,” he wrote. “The implications of a warming climate and its ecological effects on the arctic elevate the importance of this work.”
He worked six days a week, and upwards of 12 hours a day were spent in the field and in the lab. “It was a lot of work, but it was very rewarding,” says Sleeper. “Whether it was spending a full day cruising the tundra in a helicopter to collect distant samples, wading through a river to record benthic algal composition, or simply filtering water samples, I was constantly learning and acquiring new skills.”
“Most importantly, I learned that science does not only need to take place in a lab, but that it can provide you with the outdoor adventure of a lifetime,” he says. “I want to stress that advertised internships are hardly the only opportunities out there. Simply asking a professor if they know of any summer jobs can go a very long way. If you travel somewhere exotic for an internship, make time before or after it to explore the region and go off the beaten path.”
Sleeper’s summer plans include a return to Alaska and the Toolik Field Station to work under the “Scale, Consumers and Lotic Ecosystem Rates” (SCALER) project. He has also received an offer of employment as a water resources scientist with Stone Environmental in Vermont.
