Casa MESA Students Participate in NCAR Summer Intern Research Projects!
Santiago Arredondo and Esteban Gonzales, from Casa de la Esperanza MESA, were introduced to the rigors of real scientific research this summer. They climbed ladders to place their data collection devices in trees on Niwot Ridge and fought bigger than life mosquitoes during the process. They were mentored by NCAR/UCAR scientist, Lynette Laffea. During internship program, NCAR scientists learned that high school students are more than capable of contributing to scientific research. The results of the pilot program on the effectiveness of using high school students as interns will be presented at the National Meteorological Society's upcoming convention.
Modeled after UCAR’s SOARS program, the students worked for eight weeks in the Earth Observing Laboratory at NCAR under guidance of a science mentor as well as support from community, writing and peer mentors. They were each given an independent project setting up experiments that used wireless sensor technologies to measure global warming processes at a field research location near Boulder, Colorado. Wireless sensor technologies are new to atmospheric sciences, and researchers are interested in how these technologies can be used to assist their research. Results of their research will be used to provide feedback to engineers of these technologies for environmental applications. The students also gave an oral talk to a friendly audience and presented the results of their research at a poster session. The evaluation of this pilot project will include informal interviews and online evaluations from the students and mentors. More importantly, we plan to work with MESA to offer ongoing guidance to the students on how to pursue a career in STEM.
This presentation will describe our summer experience, share lessons learned and present recommendations resulting from our evaluations. For example, preliminary evaluation indicates that the students gained confidence in their research abilities. Further, NCAR scientists learned that high school students are more than capable of contributing to scientific research. Overall, we found that despite the challenge to provide an augmented mentoring and support system for the students, involving high school students in research brought positive results to both students and mentors.
-Rebecca Haacker-Santos, SOARS Program Coordinator
