By Rachel Kaplan, PhD candidate, Oregon State University College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences and Department of Fisheries, Wildlife, and Conservation Sciences, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Lab
I moved to Corvallis exactly four years ago, in the deep, dark midst of the Covid pandemic, and during the added chaos of the 2020 Labor Day Fires, some of the worst in Oregon’s history. I vividly remember attending our virtual lab meeting sitting on the floor surrounded by boxes, while my labmates told me their own stories (many, surprisingly!) of moving during natural disasters. At the time, beginning graduate school represented so many big changes in my life: I had quit my job, sold my furniture, and moved across the country, hoping to explore an area of research that had been calling to me for years, and to gain a new skillset and confidence.
Highlight: A very pandemic cruise. My first day of marine mammal fieldwork in 2021, at sea with (now Dr.) Dawn Barlow.
Now, I’m starting the fifth year of my PhD, thinking about all that has happened and all that is to come. Graduate school is full of milestones to mark time and progress: I’ve taken the courses required for my program, sat for a written exam to test my broad knowledge of oceanography, and written a dissertation proposal. Earlier this year, I spent two months buried in the literature on oceanography, krill, and whale ecology in preparation for my oral qualifying exam. I’ve stared at the water for dozens of hours watching for whales off the Oregon coast, and experienced polar night studying winter krill in Antarctica. I’ve conquered my fear of learning to code, and felt constant, profound gratitude for the amazing people I get to work with.
The last four years have been incredibly busy and active, but now more than ever, it feels like the time to really do. I can see the analytical steps ahead for my final two dissertation chapters more clearly than I’ve been able to see either of the other two chapters that have come before. One of my favorite parts of the process of research is discussing analytical decisions with my labmates and supervisors, and experiencing how their brains work. Much of our work hinges on modeling relationships between animals and their environment. A model, most fundamentally, is a reduced-scale representation of a system. As I’ve learned to use statistical models to understand relationships between krill and whales, I have simultaneously been building a mental model of the Northern California Current (NCC) ecosystem and the ecological relationships within it. Just as I have long admired in my supervisors and labmates, I can now feel my own mind becoming more playful as I think about this ocean environment, the whales and krill that make a living in the NCC, and the best way to approach studying them analytically.
Highlight: Working on my dissertation proposal during a friend’s 2022 wedding celebration in Utah.
Graduate school demands that you learn and work to constantly exceed your own bounds, and pushing to that extent for years is often stressful and even existentially threatening. However, this process is also beautiful. I have spent the last four years growing in the ways that I’ve long wanted to, and reveled in feeling my mind learn to play. I wouldn’t give up a moment of the time I’ve spent in the field, the relationships I’ve built with my labmates, or the confidence I’ve developed along the way.
As I look ahead to this next, final, year of graduate school, I hope to use what I’ve learned every day – and not just about how to conduct research, but about myself. I want to always remember that krill, whales, and the ocean ecosystem are incredible, and that it is a privilege to study them. I hope to work calmly and intentionally, and to continue appreciating this process of research and growth.
Highlight: My first in-person oral presentation, at the 2024 ICES-PICES International Zooplankton Production Symposium in Hobart, Tasmania.
By Hali Peterson, rising freshman, Western Oregon University
Hello, my name is Hali Peterson and I am a rising freshman in college. Last summer (2023) I was given the opportunity to be a paid high school intern for the OSU Marine Mammal Institute’s very own GEMM Lab (Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna Laboratory) based at the Hatfield Marine Science Center in Newport, Oregon. My time working in the GEMM Lab has been supported by the Oregon Coast STEM Hub. I started my internship in June 2023 and I was one of the two GEMM Lab summer interns. However, my internship did not end when summer did, as I continued to work throughout the school year and even into this summer.
Figure 1: Leaving work late and accompanied with a beautiful view of the Newport bridge over Yaquina Bay.
June 29, 2023 to September 20, 2024 (1 year, 2 months, and 21 days if anyone is curious) – what did I do and what did I learn during this time…
Initially, I was tasked with helping the GRANITE project (Gray whale Response to Ambient Noise Informed by Technology and Ecology) by processing drone footage of Pacific Coast Feeding Group (PCFG) gray whales and identifying their zooplankton prey. I started off my internship under the mentorship of KC Bierlich and Lisa Hildebrand and I dove into looking at zooplankton underneath a microscope and watching whales in drone footage, both gathered by the GEMM Lab field team.
KC taught me how to process drone footage, measure whales and calibration boards, test an artificial intelligence model, as well as write a protocol of the drone processing methods that I had worked on. These tasks were a big responsibility as the measurements need to be accurate and precise so that they can be used to effectively assess the body condition of gray whales, which provides crucial insights into population health.
Figure 2: My favorite drone video of moms and calves meeting up for a playdate!
Under Lisa’s mentorship I learned how to identify and process zooplankton prey samples, process underwater GoPro videos, as well as identify and analyze kelp patches from satellite images. Within these tasks, I honed my expertise in zooplankton and habitat analysis and the results of my work will contribute to a deeper understanding of gray whale feeding habits along the Oregon coast.
Figure 3: My favorite zooplankton to see, a juvenile crab larva.
As my main mentors, KC and Lisa taught me so much about the world of science and research. All of these detail-oriented and multi-layered tasks helped me improve some of the skills I already had before I started the internship as well as gift me with skills I didn’t previously possess. For example, I learned how to collaborate and work with a team, pay attention to detail, double and even triple check everything for quality work, problem solve, and learn to ask questions.
However, as my time in the GEMM Lab extended beyond the summer of 2023, so did my tasks. Later on I received another mentor, Clara Bird. Under Clara I learned how to identify whales from drone footage recorded in Baja, Mexico (an area that is specifically known as the breeding lagoons where the gray whales go in the winter), as well as use the Newport, Oregon drone footage and CATS (Customized Animal Tracking Solution) tag data to measure inhalation duration and bubble blast occurrences. These experiences furthered my knowledge and yet again I learned something new, a common theme throughout my time in the GEMM Lab.
Just a few months ago, the GEMM Lab hired Laura Flores Hernandez as a new high school student summer intern, and under the guidance of both Lisa Hildebrand and Leigh Torres, I was given the opportunity to develop my own mentoring skills. I used the skills I had obtained over the past year to teach someone else how to do the tasks I once was new to. I taught Laura how to identify zooplankton, process drone footage, and measure calibration boards. Stepping into that mentor role helped me reflect on my own learning and experiences. I had to go back and figure out how I did things, where I struggled, and how I overcame those struggles. Not an easy task but one I was glad to be presented with.
Figure 4: Matthew Vaughan (chief scientist on the trip) and me (right) looking at a box core sample.
During my time here I was also invited to join a STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Mathematics) cruise led by Oregon Sea Grant with fellow high school students. On this science cruise I got to help look at box core samples (a tool used to collect large amounts of sediment off of the ocean floor). Equipped with my previous knowledge on zooplankton identification, I was able to help the chief scientist on the trip to explain to other high school students what we were seeing in the samples. This trip helped me grow my teamwork and identification skills, as well as experience what it is like to collect data while on a moving ship.
Figure 5: Sea Kayaking through the fjord with the Girls on Icy Fjords team of 2024.
Another amazing opportunity I was selected for was to join the 2024 Girls on Icy Fjords team. This program, in association with OSU, was designed to empower young women in STEM in the backcountry of Alaska. With a team of 3 amazing instructors and 8 girls (all from different parts of the United States of America) we camped in the backcountry for 8 days, learning about glaciers and fjords, surviving in the backcountry, sea kayaking, and working as a team. I would highly recommend any young woman interested in science, art, or just an amazing experience to check out Inspiring Girls Expeditions.
Bonus Image: This is Jeff the Moyebi Shrimp and I love him.
All in all this will be a job that I will not soon forget; interning in the GEMM Lab has been both a learning opportunity as well as a challenge. My internship wasn’t without its challenges, from a computer that seemed determined to shut down whenever I made progress, to endless hours spent staring at a green screen, waiting to count a fish that might eventually swim by. Though the job had its ups and downs, I am so glad I was given this opportunity and was kept on in the lab for as long as I was. In just a few weeks, I will start my Bachelors of Aquarium Science at Western Oregon University and I’m both excited and nervous. I know that without a doubt the skills I learned during this internship will come in handy as I continue my education and pursue a career in the future.
Thank you to all my mentors, anyone who answered one of the many questions I had, and to the friends I made along the way!
With the changing of the season, gray whales are starting their southbound migration that will end in the lagoons off the Baja California Mexico. The migration of the gray whale is the longest migration of any mammal—the round trip totals ~10,000 miles (Pike, 1962)!
Like these gray whales, I am also undertaking my own “migration” as I leave Newport to start my post-Master’s journey. However, my migration will be a little shorter than the gray whale’s journey—only ~3,000 miles—as I head back to the east coast. As I talked about in my previous blog, I have finished my thesis studying the energetics of gray whale foraging behaviors and I attended my commencement ceremony at the University of British Columbia last Wednesday. As my time with the GEMM Lab comes to a close, I want to take some time to reflect on my time in Newport.
Me in my graduation regalia (right) and my co-supervisor Andrew Trites holding the university mace (left) after my commencement ceremony at the University of British Columbia rose garden.
Many depictions of scientists show them working in isolation but in my time with the GEMM Lab I got to fully experience the collaborative nature of science. My thesis was a part of the GEMM Lab’s Gray whale Response to Ambient Noise Informed by Technology and Ecology (GRANITE) project and I worked closely with the GRANITE team to help achieve the project’s research goals. The GRANITE team has annual meetings where team members give updates on their contributions to the project and flush out ideas in a series of very busy days. I found these collaborative meetings very helpful to ensure that I was keeping the big picture of the gray whale study system in mind while working with the energetics data I explored for my thesis. The collaborative nature of the GRANITE project provided the opportunity to learn from people that have a different skill set from my own and expose me to many different types of analysis.
GRANITE team members hard at work thinking about gray whales and their physiological response to noise.
This summer I also was able to participate in outreach with the partnership of the Oregon State University Marine Mammal Institute and the Eugene Exploding Whales (the alternate identity of the Eugene Emeralds) minor league baseball team to promote the Oregon Gray Whale License plates. It was exciting to talk to baseball fans about marine mammals and be able to demonstrate that the Gray Whale License plate sales are truly making a difference for the gray whales off the Oregon coast. In fact, the minimally invasive suction cup tags used in to collect the data I analyzed in my thesis were funded by the OSU Gray Whale License plate fund!
Photo of the GEMM Lab promoting Oregon Gray Whale License plates at the Eugene Exploding Whales baseball game. If you haven’t already, be sure to “Put a whale on your tail!” to help support marine mammal research off the Oregon Coast.
Outside of the amazing science opportunities, I have thoroughly enjoyed the privilege of exploring Newport and the Oregon coast. I was lucky enough to find lots of agates and enjoyed consistently spotting gray whale blows on my many beach walks. I experienced so many breathtaking views from hikes (God’s thumb was my personal favorite). I got to attend an Oregon State Beavers football game where we crushed Stanford! And most of all, I am so thankful for all the friends I’ve made in my time here. These warm memories, and the knowledge that I can always come back, will help make it a little easier to start my migration away from Newport.
Me and my friends outside of Reser Stadium for the Oregon State Beavers football game vs Stanford this season. Go Beavs!!!
Me and my friends celebrating after my defense.
Did you enjoy this blog? Want to learn more about marine life, research, and conservation? Subscribe to our blog and get a weekly message when we post a new blog. Just add your name and email into the subscribe box below
References
Pike, G. C. (1962). Migration and feeding of the gray whale (Eschrichtius gibbosus). Journal of the Fisheries Research Board of Canada, 19(5), 815–838. https://doi.org/10.1139/f62-051
By Abby Tomita, undergraduate student, OSU College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences, research intern in the GEMM and Krill Seeker Labs
This February, during the winter term of my third year at Oregon State, I was presented with a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. After spending the last year studying the zooplankton krill as part of Project OPAL, I was invited to spend the austral winter season doing research on Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba) under supervision of experts Dr. Kim Bernard and PhD student Rachel Kaplan. Additionally, we were lucky enough to participate in two research cruises along the Western Antarctic Peninsula (WAP).
Figure 1. Sailing into the sunset on the RV Laurence M. Gould.
Unsurprisingly, it is no easy feat getting to the bottom of the world. After an incredibly thorough physical qualification process and two days of air travel from Portland, Oregon, we reached the lovely city of Punta Arenas, Chile. It was such a relief to arrive – but we were only halfway there. The next portion of our trip was the one that I was most anxious about, especially as someone who is prone to seasickness: crossing the Drake Passage. This stretch of the ocean, from the southernmost tip of South America to the Antarctic Peninsula, is notoriously treacherous as water in this area circulates the globe completely unobstructed by land masses. I soon learned the value of scopolamine patches and nausea bracelets, which helped me immensely through this five day journey. From Punta Arenas, we boarded the RV Laurence M. Gould, along with a seal research team from the University of North Carolina Wilmington. They were headed down south to look for crabeater seals to better understand not only their physiology, but also their role in the trophic ecology of the WAP.
The Passage was rough, but not as terrible as I expected. The hype around it made me think I’d be faced with something as menacing as the giant wave from The Perfect Storm, and while the rocking and rolling of the ship was far from pleasant, my nausea aids, as well as the amazing people and vast selection of movies on board made it manageable. Despite being extremely nervous for the Passage, I was also very excited to celebrate my twenty-first birthday during it. It was a memorable, although untraditional birthday experience that was made all the more special by my friends on the ship who took the time to celebrate the day as best as we could.
Figure 2. Taking in the sights of the Neumayer Channel with Kim!
The morning that we reached the Bransfield Strait was something truly unforgettable. Up until that point, I knew our destination was Antarctica, but I couldn’t really wrap my head around it because it was such a distant place and concept to me. I remember walking out onto the starboard side of the second level deck and seeing huge mountains out in the distance. For some reason, I had never considered how massively tall the mountains of the peninsula are, and just the fact that there were mountains down here at all. I joined the others at the bow, where we stood for hours in awe at the first land we had seen in days. Though many of the other scientists and crew members on board had been to this icy continent before, this was my first time, and I was in a state of disbelief. We’d finally made it and it sunk into me that I was in Antarctica, and that I would be here for the next five and half months.
After a day of hiding from strong winds in the Neumayer Channel, we were able to dock at Palmer Station (the smallest of the three US research bases in Antarctica) for our first port call, and seeing Palmer for the first time was just as exciting as seeing the continent. It looked so small at first, especially with the glacier and mountains looming behind it. Once the ship was tied up, orientation began. The station manager came onto the ship to give us an overview of what we could expect on station and the general Palmer etiquette. Next, we were given a tour of the facilities, from the lab spaces and aquarium room, up through the galley/dining area, past the hot tub and sauna, and into the lounge and bar in the GWR (Garage, Warehouse, and Recreation) building. I was surprised at how cozy the station was on the inside. In pictures, the buildings’ exteriors looked similar to the outside of a metal shipping container, but the inside was welcoming and warm. Those of us staying on station then sat through several hours of a more detailed orientation that somehow wore us out despite sitting in comfy recliner sofas the whole time. After sleeping on the rocking ship for about a week, I had some of the best sleep of my life that first night at Palmer Station.
Figure 3. Arriving at the Palmer Station pier in the first morning light.
Our first research cruise started a few days after arriving at Palmer, and just like that, we were off to explore the Southern Ocean. This leg of the trip took us south, down to Marguerite Bay and the region of Alexander Island, for ten days. The views were just spectacular everywhere we went, and it was so humbling to step out onto the deck to see gigantic mountains all around the ship. By day, us “krillers”, as our team is known, camped out on the bridge of the ship with the seal team, where we looked for sea ice floes with lounging crabeater seals. By night we conducted CTD casts, filtered water for chlorophyll, and deployed nets to catch our favorite tiny crustacean critters, along with any other zooplankton in our track. Unfortunately for both our group and the seal team, many areas that we visited were not frequented by krill or crabeater seals, though the seal team did successfully study and tag one seal over the course of the first cruise.
Figure 4. Rachel (right) and I (left) filtering water for chlorophyll on the LMG.
One of the highlights of this leg of the cruise was our Crossing Ceremony, as we’d crossed the Antarctic Circle (approximately 66.5ºS) shortly after leaving Palmer station. Myself and six others were crossing for the first time, so to earn our “Red Noses”, we had to pay tribute to King Neptune and his court. It would not be a Crossing Ceremony without at least some light pranking, so when they brought us out individually to the main deck, I knew something was coming our way.
Figure 5. Taking a celebratory picture with King Neptune’s court…with a surprise after.
The ten days flew by, and when we arrived back on station, we had less than a week to prepare for our next excursion on the LMG, which would be fifteen days. The time back at Palmer went quickly as we organized our lab space and entered data from the first cruise. The ship came back once more and we were off, this time heading north along the Peninsula to the Gerlache Strait. The sights were as breathtaking as ever, and I was excited to be back with my friends from the ship.
Figure 6. Kim (left) and I (right) pour krill we caught into an XACTIC tank.
Our first day of transit was through the Lemaire Channel, one of the most stunning areas that we passed through (check out the photo gallery at the end of this post!). We spent the majority of the day on the bow and the deck of the bridge taking in the beautiful towering mountains on either side of the narrow channel and watching for penguins and humpbacks, of which there were many. This voyage segued into an extremely productive night of science for us where we caught thousands of krill that we were able to keep live in tanks on the ship, in preparation for later use for our experiments on station. Our first productive night of science was auspicious for the rest of the cruise as we caught and processed thousands more krill, and the seal team had a much more fruitful experience finding crabeater seals (they found/worked on 8 seals and named them all after fruits!). The highlight of this second cruise for me was getting to accompany the seal team onto an ice floe in the Lemaire Channel to assist them in their work on the crabeater, a female juvenile who they named Mango!
Figure 7. Watching Mango’s nose to calculate and record her breaths per minute (US NMSF Permit #25770).
Returning to Palmer for the final time on the LMG was just as exciting as arriving the first time, especially with the knowledge that we’d have one last night of celebration with our friends from the ship at the Cross Town Dinner – a night to celebrate the solstice with both the Palmer crew and LMG crew. Although the dinner and subsequent party were a blast, I felt a lingering sadness knowing that the majority of the people I spent almost two months with would be heading north, back to their respective homes while Kim, Rachel, and I stayed at Palmer for the next few months. The next day, after saying our goodbyes, the three of us stood on the Palmer pier with tears streaming down our faces, waving frantically at the ship to our friends on the deck. In spite of my sadness, I knew that the coming months would be a thrilling series of new experiences in one of the most magical and special places that I have ever had the pleasure of being in.
Figure 8. The LMG departs Palmer Station for the last time this winter!
One of the most frequent questions graduate students get asked (besides when you are going to graduate) is what their plans are after university. For me, the answer has always adamantly been continuing to do research, most likely as a government researcher because I don’t want teaching commitments to take away from my ability to conduct research.
However, one of the most fulfilling parts of my degree at University of British Columbia has actually been teaching four terms of a 100-level undergraduate science course focused on developing first-year students’ critical thinking, data interpretation, and science communication skills. My role in the course has been facilitating active learning activities that exercise these skills and reviewing material the students go over in their pre-class work. Through this course, I have experienced the teaching styles of six different professors and practiced my own teaching. As with any skill, there is always room for improvement, so when I had a chance to read a book titled How Learning Works: Seven Research-Based Principles for Smart Teaching (Ambrose et al. 2010), I took it as an opportunity to further refine my teaching and explore why some practices are more effective than others.
In the book, Ambrose et al. present principles of learning, the research surrounding these principles and examples for incorporating them into a university level course. Some of the principles gave me ideas for strategies to incorporate into my teaching to benefit my students. These described how prior knowledge impacts student learning and how to use goal-oriented practice and give feedback relative to target criteria that the students can apply to the next practice task. For example, I learned to be more conscious about how I explain and clarify course material to make connections with what the students have learned previously, so they can draw on that prior knowledge. Other principles presented by Ambrose et al. were more complex and offered a chance for greater reflection.
Beyond presenting strategies for improving teaching, the book also presented research that supported what I had learned firsthand through teaching. These principles related to the factors that motivate students to learn and why the course climate matters for learning. I have seen how student motivation is impacted by the classroom climate and culture put forth by the teaching team. Perhaps the most frustrating experiences I have had teaching were when one member of the teaching team does not see the importance of fostering a supportive course environment.
For this reason, my favorite assignments have been the Thrive Contract and the Group Contract. Each term, the Thrive Contract is the first major class activity, and the Group Contract is the first group assignment. These assignments serve as a means for everyone to co-create guidelines and expectations and establish a positive classroom culture for the rest of the term. After an exceptionally poor classroom experience my first time teaching, I have highlighted the importance of the Thrive Contract in all subsequent terms. Now, I realize the significance I lent this assignment is supported by the research on the importance for a supportive environment to maximize student motivation and encourage classroom engagement (Figure 1).
Another powerful lesson I have learned through teaching is the importance of clarifying the purpose of an activity to the students. Highlighting a task’s objective is also supported by research to ensure that students ascribe value to the assigned work, increasing their motivation (Figure 1). In my teaching, I have noticed a trend of lower student participation and poorer performance on assignments when a professor does not emphasize the importance of the task. Reviewing the research that shows the value of a supportive course climate has further strengthened my belief in the importance of ensuring that students understand why their teaching team assigns each activity.
Figure 1. How environment, student efficacy, and value interact to impact motivation. The above figure shows that motivation is optimized when students see the value in a goal, believe they have the skills to achieve the goal, and are undertaking the goal in a supportive class environment (the bright blue box in the bottom right corner). If this situation were to occur in an unsupportive class environment, defiant behaviour (e.g. “I’ll prove you wrong” attitude) is likely to occur in response to the lack of support, as the student sees the value in the goal and believes in their ability to achieve the goal. Rejecting behaviour (e.g., disengagement) occurs when the student does not associate value to a task and does not believe in their ability to complete the goals regardless of the environment. Evading behaviour (e.g., lack of attention or minimal effort) results when students are confident in their ability to complete a task, but do not see the goal as meaningful in both supportive and unsupportive environment. When a student sees the importance of the goal but are not confident in their ability to complete it, they become hopeless (e.g., have no expectation of success and act helpless) when in an unsupportive environment and fragile (e.g., feign understanding, deny difficulty, or make excuses for poor performance) in a supportive environment. Diagram adapted from Ambrose et al. (2010) Figure 3.2 incorporating the works of Hansen (1989) & Ford (1992).
Potentially my favorite part about the structure of Ambrose’s book was that it offered me a chance to reflect not only on teaching, but also on my own learning and cognitive growth since I started my master’s degree. Graduate students are often in a unique position in which we are both students and teachers depending on the context of our surroundings. The ability to zoom out and realize how far I have come in not only teaching others, but also in teaching myself, has been humbling. My reflection on my own learning and growth has been driven by learning about how organizing knowledge affects learning, how mastery is developed and how students become self-directed learners.
One of the main differences between novices and experts in how they organize their knowledge is the depth of that knowledge and the connections made between different pieces of information. Research has shown that experts hold more connections between concepts, which allows for faster and easier retrieval of information that translates into ease in applying skills to different tasks (Bradshaw & Anderson, 1982; Reder & Anderson, 1980; Smith, Adams, & Schorr, 1978). Currently in my degree, I am experiencing this ease when it comes to coding my analysis and connecting my research to the broader implications for the field. By making these deeper connections across various contexts, I am building a more complex knowledge structure, thus progressing towards holding a more expert organization of knowledge.
In the stages of mastery concept proposed by Sprague and Stewart (2000), learners progress from unconscious incompetence where the student doesn’t know what they don’t know, to conscious incompetence where they have become aware of what they need to know (Figure 2). This was where I was when I started my master’s — I knew what objectives I wanted to achieve with my research, but I needed to learn the skills necessary for me to be able to collect the data and analyze it to answer my research questions. The next stage of mastery is conscious competence, in which the ability of the learner to function in their domain has greatly increased, but practicing the necessary skills still requires deliberate thinking and conscious actions (Figure 2). This is the level I feel I have progressed to — I am much more comfortable performing the necessary tasks related to my research and talking about how my work fills existing knowledge gaps in the field. However, it still helps to talk out my proposed plans with true masters in the field. The final stage of mastery, unconscious competence, is where the learner has reached a point where they can practice the skills of their field automatically and instinctively such that they are no longer aware of how they enact their knowledge (Figure 2).
Figure 2. Stages of mastery showing how the learner consciousness waxes and then wanes as competence is developed. Unconscious states refer to those where the learner is not aware of what they are doing or what they know, whereas conscious states have awareness of thoughts and actions. Competence refers to the ability of the learner to perform tasks specific to the field they are trying to master. Diagram adapted from Ambrose et al. (2010) Figure 4.2 incorporating the works of Sprague & Stewart (2000).
In line with my progression to higher levels of mastery has come the development of metacognitive skills that have helped me become a better self-directed learner. Metacognition is the process of learning how to learn, requiring the learner to monitor and control their learning through various processes (Figure 3). The most exciting part of my metacognitive growth I have noticed is the greater independence I have in my learning. I am much better at assessing what is needed to complete specific tasks and planning my particular approach to successfully achieve that goal (e.g., the construction of a Hidden Markov model from my last blog). By becoming more aware of my own strengths and weaknesses as a learner, I am better able to prepare and give myself the support needed for completing certain tasks (e.g., reaching out to experts to help with my model construction as I knew this was an area of weakness for me). By becoming more aware of how I am monitoring and controlling my learning, I know I am setting myself up for success as a lifelong learner.
Figure 3. Metacognition requires learner to monitor and control their learning through various processes. These processes involve the learner assessing the necessary skills needed for a task, evaluating their strengths and weaknesses with regards to the assigned task, and planning a way to approach the task. Once a plan has been made, the learner then must apply the strategies involved from the plan and monitor how those strategies are working to accomplish the assigned task. The learner must then be able to decide if the planned approach and applied strategies are effectively accomplishing the assigned task and adjust as needed with a re-assessment of the task that begins the processing cycle over again. Underlying each of these metacognitive processes are the learner’s belief in their own abilities and their perceptions of their intelligence. For example, students who believe their intelligence cannot be improved and do not have a strong sense of efficacy will be less likely to expend effort in metacognitive processes as they believe the extra effort will not influence the results. This contrasts with students who believe their intelligence will increase with skills development and have a strong belief in their abilities, as these learners will see the value in putting in the effort of trying multiple plans and adjusting strategies. Diagram adapted from Ambrose et al. (2010) Figure 7.1 incorporating the cycle of adaptive learning proposed by Zimmerman (2001).
References:
Ambrose, S. A., Bridges, M. W., DiPietro, M., Lovett, M. C., & Norman, M. K. (2010). How learning works: Seven research-based principles for smart teaching (1st ed.). San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass.
Bradshaw, G. L., & Anderson, J. R. (1982). Elaborative encoding as an explanation of levels of processing. Journal of Verbal Learning and Verbal behaviours, 21,165-174.
Ford, M. E. (1992). Motivating humans: Goals, emotions and personal agency beliefs. Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications, Inc.
Hansen, D. (1989). Lesson evading and dissembling: Ego strategies in the classroom. American Journal of Education, 97, 184-208.
Reder, L. M., & Anderson, J. R. (1980). A partial resolution of the paradox of interference: The role of integrating knowledge. Cognitive Psychology, 12, 447-472.
Smith, E. E., Adams, N., & Schorr, D. (1978). Fact retrieval and the paradox of interference. Cognitive Psychology, 10, 438-464.
Sprague, J., & Stewart, D. (2000). The speaker’s handbook. Fort Worth, TX: Harcourt College Publishers.
Zimmerman, B. J. (2001). Theories of self-regulated learning and academic achievement: An overview and analysis. In B. J. Zimmerman & D. H. Schunk (Eds.), Self-regulated learning and academic achievement (2nd ed., pp. 1-38). Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum.
By Abby Tomita, undergraduate student, OSU College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences
From long days in Newport performing the patience-testing task of bomb calorimetry, to spending hours transfixed by the microscopic world that exists in our oceans, I recently got an amazing glimpse into the world of marine biological research working with PhD student Rachel Kaplan. She has been an amazing teacher to my fellow intern Hadley and I, showing us the basics of the research process and introducing us to so many wonderful people at NOAA and the GEMM Lab. I am in my third year studying oceanography here at OSU and had no real lab experience before this, so I was eager to explore this area of research, and not only learn new information about our oceans, but also to see the research process up close and personal.
After being trained by Jennifer Fisher, a NOAA Research Fisheries Biologist, I sorted through zooplankton samples collected on the R/V Bell M. Shimada from the Northern California Current region. This data will be used to get an idea of where krill are found throughout the year, and in what abundances. Though my focus was mainly on two species of krill, I also found an assortment of other organisms, such as larval fish, squid, copepods, crabs, and tons of jellies, which were super interesting to see.
A small group of larval squid and other unknown species (photo by Abby Tomita).
I also studied krill through a technique called bomb calorimetry, which is not for the faint of heart! It takes a tough soul to be able to put these complex little creatures into a mortar and pestle and grind them into a dust that hits your nose like pepper. They then take their final resting place into the bomb calorimetry machine (which can and will find something to fuss over) until it finally manages to ignite and dispose of the krill’s remains. The light that guided me through this dark tunnel was the knowledge that these sacrificial krill were taken in the name of science, with the aim of eventually decreasing whale entanglements.
Abby placing the pellet within the coil for the bomb.
That, and Rachel’s contagious positivity. In the early stages, we would spend the majority of our time troubleshooting after constant “misfires”, in which the machine fails to combust the sample properly. Bomb calorimetry involves many tedious steps, and working with such small quantities of tissue – a single krill could weigh 0.01 grams or even less – poses a plethora of its own challenges. One of my biggest takeaways from this experience was to have patience with this kind of work and know when to take a much-needed dance break. Things often do not work out according to plan, and getting to see first-hand how to adapt to confounding variables and hitches in the procedure was an invaluable lesson.
I also got to see how collaborative the research process is. We received helpful advice from other members of the GEMM Lab at lunch, as well as constant help from our esteemed Resident Bomb Cal Expert, Elizabeth Daly. It was comforting for me to see that even when you are doing independent research, you are not expected to only work alone, and there can be so much community in higher level research.
A larval snailfish.A larval fish (sp. unknown) still in its egg.A larval octopus. Female Thysanoessa spinifera krill (photos by Abby Tomita).
Did you enjoy this blog? Want to learn more about marine life, research, and conservation? Subscribe to our blog and get a weekly message when we post a new blog. Just add your name and email into the subscribe box below.
Dr. Alejandro A. Fernández Ajó, Postdoctoral Scholar, Marine Mammal Institute – OSU Department of Fisheries, Wildlife, & Conservation Sciences, Geospatial Ecology of Marine Megafauna (GEMM) Lab.
The English language is recognized as the international language of science (Gordin, 2015); I believe this is a useful convention that allows scientists to communicate ideas and gain access to global scientific literature regardless of their origin or native tongue. However, this avenue for sharing knowledge is open only for those proficient in English, and many scientists and users of scientific information, such as policy makers and conservationists, communicate on a daily basis in languages other than English. This inevitably creates barriers to the transfer of knowledge between communities, potentially impacting conservation and management because scientific knowledge is often unavailable in local languages.
Although in non-English speaking countries, local journals are receptive to publishing scientific research in languages other than English (i.e., their local language), oftentimes these local journals are perceived as low-quality and have a relatively low impact factor, making publishing in such journals less attractive to scientists. Therefore, readers with language barriers only have access to limited studies and are often unaware of the most significant research, even when the research is conducted in their region. This situation can result in a void of information relevant for environmental policies and conservation strategies. Ensuring that research findings are available in the local language of the region in which the research is conducted is an important step in science communication, but one that is often neglected.
In addition, scientists with English as a Foreign Language (EFL) confront the added challenge of navigating a second language while writing manuscripts, preparing and presenting oral presentations, and developing outreach communications (Ramirez-Castaneda, 2020). For example, EFL researchers have reported that one of the primary targets of criticism for their manuscripts under review is often the quality of their English rather than the science itself (Drubin and Kellogg, 2012). In academia, most job interviews and PhD applications are conducted in English; and grant and project proposals are often required to be written in English, which can be particularly challenging and can impact the allocation of resources for research and conservation in non-English speaking regions.
I am from Argentina, and I am a native Spanish speaker. I am fortunate to have started learning English at an early age and continue practicing with international collaborations and traveling abroad. Being able to communicate in English has opened many doors for me, but I recognize that I am in a privileged position with respect to many Argentinians and South Americans in general, where the majority of the population receives minimal training in English and bilingualism with English is very low. Thus, socioeconomic status can influence English proficiency, which then determines scientific success and access to knowledge. I believe that the scientific community should be aware of these issues and work towards improving equality in the process of research collaborations. Providing opportunities for students, and enhancing the availability of scientific knowledge for non-English speaking communities, particularly when the research is relevant for such communities.
In this picture I am with an international group of Fulbright scholars during the Spring International Language Program at the University of Arkansas. This is on of many activities organized by the Fulbright program to create bridges across cultures and languages.
Fortunately, there are several examples pointing towards improving equality in the scientific process, access to knowledge, and opportunities for EFL communities in STEM careers. Several journals are now accepting, or considering to accept the publication of papers in multiple languages. One example of this is the journal Integrative Organismal Biology, which provides the option for publishing the paper abstract in multiple languages. In our recent publication, “Male Bowhead Whale Reproductive Histories Inferred from Baleen Testosterone and Stable Isotopes,” we provided an abstract in five different languages, including Inuktitut, one of primary languages of indigenous groups in the area. And, international exchange programs like the Fulbright Foreign Student Program, of which I was a beneficiary between 2018-2020, enable graduate students and young professionals from abroad to study and conduct research in the United States.
In an effort to contribute to addressing these problems, I am working with a group of colleagues from Argentina (María Constanza (Kata) Marchesi and Tomas Marina) to develop graduate level coursework that will be offered at the Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia in Puerto Madryn, Argentina, with the objective to enable students to learn effective communication using English in the scientific environment. Unfortunately, these types of programs focused on EFL proficiency for STEM students are currently rare in Argentina, but my hope is that our work can spur the creation of additional programs for EFL students in STEM across the region.
I want to finish this post with the acknowledgement of the huge support I have form the GEMM Lab, which welcomes diversity, equity, and inclusivity, and promotes a culture of anti-racism, transparency, and acceptance (See the GEMM Lab DEI statement here).
Did you enjoy this blog? Want to learn more about marine life, research and conservation? Subscribe to our blog and get weekly updates and more! Just add your name into the subscribe box below!
References and Additional Readings
Gordin, M. D. (2015). Scientific Babel : How Science Was Done Before and After Global English. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.
Ramírez-Castañeda V (2020) Disadvantages in preparing and publishing scientific papers caused by the dominance of the English language in science: The case of Colombian researchers in biological sciences. PLoS ONE 15(9): e0238372. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0238372
Drubin, D. G., and Kellogg, D. R. (2012). English as the universal language of science: opportunities and challenges. Mol. Biol. Cell 23:1399. doi: 10.1091/mbc.E12-02-0108
Amano, T., González-Varo, J. P., & Sutherland, W. J. (2016). Languages are still a major barrier to global science. PLoS Biology, 14(12), e2000933. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pbio.2000933
Marden, E., Abbott, R. J., Austerlitz, F., Ortiz-Barrientos, D., Rieseberg, L. H. (2021). Sharing and reporting benefits from biodiversity research. Molecular Ecology, 30(5), 1103–1107. https://doi.org/10.1111/mec.15702
Márquez, M. C., & Porras, A. M. (2020). Science communication in multiple languages Is critical to Its effectiveness. Frontiers in Communication, 5(May). https://doi.org/10.3389/fcomm.2020.00031
Ramírez-Castañeda V (2020) Disadvantages in preparing and publishing scientific papers caused by the dominance of the English language in science: The case of Colombian researchers in biological sciences. PLoS ONE 15(9): e0238372. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0238372
Trisos, C. H., Auerbach, J., & Katti, M. (2021). Decoloniality and anti-oppressive practices for a more ethical ecology. Nature Ecology and Evolution, 5(9), 1205–1212. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-021-01460-w
Letter to the Editor of Marine Mammal Science: Enhancing the impact and inclusivity of research by embracing multi-lingual science communication (2022) DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.29934.08001 http://dx.doi.org/10.13140/RG.2.2.29934.08001
Leal, J. S., Soares, B., Franco, A. C. S., de Sá Ferreira Lima, R. G., Baker, K., & Griffiths, M. (2022). Decolonizing ecological research: a debate between global North geographers and global South field ecologists. https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/wbzh2
The pandemic has taught me that certain skills – including ones I never recognized as such – can atrophy. How do I construct an outfit that involves actual pants instead of gym shorts? How do I make a lunch that is portable and can be eaten outside my home?
These are things that I’ve had to relearn over the last year, as I increasingly leave my virtual work world and move back into the physical world. Recently, the new ways in which the world is opening up again have pushed me to brush off another skill – how do I talk to other people about my work?
The pandemic has necessarily made the world a bit more insular. A year and a half into my graduate career, I’ve mostly discussed my work within the cozy cocoon of my lab groups and cohort. In particular, I’ve lived the last few months in that realm of research that is so specific and internal that almost no one else fully understands or cares about what I’m doing: I’ve spent days tangled up in oodles of models, been woken up at night by dreams about coding, and sweated over the decimal points of statistical deviance-explained values.
This period of scientific navel gazing abruptly ended this February. In the space of ten days, I presented at my first in-person conference during graduate school, gave a short talk at my first international conference, and gave my longest talk yet to a public audience. After reveling in the minutiae of research for months, it was so valuable to be forced to take a step back, think about the overarching narrative of this work, and practice telling that story to different audiences.
A February talk for the Oregon chapter of the American Cetacean Society gave me the chance to tell the story of my research to a broad audience.
Presenting this work to an in-person audience for the first time was especially rewarding. With a physical (!) poster in hand, I headed out to Newport for the annual meeting of the Oregon Chapter of The Wildlife Society. The GEMM Lab really took this conference by storm – Leigh gave a plenary talk on the meeting’s theme of “Dynamic Oceans, Shifting Landscapes”, Lisa chaired a session and gave a talk about trophic relationships between kelp and whales, and Miranda presented a poster on the new Holistic Assessment of Living marine resources off the Oregon coast (HALO) project.
This great GEMM Lab presence gave me the opportunity to reference everyone else’s work as I shared my own, and to think about the body of work we do as a group and the coherence in research themes that different projects share. I almost lost my voice by talking for the entire duration of the poster session, and was energized by the opportunity to share this work with so many interested people.
The GEMM Lab and other OSU Marine Mammal Institute members presented alongside terrestrial researchers on the theme of “Dynamic Oceans, Shifting Landscapes”.
Originally scheduled for Hawaii, this meeting was instead held virtually as a safety precaution against Covid-19. Nevertheless, the diversity of talks and time spent gathering online still gave me the sense of being part of an international ocean science community. People attended from every time zone, and watching early-morning talks while wearing pajamas with Solene, Dawn, and Quin the dog is officially one of my new favorite conference experiences.
In addition to the chance to discuss science with other students and researchers, it was great to have the opportunity to step back from our normal routines a bit. The Krill Seeker Lab did the conference-organized 5K walk together (in intermittent rain, of course) and our team even came within one point of winning the trivia contest. All the while, we were hopping in and out of poster sessions and talks, realizing that virtual conferences can be just as busy as in-person ones.
Taking a 5k-long break from watching talks! From left to right: Rachel Kaplan, Kim Bernard, Giulia Wood, and Kirsten Steinke.
Over the last two years, one of the things the pandemic has made me appreciate the most is the ability to gather. Dinner with friends, holidays with family – the ability to be together is far more tentative and precious than I realized during the “before times.” Now, as we start tiptoeing back into normal life a bit more, I’m appreciating the ability to gather for science and looking forward to more conferences in the future.
Did you enjoy this blog? Want to learn more about marine life, research and conservation? Subscribe to our blog and get a weekly email when we make a new post! Just add your name into the subscribe box on the left panel.
If you are an avid reader of our blog, you probably know quite a bit about gray whales, specifically the Pacific Coast Feeding Group (PCFG) of gray whales. Of the just over 50 GEMM Lab blogs written in 2021, 43% of them were about PCFG gray whales (or at least mentioned gray whales in some way). I guess this statistic is not too surprising when you consider that six of the 10 GEMM Lab members conduct gray whale-related research. You might think that we would have reached our annual limit of online gray whale content with that many blogs featuring these gentle giants, but you would in fact be wrong…
At the end of 2021, we launched a brand new website all about gray whales called IndividuWhale! It features stories of some of the Oregon coast’s most iconic gray whales, as well as information about how we study them, stressors they experience in our waters, and even a game to test your gray whale identification skills. IndividuWhale is a true labor of love that took over a year to create and that we are extremely proud to share with you today. Before I tell you more about the website, I want to take a moment to give a huge shout out to Erik Urdahl who was instrumental in getting this website off the ground and making it as interactive and beautiful as it is – hurrah Erik!
Equal‘s right side with visible boat propeller scars. Source: GEMM Lab.
Like us humans, gray whales have individual personalities and stories. They experience life-altering events, go through periods of stress, must provide for their offspring, and can behave differently to one another. Since Leigh & co. have been conducting in-depth research about PCFG gray whales in Oregon waters since 2016, we have been able to document several fascinating stories and events that these individuals have experienced. Take Equal, for example, a male whale that is at least 7 years old. The GEMM Lab observed Equal on consecutive days in June 2018, where on the first day he looked healthy and normal, but on the second day had fresh boat propeller-like scars on his back. Not only did we document these scars in photographs, but we were also able to collect a fecal sample from Equal the day we observed him with these scars. After analyzing his fecal sample for stress hormones, we discovered that Equal had very high stress levels compared to previous samples collected – unsurprising seeing as he had been hit by a boat! While this event was certainly sad for Equal (although don’t worry – we have seen him many times again in the years after this event looking healthy & normal once again), it was a very fortuitous occurrence for us since we were able to “validate” our stress hormone data relative to the value from Equal when he was clearly stressed out. Find out more about Equal as well as seven other gray whales here!
You might be wondering, how we knew that the whale with the boat propeller scar was Equal and how we recognize him again years after the incident. Gray whales have unique pigmentation patterns on their bodies and flukes that allow us to re-identify individuals between years and distinguish them from one another. Additionally, scars, such as those that Equal now carries on his back, can also be useful in telling whales apart. Therefore, we take photographs of every whale we see to match markings and identify whales. This process is called photo ID. Some individuals can have very distinctive markings, such as Roller Skate who has two big white dots on her right side, while others can look more inconspicuous, like Clouds. Therefore, conducting photo ID requires a lot of attention to detail and perseverance. To learn more about the different features we use to identify individuals, check out the “Studying Whales With Photographs” page. Do you think you have what it takes to tell individuals apart? Then try your luck at our photo ID game after!
Test your photo ID skills in our whale match game!
Unfortunately, these whales do not live in a pristine environment, as is evidenced by Equal’s story. Their main objective during the summer when in Oregon waters is to gain weight (energy stores) by consuming large amounts of prey, which is made more difficult by a number of stressors, including potential fishery entanglements, ocean noise, vessel traffic, and habitat changes. We describe these four stressors on the IndividuWhale website since we are trying to assess the impacts of them on gray whales through our research, however they are certainly not the only stressors that these whales experience. Little is known about the level at which these stressors may have a negative impact on the whales, and how whales react when they experience some of these stressors in concert. The answers to these questions are difficult to tease apart but the GRANITE project is aiming to do so through a framework called Population Consequences of Multiple Stressors (read more about it here). This approach requires a lot of data on a lot of individuals in a population and as you can see from the IndividuWhale website, we are slowly starting to get there! 2022 will certainly bring many more gray whale-themed blogs to this website, and you can share in our journey of learning about the lives of PCFG gray whales by exploring the IndividuWhale website (https://www.individuwhale.com).
There is something special about the Oregon Coast. It’s like nowhere else in the world. When Lisa told me that gray whales are understudied on our coastline, I secretly and selfishly thought to myself, “I hope it stays that way”. Then I would have a chance to be a pioneer one day too, studying something along this rugged coast full of life, death and everything in between, that no one has answered before. Of course, I only feel this way half of the time.
Yet, the more time I spend in Port Orford, the more I realize that our coastline truly is one of those last frontiers. A place where fundamental questions have yet to be explored, where the passing of seasons brings with it a violent change in conditions. From sunny summer days on the Port Orford beaches taking in the soft glistening of sunlight illuminating Redfish Rocks Marine Reserve, to cold, dark and stormy months with no end in sight and nothing but the sound of wind curving around the bends of your home and rain puttering against the windows.
Noah reading a book on the cliff site with a view of Mill Rocks in the background. Source: N. Dolinajec.
But no matter the season, no matter the conditions, the Oregon Coast harnesses something truly special, truly extraordinary. A cyclical diversity of life.
Since I was a kid, the Oregon Coast has inspired me. Not always to think about wildlife, in fact, mostly in other ways. To contemplate more primal philosophical questions. At 28 years old, it’s been a longer road than expected to get to this point, working with these amazing people, in this amazing place, on this amazing project. And the more time that passes, the more failures, missteps and dysfunctional experiences I absorb, the more that I learn about what really needs to change. In the world of course, but, mostly in science.
In the past few years, as I eek closer to 30, and I begin to look back on some of the adventures I have taken in my life, I take heavy note of where I am now, sitting on a kayak in Mill Rocks sampling for gray whale prey abundance and distribution, or atop the cliff, gazing out into the open ocean waiting patiently and graciously (at least trying to be) for a small poof of water spray from the beating surface of the sea. That little poof? It may not seem like much but it’s a sign of life. Of an age-old journey, one we know very little about. And here I am, a part of it, albeit a small one, but nevertheless, forever a part of that great journey.
A foggy view of Mill Rocks from the cliff (left) and a shot from the kayak (right). Source: N. Dolinajec.
And without losing sight of my job, sampling for zooplankton or tracking the whales as they move across the open water, I’ve found myself thinking about the depth of being involved in such an ancient process, and considering a very important question. One that doesn’t spend nearly enough time in the day-to-day conversation of an academic…
What exactly is a scientist? And how does one become a scientist?
The academic path to the sciences is exclusionary, beyond any reasonable level. It discriminates on gender, race, experience and age. Making the sciences, which are meant as a tool to better the world and make useful contributions to society and the future, feel inaccessible for so many people full of potential but without the right boxes ticked on a form.
How many beautiful ideas have been left to decay because of the ego that science has built for itself?
A sign that sits in the front window of the OSU Port Orford Field Station. Source: N. Dolinajec.
Don’t get me wrong, I love science, it has given me joy that other things in life cannot. It has shown me both the complexity of the world and the simplicity of how we view it. And I believe that science can still be the future. But in order for science to command our future, to guide us in the right direction, it cannot be a hierarchy of antiquated procedures any longer. We must open our arms, our minds and our resources to take chances on students, far and wide, that may lack traditional training but instead have other skills or experiences to offer science. Science needs an overhaul. Science needs diversity.
After all, change of perspective can be a profound driver of scientific results, can it not?
Here in Port Orford, in this bizarre year of 2020, we have the beginning, the makings if-you-will, of that very diversity that I am speaking of. The four of us, ‘The Theyodelers’ as we righteously call ourselves, each come from such drastically different places in life only to meet under the same roof for 6 weeks and miraculously not only survive together, but thrive together.
‘The Theyodelers’ after the 2020 (virtual) Port Orford Community Presentation, from left to right: Dr. Leigh Torres, Lisa Hildebrand, Liz Kelly, Mattea Holt Colberg, Noah Dolinajec, Tom Calvanese, Tom McCambridge (front). Source: L. Hildebrand.
And that, that essence of positivity that we have been able to build around one another this season, is exactly what I mean when I say that science needs an overhaul.
We do not all find our way to this moment, doing science in such an inspiring place, in the same way. Some of us are born with the innate ability to see the world through objective eyes, the kind of mind that makes great science happen from an early age. And others find our way to science after being enlightened by trials and travails, failures and mistakes, missed opportunities and missteps.
No matter the journey, we all ended up here. Watching these great gray giants on their journeys.
And it all comes full circle doesn’t it?
Each of our journeys, human or whale, can lead to the very same point despite beginning at very different places. And in that diversity of experience, of life, of age, of color, is where we find our brightest moments, our grandest ideas and our future, driven by science.
