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We’re re-branding ourselves as the Graduate Student Committee (GSC)! We want to make it clear that GSC is a graduate student group that works on behalf of fellow graduate students.

Our mission and duties will remain the same and we will continue to act as a liaison between students and faculty/staff. We do this in a number of ways that include quarterly meetings with the Dean and attending faculty committee meetings (which are actually fascinating). As an example, we brought our concerns about the lack of a solid grad student space to the Dean, and now Dawes House is currently being converted into a grad student hang out space. We’re just doing our thang under a new name!

As always, another part of our mission is to build community between departments and faculty. GSC organizes social events, like Snow Weekend and snack lunch, runs CEOAS awards, coordinates gear sales, awards student travel grants, and organizes College-wide volunteer projects. We’re also working on some cool new ideas to connect students with people in the private sector to learn more about skills students might need for jobs outside of academia.

Please contact us with comments/questions at our new e-mail address: (gsc@coas.oregonstate.edu)

SAC has developed a Survival Guide with tips n’ tricks for incoming students. Check it out and share with incoming students in your lab group!

The Student Advisory Committee (SAC) is now accepting applications for Summer 2014 travel reimbursements.

The purpose of SAC travel reimbursements is to provide an additional funding opportunity for student travel that is not otherwise covered by the student’s primary sources of travel funding. Per the SAC website: “Students attending conferences, workshops, or off-campus courses for which they receive only partial or no financial support from other sources, may apply for travel reimbursement to SAC.”

The deadline to submit your application is FRIDAY, August 15, 2014.

You can also find the SAC Travel Reimbursement Form on the website (http://ceoas.oregonstate.edu/current/sac/).

Please drop the completed Travel Reimbursement Form, all receipts, conference abstract and a short statement about the pertinence of the meeting in the SAC mailbox in CEOAS admin (NOT the CEOAS Travel mailbox). Applications will be considered for a maximum reimbursement equal to the total cost demonstrated in receipts, so please remember to attach all relevant receipts.

Note: if you are graduating at the end of this summer term you are not eligible for reimbursement. SAC can only refund money to students enrolled the following term.

If you are traveling after August 15th, please submit your application next term. The deadlines for the coming terms are posted on the SAC website. Please feel free to contact us with any questions.

Come celebrate the end of the year with delicious ice cream cones! SAC is actively recruiting CEOAS students to represent all disciplines in the college.

Come get to know us more and enjoy a sweet treat!

ALL CEOAS students and staff welcome!

• What: FREE ICE CREAM #needwesaymore
• When: Friday, June 6th from 4-5pm #pre-beersnack
• Where: Burt Courtyard #sunshine
• Who: You and your friends #fun

Please come see us in CEOAS Admin from 12-2pm every day until Friday June 13th. We can accept checks AND cash!

We’ll be selling t-shirts and hoodies with the new logo designed by our very own Mo Bancroft, along with tote bags and hats with the classic logos.

If you cannot make it to these hours between now and then, come out for the SAC sponsored ice cream social this Friday, June 6 and we will gladly sell you something between 4 and 5 PM!

If you can’t make it for ice cream, just e-mail SAC, and we’ll work something out with you.

Thanks for your support!

CEOAS Merch Flyer

Are you finishing up your MS/MA/PhD document now or in the near future? Need to prepare it for final submission to your committee and to the grad school?

Bojan Šavrič and Jennifer Veilleux are offering a tutorial on how to format your thesis/dissertation document for submission.

What: We will walk you through graduate school guidelines with the formatting tools found inside of your Microsoft Word program. All the styles and automated functions that you need already exist in Word,and Bojan will explain how to demystify the process of coding your document. (Such as how to automatically populate your Table Of Contents or how to automatically generate chronological numbers for your figures.) This can also help you in general with any document you are preparing for submission for publication.

When and Where: Wednesday, May 21st from 1300-1400 in Wilkinson Room 203.

*You are welcome to bring your lunch*

Jen recently went through this process with her PhD document and found Bojan’s assistance hugely helpful. Now they want to share this insider knowledge with you too!

The CEOAS egg hunt last Saturday, organized by Jen Lam and Liz King with SAC, was a success! We had over 20 kids participate in the event, which included over 550 hidden eggs, face painting, music, and refreshments! Check out photos from the event taken by Aurelie Moulin.

SAC has created a CEOAS-specific craigslist-like forum for anyone in the CEOAS community looking to advertise for roommates/housing or buy/sell miscellaneous goods.

See the webpage here for more information, or go directly to the link!

Several talented CEOAS students have their own blogs. Check them out below!

• Oceans Simplified (by Aurelie Moulin)

“Just about every day I am asked something about the ocean. How are the whales doing? What is climate change going to do to the ocean? Can I keep eating tuna? Do you dive? How does an ocean model work? What’s the Coriolis force? What is it like to be an oceanographer? What causes El Niño? Are coral reefs dying?  Why do you do what you do? If I am not asked about the ocean, I read inaccurate or wrong statements about the ocean in this interminable quest to sensationalize simple facts or debunk climate change.
With this blog, I hope to:

1. share with you my passion of the ocean, how it works, who lives in it and how well it is doing.
2. teach you about things I know, or break down peer-reviewed articles I read so that anyone can understand them.
3. learn from you anything ocean-related you would like to share.
4. answer any questions you may have about the ocean. Want to know something? ASK ME ANYTHING! If I can’t answer, I know where to look or who to ask. In any case, I promise an honest and accurate answer, with science-worthy references.
5. correct wrong or inaccurate statements I read on blogs or in layman press with a scientific proof. If you read something and want to know if this is true, please ask.
6. show you how the oceans matter to all of us and why we should work on making them healthier.
7. suggest things you can do to help conserve and protect our oceans, or the environment in a broader sense.”

Aurelie would be more than happy to write posts about papers being published by CEOAS students to promote their work. Contact her if interested!

• The Way of Water (by Jennifer Veilleux)

“Oregon State University Geography PhD Student, Jennifer Veilleux, records her fieldwork, research, and thoughts about transboundary water resources development in the Nile River and Mekong River basins. Particular attention is given to Ethiopia’s Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam and Laos’ Xayaburi Dam.”

• Oceans, the Arctic, and Science Exploration (by Allison Einolf)

“Allison Einolf is a doctoral student in Physical Oceanography at Oregon State University studying with Emily Schroyer. She is interested in all things arctic and got her start blogging at Icy Seas during a summer internship with Andreas Muenchow at the University of Delaware.”