Sunday night, I arrived at the Oregon State University Campus in Corvallis, Oregon.\u00a0 The next morning, my fellow summer scholars and I met up for orientation where we ate breakfast and conversed about expectations for the summer.\u00a0\u00a0 It was great to meet everyone and I\u2019m excited to spend the summer with a good group of people.\u00a0 After our meeting, we went out to lunch and headed to Newport – my home for the next two months.\u00a0 The biggest shocker to me was how cold it is here even in the summer, but that is something that I will have to get used to.<\/p>\n
My first day on the job was Tuesday.\u00a0 I met my mentor, Ted DeWitt, and he briefed me on the project that we will be doing over the summer.\u00a0 So basically, what I\u2019m going to be doing is setting up these chambers made out of 6 inch diameter PVC pipe attached to a cubitainer, which you can probably guess is a plastic container in the shape of a cube.\u00a0 The cubitainer is filled with water with a known nutrient concentration and attached to the PVC pipe with a hose and is placed below the chamber in the estuary. \u00a0As the tide rises over the cubitainer, the pressure forces the water out and into the chamber and when the tide falls, the water drains into the cubitainer again.\u00a0 After a tidal cycle, we can analyze the nutrients in the cubitainer to see if there were any changes.\u00a0 As you may know, wetlands are extremely good at removing nutrients to clean the water, so we are trying to find out what is removing it and how much it is removing.\u00a0 Unfortunately nature is not cut and dry, so this is way easier said than done.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seagrantscholars\/files\/2011\/06\/chambers1-300x225.jpg\")
<\/a>Nutrient chambers that we will be setting up. <\/p><\/div>\n
This afternoon, I got to experience my first day of field work.\u00a0 I went out with the chemical technician here, Jody Stecher, to set up the bases for the chambers.\u00a0 Dealing with tides is never something that I had to do before, so that was a new experience for me.\u00a0 In Hawaii the difference between high tide and low tide is about one and a half feet while here it\u2019s usually eight feet or more.\u00a0 So timing is everything when it comes to the tides.\u00a0 In order to get to the spot where we set up the chambers we had to cross a small stream.\u00a0 By the time we got done, the small stream was turning into a large creek.\u00a0 I\u2019m afraid that I won\u2019t pay attention to the tides enough and get stuck somewhere!\u00a0 So, what we were doing today was preparing for Monday when we are going to be out on the estuary all day to deploy the chambers and run the experiment.\u00a0 My coworker Caitlin explained to me all we do is, \u201cPrepare for field work, do field work, and recover from field work.\u201d \u00a0I found that to be funny.<\/p>\n
As you know, the organization that I was paired with was the famous (or infamous, depending on how you view it) Environmental Protection Agency.\u00a0 As a scientist, there are three main job markets that I can go into: government, industry, or academia.\u00a0 Being a student, I have a lot of background in academia while this internship lets me dally in the government sector of the work force.\u00a0 I\u2019ve heard many different stories about what it\u2019s like to work for the government, so I\u2019m excited to take a stab at it myself for the summer.\u00a0\u00a0 The first thing that I noticed when I walked into the door was a picture of Obama and Biden in the entry way.\u00a0 I was also surprised to find out that our mail is x-rayed before we get it and that our computer network is under constant attack from intruders that would love to get a hold of the information here.\u00a0 I never realized how many people are trying to take the EPA down.\u00a0 Working for EPA involves a lot of protocol that we have to go through on a daily basis.\u00a0 If something goes wrong with my computer, I can\u2019t just run down the hall to grab the tech guy, I must call the helpdesk which is somewhere in the U.S. and then they walk me through the problem remotely or they contact the tech guy to help me.\u00a0 Thankfully I haven\u2019t had any problems yet.\u00a0 Since I will be involved with field and lab work, I had to take an online safety training course that is supposed to last 24 hours from start to finish.\u00a0 Thankfully, I got it done in less than a day but most of it was regarding things that I will never have to do here.\u00a0 So far I haven\u2019t had much of a problem with anything.\u00a0 As I have learned, working for the EPA involves extreme organization.\u00a0 Everything must be planned and recorded which I think is overall a good thing.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/seagrantscholars\/files\/2011\/06\/desk-225x300.jpg\")
<\/a>Sitting at my new desk ready to get started.<\/p><\/div>\n
So far my week has been exciting and I have learned a lot.\u00a0 I am asking as many questions as I can from as many people as I can.\u00a0 I can\u2019t wait for Monday when I get to be out in the field all day.\u00a0 I\u2019m not a fan of sitting at a desk staring at a computer, so I\u2019m so glad to have gotten this opportunity.\u00a0 I hope that this experience is overall a positive one.\u00a0 Stay tuned to learn about what I am doing every week.\u00a0 I will keep you as updated as I can!<\/p>\n
Sara Duncan<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Aloha everyone! My name is Sara Duncan and I say \u2018Aloha\u2019 because I am currently a senior at Hawaii Pacific University studying Environmental Science.\u00a0 For Summer 2011, I am partaking in the Oregon Sea Grant Summer Scholars Program where I … Continue reading