Taylor's Recap

The past two weeks of the internship has been mostly us coming up with our research question and proposal. We also have had multiple opportunities to go out and do things so that we are not stuck inside thinking all day. We took a lot of interesting tours of places around the area. We got to go out and learn about NICHES, Martell, the Purdue Wildlife Area, and Prophetstown. We have also gotten some training this week. I learned a lot about how to be a good mentor and how to handle conflict. This was very helpful for me since I have not been a mentor before, and I want to be the best mentor that I can be to the high school students that will be coming. I also learned basic CPR and what to do if something happens when out doing fieldwork. This past weekend (June 8th) a group of us went to Indianapolis to visit the zoo and to go to Indy Pride Fest. This was a great experience. I felt like being able to spend the day together really brought all of us closer together.

As for my partner and I’s research project, things went well. Reece and I work well together and bounce ideas off each other well. We were able to come up with a research question quickly and spent the rest of the week working out the details. We were able to finalize our sites and our methods. Wednesday, June 12, my partner and I got to start sampling. We learned very quickly that when doing fieldwork, things do not always go as planned. Our equipment was not working so we had to start sampling early. In a way, I am glad that this happened because it gave me the opportunity to learn how to troubleshoot problems with a piece of equipment I was not familiar with. Now that we have most of everything finalized and our proposal finished, we will be able to start sampling. I am excited to be able to get into the field. Although I have done all the sampling methods we will be doing, I can always use the practice. Also, we are sampling in some areas that I have not sampled in before so I am interested to see what our result will be.