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Academic
Services Event Archive
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Updated:
30 March 2007
Alternative
Spring Break Program
2007
Student
Biographies
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About
the ASB Program
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Special
Tours Photo Gallery
Each
spring university students have the opportunity to spend
their week-long spring break at the National Museum of
Natural History participating in the Museum's ongoing
activities. The program is coordinated by Mary Sangrey,
Head of the Office of Academic Services. In 2007 students
selected projects and advisors from a list
of about 14 NMNH options.
In
2007 there were 16 students who participated in the Alternative
Spring Break Program, 3 from the University of Michigan
ASB program.
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Spring
Break Students
26
Feb - 2 Mar 2007
Nayeoung Kim
Andrew MacLaren
Tonia Schneider
5
- 9 March 2007
Maureen Murphy
12
- 16 March 2007
Jerome Bucceri
Ashlei Cooke
Gwen Corder
Elizabeth Finn
Milo Mietzner
Carolyn Porrata
Cris Salas
Dong-Hyok So
19
- 23 March 2007
Morgan Little
Tara Lynn
26 - 30 March 2007
Christine Regan
2
- 6 April 2007
Nakita Persaud
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The
Department of Botany hosted eight of the '07 Spring Break
interns.
The week of 12 - 16 Mar 07 was particularly active with
interns plus Earth Watch volunteers joining in project
activities. Bianca Lipscomb (front, center) coordinated
many of the Botany aspects, including a visit to the Botanic
Garden.
Jerome
Bucceri
 Jerome
is a Junior at Ohio Wesleyan University majoring
in Sociology and Anthropology.
During
his week at the Museum Jerome worked with Richard
Wunderman in the Department of Mineral Sciences
helping to edit and produce the January 2007 issue
of the Bulletin of the Global Volcanism Network
(BGVN
32:01). available on the our GVP website,
a place where millions of people go to learn about
active volcanism.
Comments
his advisor Rick Wunderman: "Jerome Bucceri
was both energetic and enthusiastic. He really
seemed to enjoy helping out. Owing
to a serious shortage of professional staff, getting
that issue out was a workout and Jerome pulled
hard and learned a lot. He made a big difference
and I appreciate his efforts."
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Ashlei
Cooke
 Ashlei
is a Sophomore at the College of William and Mary
where she's majoring in neurobiology.
Cris
Salas, Ashlei Cooke and Carolyn Porrata created
a formidable team while working on the Pacific
Islands Ethnobotany Project. Sponsored by the
Earthwatch Institute, the aim of this project
is to build a compendium of information about
plant usage in the Pacific Islands. Working directly
from herbarium specimens, some of which document
usage more than 100 years ago, they collected
and recorded plant scientific names, common names,
uses, applications, and the cultures using the
species. These data will form the basis of an
online resource for students and scholars around
the world.
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Gwen
Corder
 Gwen
is in her final year as a graduate student at
the University of Louisville where she is specializing
in curatoral studies. During spring break she
worked with Amy Bolton in the Office of Guest
Services helping in the Discovery Room.
During
her Discovery Room Collections internship Gwen:
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Conducted an analysis of the square footage required
to house the entire collection Discovery Room
collection
- Prepared a plan to move the collection to another
location including materials needed and sizes
of storage units (shelves, quarter units, etc.)
- Developed a numbering system for locating objects
including numbering objects, bags, trays, shelves
and units
- Created a template (excel file) for collection
inventory
- Tested the new template by inputting specimen
or artifact data.
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Nayeoung
Kim
 Nayeoung
received her undergraduate degree from Michigan
State University in Telecommunication, Information
and Media in May of 2005. She is currently a first
year graduate student at the University of Michigan
School of Information where she is specializing
in human and computer interaction. For he spring
break week she worked with Dennis Hasch in the
Office of Information Technologies, Web Services
Branch.
Nayeoung
worked on, and completed, phase one of a project
to Flash animate the main NMNH web page intro
images section to blend multiple highlights and
exhibit happenings at the museum. She programmed
and documented how to transition the images as
well as the associated text and web links. We
still have a few minor modifications to make for
the presentation, but she provided us with a solid
foundation and baseline Flash file.
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Morgan
Little
 Morgan
will graduate this May (2007) from the University
of Maryland, Baltimore County with a Bachelor
of Arts degree in Ancient Studies. She also serves
as a curator at the UMBC Albin O. Kuhn Gallery.
Next fall she will begin her graduate education
at George Washington University in the Museum
Studies program. She spent her spring break documenting
the history and stories of some of Natural History's
staff in the Department of Botany, including Harold
Robinson and Ruth Schallert.
An
excerpt from Morgan's article on Harold Robinson:
"Far
beyond the blockbuster
paleontology exhibits, awe-inspiring gemstones,
and carefully displayed exotic mammals that spellbound
millions of visitors at the Smithsonian National
Museum of Natural History each year, is a still
more fascinating component of the museum, in the
most unlikely of places, far beyond the public
eye. A variety of un-accessioned treasures with
stories of their own to tell- curators, research
scientists, and technicians alike- embody the
National Museum of Natural History, and are worthy
of as much study as the exhibits utilizing their
research.
Dr.
Harold Robinson became a member of the Department
of Botany at the National Museum of Natural History
in October of 1962, and clearly remembers all
forty-four years he has spent there since. At
the time he was hired, as a "mere youngster"
with the "union card" (a Ph.D.), Dr.
Robinson and the rest of the department resided
in the cramped quarters of the Smithsonian Castle.
Dr. Robinson used to take the bus to work, almost
always arriving at the corner of the department
of Justice at the same time as J. Edgar Hoover
and his limo. The two exchanged stares bright
and early in the morning, and Dr. Robinson has
a feeling they wouldn't have gotten along had
they met one another."
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- > Read
the full article
An
excerpt from Morgan's article on Ruth Schallert:
"If
the book-lined walls of the Botany Branch Library
at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural
History could talk, they would speak through the
mouth of Mrs. Ruth Schallert. Incidentally, she
is the sole librarian, and has single-handedly
cared for all 60,000 of the books in the collection
for the past 40 years. When the Smithsonian sent
out the call for a librarian in the newly constructed
Botany Branch Library in the winter of 1966, Mrs.
Schallert answered, and has been a part of the
Museum of National History's history ever since.
The
west wing of the museum had just been built, and
the Botany Library was still undergoing construction,
when Ruth began the formidable task of organizing
the museum's jumbled Botany collection. Catalogued
in both the Dewey Decimal, and Library of Congress
systems, the books were not so much organized,
but disorganized, in such a state of disarray
that researches had to look two places for one
book. Mrs. Schallert completed the daunting challenge
of synthesizing the collection into the research-friendly
Library of Congress system in 1989. She became
a leading expert in the bibliography of botany,
assisting fellow experts from around the world,
their names on the title pages of her books, with
their daunting botany projects in turn."
-
- > Read
the full article
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Tara
Lynn
 Tara
is Junior at the University of Maryland, College
Park where she's majoring in Marine Biology. She
spent her spring break working with scientific
illustrator, Molly Ryan, in the Department of
Invertebrate Zoology scanning images of invertebrates.
Comments
her advisor, Molly Ryan: "Tara Lynn was
very efficient at scanning invertebrate illustrations
from the archive. The job needed care in handling
the drawings and patience for sitting hour after
hour doing a somewhat boring task."
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Andrew
MacLaren
 Andrew
is a second year graduate student at the University
of Michigan, School of Information Science. He
spent his week working with Jim Harle in the Department
of Botany organizing the map collection.
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S.
Milo Mietzner
 Milo
is a first year graduate student at the University
of Minnesots, Twin Cities where he is focusing
his studies on Cultural Heritage and Museum Studies.
In addition to his graduate work, he is an exhibit
developer with KidZibits, LLC. His research interests
include human and environmental relationships
through time-particularly climate change in the
past and present-and how exhibits can effectively
interpret such complex topics. He spent his spring
break documenting the history and stories of some
of Natural History's staff including Stan Shetler
in the Department of Botany and Betty Meggers
from the Department of Anthropology.
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Maureen
Murphy
Maureen
will graduate this May (2007) with a degree in
Studio Art from the University of Mary Washington.
She spent her spring break working on the Wilkes
project with Bianca Lipscomb in the Department
of Botany, but also ventured over to the Department
of Paleobiology one afternoon (as pictured below)
to learn more about the Paleontology collections.
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Nakita
Persaud
 Nakita
is a Sophomore at Binghamton University where
she's majoring in Biology.
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Carolyn
Porrata
 Carolyn
will graduate in May (2007) with a degree in Art
History from the University of Texas at Austin.
Cris
Salas, Ashlei Cooke and Carolyn Porrata created
a formidable team while working on the Pacific
Islands Ethnobotany Project. Sponsored by the
Earthwatch Institute, the aim of this project
is to build a compendium of information about
plant usage in the Pacific Islands. Working directly
from herbarium specimens, some of which document
usage more than 100 years ago, they collected
and recorded plant scientific names, common names,
uses, applications, and the cultures using the
species. These data will form the basis of an
online resource for students and scholars around
the world.
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Christine
Regan
 Christine
is a sophomore at the University of Delaware where
she's majoring in Art Conservation.
Christine
spent her week working with Jim Harle in the Department
of Botany organizing the map collection.
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Marielos
Cris Salas
 Cris
is a graduating Senior (May, 2007) currently attending
Eastern Kentucky University where she is majoring
in Anthropology and Art.
Cris
Salas, Ashlei Cooke and Carolyn Porrata created
a formidable team while working on the Pacific
Islands Ethnobotany Project. Sponsored by the
Earthwatch Institute, the aim of this project
is to build a compendium of information about
plant usage in the Pacific Islands. Working directly
from herbarium specimens, some of which document
usage more than 100 years ago, they collected
and recorded plant scientific names, common names,
uses, applications, and the cultures using the
species. These data will form the basis of an
online resource for students and scholars around
the world.
Subsequent
to her spring break internship, Cris was selected
for a Katzenberger Internship, to return to NMNH
to work with Molly Ryan in the Department of Invertebrate
Zoology. The Katzenberger Foundation Art History
Internship Program is a need-based program supporting
internships for undergraduates in research and
collections projects at the Smithsonian Institution
in Washington, D.C. The program is generously
funded by the Katzenberger Foundation and administered
by the Smithsonian Center for Education and Museum
Studies.
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Tonia
Schneider
 Tonia
is a graduate student at the University of Michigan,
School of Information where she is specializing
in archives and records management. She spent
her spring break working with scientific illustrator,
Molly Ryan, in the Department of Invertebrate
Zoology scanning images of invertebrates.
Comments
her advisor Molly Ryan: "Tonia was efficient
at scanning invertebrate illustrations from my
archive. The job needed care in handling the drawings
and patience for sitting hour after hour doing
a somewhat boring task. She also assisted with
checking on and sorting some paintings which had
questionable data."
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Elizabeth
Scotten Finn
 Beckie
is a first year graduate student at Antioch University
in New England, pursuing a Masters degree in Environmental
Studies.
Beckie
participated in the Palmer Ethnobotany Project
in the Department of Botany. Working with Rusty
Russell, Collections Manager, and Jamie Whitacre,
Project Manager, she assisted in the processing
of plant collections made by Dr. Edward Palmer
in Mexico and southwest U.S. over a century ago.
These specimens were made by Palmer in his attempts
to document the use of plants by numerous indigenous
communities within this region. His handwritten
notes (oftentimes enclosed in pockets on each
specimen) record usage information, some of which
has never been published. The project has already
produced a bilingual exhibit in the Museum, and
additional publications are pending.
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Dong-Hyok
So
 Dong-Hyok
("DH") is a Senior at Virginia Commonwealth
University majoring in Mass Communications with
special emphasis on strategic advertizing. He
worked with Dennis Hasch in the Office of Information
Technologies, Web Services Branch.
DH
mastered and documented the use of a personal
audio recording device as a demo to record audio
podcasts. He also organized and recorded select
museum interviews that we will use as audio podcasting
demos for various NMNH content offerings (including
a pod cast of the Spring Break tour of Paleobotany
with Dan Chaney).
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Birds
Collection Tour
Carla
Dove hosted a tour of the bird collection on Monday,
26 Feb 07 from noon to 12:45 p.m. for about 12 interns
& fellows.
Meteorite
Room Tour
Another
special event for our Spring Break interns, Linda Welzenbach
hosted a tour of the meteorite collection in the Mason-Clarke
Room on Friday, 2 Mar 07 from noon to 12:45 p.m.
Paleobotany
Collection Tour
On
Wednesday, 14 Mar 07 our Spring Break and other interns
joined Dan Chaney for a behind-the-scenes look
at the paleobotany collections.
Invertebrate
Zoology Collection Tour
On
Wednesday, 21 Mar 07 our Spring Break and other interns joined
Chris Mah for a behind-the-scenes look at the invertebrate
zoology collections.
Mammals
Collection Tour
On
Wednesday, 28 Mar 07 a full crowd of about 15 interns and
fellows joined Suzie Peurach for a tour through the
new zoology specimen preparation lab and mammals alcohol rooms,
as well as showing of specimens from the mammals "OH
MY" research collection. A visit to the Great Ape room
was an added feature.
About
the Alternative Spring Break Program
The
Alternative Spring Break Program (ABS) provides
college-level undergraduate and graduate students
an opportunity to join week-long projects in a
wide variety of professional settings throughout
the NMNH community. The goal is to place interested
and motivated undergraduate and graduate students,
during the week of their spring break, in a professional
work environment at the National Museum of Natural
History where they can...
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gain
practical experience by working in a professional
Museum setting
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develop
new skills by learning from NMNH professionals
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provide
a service to the organization by contributing
their time and talents
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create
professional partnerships
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pursue
their fields of interest related, or not, to
their current profession
Please
note: No financial assistance, housing, or travel
are provided as part of this opportunity. Students
are responsible for making their own arrangements.
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