Walking on Mars: Dementia education through a play written by nurses.

Miami Regionals nursing faculty member Ann Bobonick has teamed up with her mentor Patricia Irwin, a nurse therapist and former Miami faculty member, to write a play to explore issues surrounding the growing prevalence of dementia.

“When Everything Looked So Dark” will get its premiere Thursday night in a Miami University Hamilton Theatre production. “The initial concept was Pat’s idea,” Ann said, but she is glad to have been a part of its development.

Performances will be 7:30 p.m. April 21, 22 and 23 in the studio theater in 307 Phelps Hall. All three shows are sold out.

“Asking me to help write a play was like asking me if I would walk on Mars with her,” she said. “I had never done anything like that. I don’t consider myself creative.”

She had known Pat for many years—both members of the Sacred Heart Church in Fairfield– and it was upon Pat’s advice that she got into nursing in the first place, “so how could I say ‘no’ to this lady?”

Pat said her first exposure to Alzheimer’s disease came around the time she got married when her Uncle Pete was suffering with it, and since then through her practice she has encountered many other cases with clients struggling with relatives who have the disease.

“There are five million active dementia cases right now in America,” she said, “and in ten years there will be thirteen million because we are living longer.”

She began working on the play five years ago to explore some of these issues. She came up with the idea of exploring a family in crisis, when a young man who is struggling to find direction in his life is suddenly confronted with the loss of his mother and is being pushed into taking care of his grandmother–Grandy–who has dementia.

“Grandy had said to her daughter, ‘Never put me in one of those places,'” Pat said, which is a common stance. “He chooses to keep his mother’s promise to not put Grandy away, so he sleeps at her bedside and learns a lot about who he is.”

Three years ago, she shared the concept with Bridget Ossman, a friend who is a teacher-turned-playwright and who encouraged her to continue working on it. Ossman coincidentally, is the sister of Bekka Eaton Reardon, Associate Professor in theatre at Miami Hamilton.

“Pat had heard me talk about teaching geriatric nursing at Miami,” Ann said, “and how the students and I lost our hearts to the people we served. It was then that she asked me to co-author the play.”

Over the next year, Pat and Ann would meet intermittently to create and develop the scenes. A new character was added, the girlfriend of the caregiver who would bring in her geriatric learning as a nursing student in to support Russell’s caregiver journey.

“When Everything Looks So Dark” comes from a lyric in the Johnny Mercer song “Accentuate the Positive” by Johnny Mercer, “because that’s what Russell learns to do with Grandy,” Pat said.
Directed by Bekka Eaton Reardon, the cast includes Miami Hamilton students Tyler King and Hannah Rastopsoff and Pat Napier, long-time theatre practitioner.

Each performance will be followed with a talk-back and panel discussion that will include a different slate of professional and personal caregivers each night.

“The arts can get deeper than more traditional teaching methods to help people learn,” Ann said. “If this goes further, perhaps it could be used to help train personal or professional caregivers.”

“It was a revelation, a gift to see it coming to life through these actors,” Pat said, “more than we expected.”

“To have them do this is beyond our wildest dreams,” Ann added. “It goes so much deeper when you see it coming through the actors.”

 

Making a Difference: Halle Gudgell

Miami Regionals’ student Halle Gudgell is full-time mother, full-time student, full-time community advocate.

Halle Gudgell didn’t plan on going to college right out of high school, and she didn’t plan on staying in Hamilton. But since she did, the Miami Hamilton campus and the entire city–if not the entire community–are enjoying the fruits of her unexpected journey.

Halle’s “Plan A” in high school was to join the United States Navy as Military Police when she graduated in 2014, and since she goes all-out when she goes, she was a leader in the Hamilton High School NJROTC program.

Halle speaking at Hamilton High in Mrs. Huff’s class about getting involved with Seat at the Table and how important it is to get involved in your community.

“I felt it was my duty as a citizen to serve and put my time in, to give back to my country,” she said. “Anybody can tell I’m a very patriotic person. I’m all about the red, white and blue, and my friends all make fun of me.”

But halfway through her senior year, she got pregnant, and switched to “Plan B”, a degree in criminal justice from Miami University Regionals with the goal of becoming a civilian police officer.

As it often happens, however, a class opened her eyes to another path. In Halle’s case, it was a Political Science class in her very first semester.

“One of my professors said that if you want to see change, you have to make a difference yourself,” she said. “Basically, if you can’t beat them, join them. Politics is the way our country is run, regardless of how corrupt it may seem.”

A friend in that class enlisted her aid in starting a new group, Student Association for Law and Politics.

“So we started that last year,” Halle recalled. “We hosted a Meet the Candidates Night at Miami Hamilton Downtown and a voter registration event. We even took a group to Washington, D.C. for a tour.”

“We hosted an event called Politics and Pizza where students can come in and voice their opinion, talk about what’s on their minds, and we provide the pizza,” she said. “There aren’t a lot of places you can go to discuss these things without being judged.”

In a busy life, being a mother is one of the most rewarding things and in the end, her son Clayton is Halle’s motivation.

During her freshman year, she decided to run for the Miami Senate, but soon raised her sights higher to the executive level and ran for secretary of the student government. She had her campaign all planned out with posters and candy give-a-ways so that she could reach out to her fellow students, so even when her opponents dropped out of the race, she followed through on the campaign, and she won. A year later, she was elected president of Miami Hamilton’s Student Government Association.

She also helped start a local program for the community called Seat at the Table, a nonprofit organization to promote voting and to get people registered.

“From there it took off to trying to get people more civically engaged in their community,” she said. “Right now, we’re working inside the high schools to build programs to help against the heroin epidemic. We’re connecting them with local officials, helping them build change in their community.”

“Back in June, we had a summit where Hamilton Mayor Pat Moeller and other officials came in and spoke to the students about getting involved and making change.”

Halle is also active in the Criminal Justice Society, a student group that has hosted events like jail tours and recruitment nights to open a light on opportunities in the criminal justice field.

Because of her lingering interest in the military, she also got involved in campus programs to help veterans, and from there her efforts began to spread off campus and out more into the community.

At a veteran’s awards ceremony at the Voice of America Learning Center, she met State Representative Tim Derickson.

“After the ceremony I introduced myself and invited him to a veteran’s dinner for the Nicholas Olivas Fund,” she said. “We stuck around for an hour talking. He’s come and done other veteran’s events.”

When Derickson decided to run in the Republican primary for the Congressional seat vacated by John Boehner, she joined that campaign and now spends her weekends knocking on doors and making phone calls to voters throughout the Eighth District on Derickson’s behalf.

And if that isn’t enough, she’s also joined forces with a group of community activists who are trying to raise awareness of one of the city’s neglected parks, Combs Park along the Great Miami River near the dam in north Hamilton.

“I started working on this in October and when the weather warms up we’ll jump on it again,” she said. “I’ve gone out there several times. I didn’t realize how big that park was and how much potential it has.”

All this, in addition to being a young mother, keeps Halle busy. But she has the energy and the drive to be the change she wants to see in the world.

She still plans on a career in law enforcement when she graduates in 2018, but she also sees herself actively involved in politics.

Does that include running for office?

“Maybe,” she said. But just then her vice-president, standing nearby and listening in on the conversation chimes in: “Most definitely!”

MUH Regional Campuses launch first master’s degree program

Miami University Hamilton

In the office of Capt. Stephen Van Winkle, Miami University Police, there is a large wall, bare but for the obligatory coat of flat white latex paint. Nearby, there is a stack of framed certificates and diplomas waiting to be hung, including one from the F.B.I. Academy.

Capt. Van Winkle said that he is waiting for one more before he hangs them all, a very important one to serve as a centerpiece for all the rest: His Master’s degree in Criminal Justice.

He is now on his way to earning that diploma as he and fellow officer Lt. Jim Bechtolt have become the first to enroll in the Masters of Criminal Justice at the Miami University Regionals.

What’s more, Van Winkle and Bechtolt are making history by being the very first graduate students in a Miami Regionals program.

“There are a lot of Masters degrees in Criminal Justice, but we had found there was a gap in the market,” said Daniel E. Hall, chair of the Department of Justice and Community Studies, “providing an on-line degree intended for people who are in the field seeking promotion or career advancement.”

So the degree was designed to be completed completely online. There are two concentrations available, administration and crime analysis, with both theory and practice components enlisting the aid of other Regional Campus departments. While it is too soon to tell as this is the first semester of the program, Hall predicts that the crime analysis concentration will eventually become popular as there are few universities offering Masters degrees in that area.

“We teamed up with the Department of Geography, which offers geographic information system classes,” Hall said. “They have designed a GIS in criminal justice. Our Statistics Department is going to offer predictive analytics.”

The Miami University Regionals program is also unique because most graduate masters degrees typically end with a comprehensive exam or a thesis.

“We have a required project as a culminating experience for every student to bring together everything they learned,” he said. “Because they are in the field, they can identify a real problem where they are working or in their community, and then in the end come up with a solution or recommendation.”

It could be about anything, Hall said, from shift scheduling to race relations, how to better train officers in making stops.

The program should also prove to be attractive to professionals in areas other than policing.

“It could be anything in a justice-related area,” Hall said. “It could be corrections, probations, parole, out of the courts, but I guess that 50 to 75 percent will be policing.”

At current staffing, Hall said the master’s program can accommodate about 20 students without jeopardizing the undergraduate program, which has grown tremendously in recent years, with the blessing of the Dean’s office to grow to 40.

“We were two faculty five years ago and we’re eight full-time now,” he said. “Plus, we have a really good cadre of part-time faculty, including former instructor Judge Keith Spaeth and current instructor John McCandless, the chief of Miami University Police Department. Other master’s degree programs are taught by graduate assistants, but all of our courses will be faculty.”

Both Van Winkle and Bechtolt are taking the administrative concentration, and both said the convenience of being able to take all of their classes online was a distinct advantage to selecting the Regional Campus program over others.

“Until recently there weren’t many online courses available,” Van Winkle said. “I did look at other institutions with fully-online programs, but once this program was developed here, I knew there was no way I was not going to enroll.

“As working professionals, this isn’t just a Monday through Friday office job,” he said. “We get calls at two or three o’clock in the morning, so it’s such a convenience to work at our own pace.”

Van Winkle said that a Master’s degree will help him be a more well-rounded administrator, more in tune to what is going on in the outside world, more receptive to different ideas and viewpoints, more responsible to the citizenry.

“I set a goal when I was hired in here that I didn’t want to stay stagnant,” Bechtolt said. “You see a lot of officers who get content with what they’re doing, and that allows them to get jaded. I just want to keep excelling at different levels.

“To be good leaders, we have to be up-to-date at what’s going on so we can educate the young officers coming in,” he said.

Although it’s a new program and they’re just beginning the work, both Van Winkle and Bechtolt said they are recommending it to their fellow officers.

“It would definitely be a lot harder to do if you had to be in a bricks-and-mortar classroom,” Bechtolt said. “I don’t know that I would be able to do it. I know I wouldn’t be able to do it.”

For more information about the Master of Science in Criminal Justice, email criminaljustice@miamioh.edu or call 513.785.7702.

Mark Krekeler Research in Minerology Helps Improve the Environment

Dr. Mark Krekeler, Associate Professor of Geology & Environmental Earth Science at Miami University Hamilton and his students have done some remarkable research in environmental and industrial minerology, and he owes it all to a pig.

Through his undergraduate and most of his master’s degree, Krekeler had been trained as “a general geologist.”

“I’ve always been an outside person and I’ve always liked rocks,” he said.

But halfway through his master’s degree, a friend received a grant to go on a research trip to Honduras for two months and invited Krekeler to assist. That trip changed his perspective.

“We were mapping a river to find the ground water associated with it, and there was a woman there washing her clothes with a pig right next to her,” he said. “The pig does its business and she doesn’t break stride. At that moment, I thought there’s got to be a better way, so I started looking at minerals as a way to remove pollutants out of the environment.

“The nice thing about minerology is that it’s a lens through which we can view all kinds of things in society as well as science,” he said.

Since then, his career has taken a lot of different tracks. He’s an expert in a specific kind of clay mined in Georgia that is efficient in removing pollutants from water. He’s worked on ways to more efficiently remove gold from ore. And he has done research to get radioactive materials out of the environment.

“It’s all unified by minerology,” he said. “Minerals are a very systematic, ordered entity. If you understand minerals and their properties and explore why their properties vary, you can solve a lot of environmental problems.

“As an environmental and industrial mineralogist, I look at minerals as a resource and a tool to remove pollutants–phosphate, metals and pharmaceuticals–out of the environment.”

While his work has taken him to far-flung places around the United States, he and his students have done important research close to home.

Some of his students have published articles on lead pollution in Hamilton. Their research determined that a lot of lead in the environment has come from road paint.

“In the state of Ohio since 1947 they have used a lead-chromate based paint,” he said. “The basis was that it was insoluble and bright yellow. But they didn’t measure solubility over time.”

The first study was published in 2013, followed by another a year later about the nature and distribution of metal pollution.  Currently another paper is in review on the subject.

One of his graduate students  was able to trace the lead chromate into the river.

“The way our sewers are designed, it’s basically a direct pour, so to speak,” he said.

“There’s a decent amount of pollution in Hamilton,” he said. “I’ve started comparing our data to other places in the world, and we’re more polluted than 70 percent of other urban settings with respect to metals.”

The problem with metals, he said, is that they don’t go away once introduced into the environment. Even gasoline is eventually broken down by bacteria.

Since coming to Miami in the fall of 2008, Krekeler has had 50 undergraduate students present posters and papers at regional and national scientific conferences.

“I recruit students from my classes, where you can see where their interests lie and what they like to do,” he said. “I give them a small task and see where they go with it. From there, there are different ways of engaging students in research.”

Krekeler said that he tries to create a research environment where experiencing some degree of failure in experiments or analysis is just of a normal part of doing good science and is just a part of the learning process.

“It’s okay to try things out,” he said, “whether or not they come out as you expect.”

He encourages his undergraduate researcher to interact with his graduate students, and he leads a research group that meets weekly to coordinate the activities of his various research projects.

“We talk about being intellectually prepared for the meetings,” he said, “about how you deal with questions and the structure of questions, arguing why their projects are significant and what impacts they’ll have on society, why someone else might be interested.”

He also helps them frame their projects as a tool for going into industry or further research.

As a result, he said about 85 percent of his undergraduate research students continue in geology or science, either getting a job in industry or governmental agencies such as the EPA, or graduate school.

“That is pretty rare if you average things out nationally,” he said. “We’ve been fairly successful in getting our students involved early. That way, they develop their interests early and there’s a feedback loop that encourages them to do more.”

MU Regionals dubbed ‘Purple Heart University’

Miami University’s regional campuses in Hamilton and Middletown have been designated a “Purple Heart University” by the Military Order of the Purple Heart.

A signing ceremony will take place from 3-5 p.m. on Thurs., Oct. 22, in 142 Johnston Hall on the Middletown campus.

“This is welcome news for our faculty and staff who’ve been through the military-friendly training, and for our student veteran population, both current and future,” said J.P. Smith, Veterans Outreach Coordinator.
Several faculty and staff members in every academic department, as well as staff members in Admission, Financial Aid, Records & Registration, and the brand new One-Stop Centers for Student Success on each campus, have completed the Military-Friendly Training that includes a pledge to be veteran- and veteran-family friendly.
Each academic department also has a Chief Military Adviser (CMA) who serves as the primary point of contact for veterans enrolling in each academic program. They will sign their pledge forms during the ceremony.
Representatives from the Military Order of the Purple Heart Chapter 31, also will be on hand to sign the official “Purple Heart University” designation with Dr. G. Michael Pratt, associate provost and dean of the regional campuses, Smith said.
The training results in a thorough understanding of military terminology, the military mindset, academic and financial issues specific to veterans, benefits available to veterans, transfer of military training to college credit, and military training that aligns with specific academic programs.
“When a veteran arrives on the Hamilton or Middletown campus and asks questions, they get answers on the spot. That’s the level of service they expect, and that’s the level of service they deserve. We are immensely proud of our student veterans,” Smith said.
Miami Hamilton and Miami Middletown have a combined 130 veterans currently enrolled.
For more information, contact J.P. Smith by email at smithjp4@miamioh.edu or call (513) 785-7733. Miami University Hamilton is located at 1601 University Blvd. Miami Middletown is located at 4200 N. University Blvd.

HEY! Hamilton! Shop

Unity is necessary, says local NAACP leaders

By Clint Combs
HEY! Hamilton! correspondent

Local NAACP leaders believe that unity is the key to a happy community.

“We divide and conquer ourselves” said Michael Reeves, local NAACP President Michael Reeves at the group’s annual meeting laste week amid concerns that multiple ethnic organizations and poor communications hinder socioeconomic progress in Hamilton.

The concerns stem from a recent event at Bailey Square on S. 2nd ST where four other events were hosted on the same day according to NAACP members. “Unity is the only way communities get together,” said Reeves.

Samy Broyles, a recent graduate of Miami University Hamilton called for a “general information center” where all ethnic organizations can host events without colluding with each other.

Bob Harris a prominent community activist cited his trip to Los Angeles as a model of possibilities for the second ward “They have people rollerblading and dog walking”. Harris said. “Second ward has some of the most valuable property.”

“This is our most diverse class, since 1999” said Hamilton City Police Chief Craig Bucheit, aftert he hiring of two women and one black male. Bucheit urged more community members to apply for personnel positions with the Hamilton Police Department. Bucheit cited several requirements for the position: must be 21 years old, have either a high school diploma or GED and a valid driver’s license.

NAACP members were concerned about the diversity of teachers the Hamilton city school district. “How can we get professionals in Hamilton” said Miami University-Hamilton student, Ronald Goings. “Potential individuals works on endorsements to teach in other states” said Goings.

Broyles suggested that community leaders in the Second and Fourth wards should join the “17 Strong Initiative” an organization spearheaded by councilwomen Kathleen Klink in hopes of uniting residents and improving living conditions.

The next Hamilton-Fairfield-West Chester NAACP is scheduled for 6 pm, Sept. 24 at the Booker T Washington Center.

Miami Regionals Awarded TRIO Grant for Student Support Services‏

Miami University Regionals recently received a five year, $1.1 million ($220,000 per year) grant from the United States Department of Education through the TRIO Student Support Services (SSS) program. The goal of the program is to support and graduate eligible, highly motivated students by providing academic coaching, intensive advising, tutoring, mentoring, financial literacy workshops, and much more as students work toward their academic and career goals. The program is all about student success!

The program is specifically designed to support students who are typically the first in their family to attend college, returning to college, or just starting college after more than five years away from high school. Many of the participants will be recipients of the Pell award, or students who would benefit from academic support in reading, writing, or math.

A very important program objective is to help students graduate in a timely fashion while accumulating as little debt as possible. With intensely guided academic coaching, the students will avoid some common mistakes, learn strategies to overcome roadblocks, and stay focused on the goal of graduation. All SSS students will participate in a Financial Frontiers program, a program that provides basic instruction regarding student loans, financial management, and how to avoid debilitating debt burden. Along with the coaches is a network of tutors who will help the students achieve their academic goals with additional support from the Ambassadors (SSS student leaders), who will guide, motivate, and monitor the students’ progress.

The program will start with the planning and implementation stages this fall, and be completely up and running by the spring semester, 2016, with 140 participants all working toward their academic and career goals.

“Many students can clearly articulate what they want to accomplish. Executing that plan might be another story altogether. This program is designed to help students make it to the end line – to earn their degree and to move into the workforce without wasting time, energy, or money.

We are very fortunate to be one of the recipients of the TRIO grant as the SSS program goals are completely in alignment with the University’s goals and this money affords us the opportunity to support students who need it the most,” said Dr. G. Michael Pratt, Associate Provost and Dean of the Regional Campuses for Miami University.

If you are interested in learning more about the program, please contact Suesann Sepela at sepelase@miamioh.edu or 513.785.3027.

 

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Campus Kids gain accreditation and Four Stars

 When the tiny students of the Hamilton “Miami University Campus Kids” return this fall, they will be coming to a nationally-accredited and state-rated Four-Star facility.

Campus Kids is the licensed daycare and preschool that has occupied the south end of Schwarm Hall since it was built in 1997.

“Before that, there was a parent co-op on the first floor of Rentschler Hall,” said Traci Anderson, program director. “The parents would help and the students would help, but due to a state policy change for group care we relocated.”

For the past two years, Anderson has led Campus Kids through a self-study with the National Accreditation Commission for Early Care and Education Programs.

“Everything we do was considered,” she said, “our curriculum, our parent letters, our activities we do with the children, how we assess the children, how we do observations.”

A box of paperwork in her office topped with a thick three-ring binder containing the manual testified to the rigors of the accreditation.

“It’s a lot of work because it’s already things we were doing, but we had to document it all,” she said. “Sometimes, you’re wondering how you’re going to prove it. It was just a lot of paperwork because our focus is really on the children and being with them every day, so doing all the paperwork is very time consuming.”

After the intensive two-year self-study, an observer visited the classrooms in May to further substantiate that the program met the requirements.

“By achieving accreditation Miami University-Campus Kids provides a high quality program for children, professional development opportunities for staff, and an environment for children that is conducive to their individual growth and development that exceeds state licensing requirements,” said a letter of acknowledgement from the Association for Early Learning Leaders.

Earlier this year, Campus Kids received a Four-Star Step Up to Quality Award from the state of Ohio.

The upgraded rating was based on a number of criteria:

• Having lower staff to child ratios. The state requires a 1:7 ratio; Campus Kids has a 1:4 ratio.
• Using child assessment results to plan activities that best support learning and development goals for each child.
• Working with other organizations or businesses within the community to support children and their families.
• Having an active and organized parent volunteer group.
• Using input from families and community partners to inform continuous improvement process.
• Having accreditation by an approved organization.

Campus Kids serves between 30 and 35 toddlers and preschoolers, Anderson said. About half of them are children of Hamilton Campus students, and there is financial assistance available. The other half are children of faculty and staff. The center does not accept children from the community at large.

“There’s a degreed teacher in each classroom, and both of them are Miami University graduates who started working there when they were student workers,” Anderson said.

For more information on the Step Up to Quality program, visit www.earlychildhoodohio.org on the Internet. For more information on the National Accreditation Commission for Early Care and Education Programs visit www.earlylearningleaders.org. To learn more about Campus Kids, visit www.regionals.miamioh.edu/campuskids.

 

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New coach coming for local rowers

Christopher Greene, former assistant coach for the Cincinnati Junior Rowing Club (CJRC), has accepted the position as Head Coach for RowAmerica Hamilton starting August 1.

Coach Greene comes to RowAmerica Hamilton with national-level experience as a rower and a coach. He rowed for the Cincinnati Junior Rowing Club (CJRC) as a junior athlete while attending Xavier High School, finishing first at the 2004 Youth National Championship in the Varsity 8+. Following high school, he attended Brown University where current U.S. Men’s National Team head coach Lucas McGee and Brown University head coach Paul Cooke coached him. Chris led his freshman 8+ to an undefeated season and an Eastern Sprints championship. During his three years on the varsity squad his crew had top 5 National Championship finishes each year. He then came back to Cincinnati and coached for CJRC at both the novice and varsity levels. All of his crews finished on the podium at Midwest Regionals.

After taking a hiatus from the sport to get his Master’s Degree in Clinical Psychology, Coach Greene returned to coaching at CJRC as an Assistant Varsity Coach for the 2014-2015 season. CJRC dominated the entire season leading up to Youth Nationals, winning every event and sweeping Midwest Regionals in every event they entered. At 2015 Youth Nationals, the CJRC Lightweight 4+ went on to win the national championship, the Heavyweight four placed 4th, and the Varsity eight placed 9th.

Coach Greene joins RowAmerica Hamilton as Head Coach with a strong passion and knowledge for the sport that he hopes to spread to all those interested. Using his background in clinical psychology, he relates very well to not only youth rowers but adults as well, understanding what motivates each individual and successful ways to build camaraderie within the team. Director of Rowing, Joy Nix, is “excited to have Chris on the leadership team at RowAmerica Hamilton. He brings great experience with him and will take our racing programs to the next level in attracting competitive athletes to the team, directing athletes in getting rowing scholarships to colleges, and getting crews on the top of the podium at Nationals.”

Coach Greene shared that; “I hope to make an immediate impact on performance, retention, and club culture. My ultimate goal for RowAmerica Hamilton is to help push athletes past their own expectations not only as individuals but as rowers and teammates as well.”

Chris will coach a number of programs this season with his focus on the Youth Racing Team starting August 24, 2015. He will also coach the Youth Intro programs and Adult Intro programming to help build up our program base. “Having Chris coach the introductory programs gives all programming a level of consistency and will help new athletes get on the path to competing with the racing teams more quickly should that be their goal,” adds Nix.

For more information about RowAmerica Hamilton, please contact Joy Nix at (513) 642- 9569 or jnix@rowhamilton.com.

MUH Biology Students Score Big with Research

Undergraduate biology students wanting a fast track into the world of biodiversity and conservation are not likely to find a better place to start than the Miami University regional campuses.
Three Miami Hamilton students who graduated last year after working in Dr. David Berg’s Aquatic Biodiversity and Conservation Laboratory have had papers published already, and two recent graduates have papers that will be submitted for publication before they begin graduate school.

“The coin of the realm in scientific research is publication,” Dr. Berg, a Hamilton Campus professor of biology, said one recent afternoon in his Pearson Hall lab in Oxford. “At a government agency such as the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, you might not be doing research, but you’re going to have to write reports. The fact that you’ve demonstrated that you can write and have met the standards of a scientific journal during your undergraduate education is really important.

“If you’re going to graduate school,” he said, “publishing a paper as an undergraduate is like being born with a savings account. Most people don’t start publishing until they’ve finished graduate school, but you’ve already got a paper or two out.”

Cayla Morningstar, a Miami Hamilton student who just graduated in May and immediately landed a job as a biologist with the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, had her first paper published from Dr. Berg’s lab when she was only a sophomore and has another in the works. The job offer, Dr. Berg said, “was based primarily on her research experience.”

Trevor Williams, another Hamilton campus student, also graduated in May and will be entering the PhD program in biology at Brigham Young University.

“Based on his research experiences in my lab and his academic performance, he received a doctoral fellowship that will pay his entire costs of attendance along with providing him a stipend,” Berg said. “This was quite an accomplishment!”

Most of the research in Dr. Berg’s lab is funded by the New Mexico Department of Game and Fish for the work they do on endangered species in the Chihuahuan Desert. Consequently, his students have the opportunity to travel to a different part of the world while working closely with agency biologists.

“I have a student right now who is out on an internship with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in Michigan,” Dr. Berg said. “When he gets his degree he will have preferential hiring status with the agency, which is very likely to lead to a permanent position as a biologist.”

Dr. Berg teaches ecology, biodiversity, and conservation courses for majors and environmental biology for non-majors at the Hamilton campus. Undergraduate and graduate researchers work out of the Pearson Hall lab, so the Regional students also get a sneak peek at what life is like on the bigger campus and also what their life as a graduate student might be like.

“Typically, when a student first enters the lab, they will be assigned general lab duties, then they’ll be paired up with a graduate student, but as they demonstrate interest and competence, they eventually become more independent,” Dr. Berg said. “The goal is by junior or senior year to have them working on their own projects.

“The students who have published papers, part of the reasons they are authors is because their efforts merited authorship, which means they contributed a creative element,” he said.

Furthermore, they have demonstrated persistence when faced with the unpredictable nature of scientific investigations.

The success of Miami Hamilton students in the world of academic publishing, Dr. Berg said, is evidence that the regional campuses are maintaining Miami standards of excellence.

“You cannot predict a student’s productivity based on which campus they originated from,” he said.

“In my 20-plus years at Miami, I’ve always maintained that our best students from the regional campuses are as good as the best students at Oxford.”

Dr. Berg said that the quality of research done in his lab greatly increases the likelihood that any student who completes a research project and goes on to graduate school will get free tuition, and a salary to boot, at a school where they can further their studies.

“I have three doctoral students in my lab and they pay zero dollars for tuition,” he said. “It’s all covered by the university, and their salaries are also covered by the university or by research grants.  The same is true for most of the undergraduate researchers from my lab who go on to graduate school at other institutions.”

“There aren’t many regional campus systems where students can pursue scientific research at the main campus with the same faculty who are teaching their regional campus classes,” he said.