Frontiers Summer 1999
Inspired
by Itasca
 Tracking raccoons, finding fungi, wading
around marshes--it doesn't sound like a glamorous vacation.
But for the group of teenagers who attended last summer's
Itasca Field Biology Enrichment Program, the experience
was, in the words of participant Elizabeth Sutton, "awesome."
Sutton, a recent graduate of Minneapolis
South High School, was one of 11 high school students
who spent two weeks at the University's Lake Itasca
Forestry and Biological Station, living with and learning
from University professors. Each morning the students
attended a lecture on a different topic--animal behavior,
ornithology, stream ecology, etc.--and each afternoon
they headed out to the field with the same professor,
collecting samples, tracking animals, or doing whatever
else that professor's research required.
The enrichment program, run by the College
of Biological Sciences (CBS) each summer, provides kids
with a broad overview of field biology.
"I learned so much about different (ecosystems),"
says Cassandra Clark, a senior at Robbinsdale Armstrong
High School. "And I really liked doing my own fish."
Clark "did her own fish"--collected
yellow perch to determine the population in Lake Itasca--as
her individual research project, the final part of the
high school program. Each student develops and plans
an experiment, and explains how he or she would go about
collecting the data. Clark even did some seining, though
she didn't have enough time to complete her study.
Overall, says Clark, the program "just
gave me a greater feel for biology and the various aspects
of it." She particularly enjoyed a "totally different
way of learning than in the classroom--we were asking
the questions and then shown the answers to our questions."
The hands-on aspect of the experience, says Clark, is
something she never got enough of in high school.
Despite the steady pace, it wasn't all
work and no play for the dozen teenagers at Itasca.
Every evening and weekend the students were free to
swim, canoe, cycle, hike, and otherwise enjoy Itasca
State Park.
The teens also enjoyed mixing with the
undergraduates working at the station. Together they
played volleyball and cards, watched movies, and "even
had a dance!" says Clark. "It was like a camp, complete
with dining hall and cabins," adds Sutton. "If you like
being outdoors, then being here is just the best thing."
"The only things students complain about,"
says CBS outreach and alumni relations coordinator Paul
Germscheid, "are the mosquitoes and getting up at 7
o'clock in the morning."
Inspired by their Itasca experience,
both Clark and Sutton spent the rest of last summer
pursuing biological sciences. Clark took part in a University
of Minnesota high school research program, in which
students are paid to work with a professor, and Sutton--who
heads off to Maine's Colby College this fall with hopes
of a future career involving "something outdoors"--worked
for a tree-care company.
by Lynette Lamb
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Frontiers Summer 1999
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