Summer Research Adds Value

“What did you do this summer?”

This common question elicits uncommon responses in the Gustavus community, where students and their faculty mentors are sharing stories of collaborative research. This work took them to such places as a field in Oregon, a county museum in Northern Minnesota, a geography mapping lab on campus, a science lab at a major research university, and beyond.

These on- and off-campus student summer research projects were highlighted at the Fall Research Symposium, held on Friday, Sept. 7 in Nobel Hall of Science.

Gustavus senior Erin Dinsmore worked with Professor of Art and Art History Linnea Wren researching the collection of Ojibwe and Lakota art works and artifacts in the Cass County Museum and Historical Society in Walker, Minn. This project will culminate with the creation of a web-based collections page and a brochure for the Cass County Museum. Dinsmore and Wren worked with moccasins made for adults and children, bandolier bags, a jingle dress, a frontier shirt, and indigenous tools for wild rice harvesting and maple sugaring.

“I learned so much throughout the course of the summer. In addition to gaining better research skills, I learned to appreciate, even more than I already did, the amazing and beautiful culture of the Ojibwe people,” said Dinsmore. “I have been able to uncover through many sources the peacefulness of their people, as well as their excellent craftsmanship and skill in so many different areas of life.

Wren added: “The project will help to make the culture and lifeways of the Ojibwe and Lakota people better known. With greater knowledge of the cultures and their mutual contributions, we move toward a society of greater respect between people.”

Junior Nick Hansen spent the summer filming a group of high school poets in Minneapolis and St. Paul, along with art professor Priscilla Briggs. Together, they created of a series of videos based on the poems of young spoken-word artists. Hansen said, “It was a unique experience. I was able to meet all kinds of new people with different passions and ideas. I was able to work on skills that will be applicable to my sought-after career path, which is film, and we were able to give a group of high school poets an opportunity that they would not have otherwise had.”

The Briggs-Hansen video research project was a community-based one that involved a lot of collaboration in the creative process. “In their work, these young poets are addressing very important current social and political issues,” Briggs said.

Benefit Self, Others

Students and faculty found the summer an ideal time both to broaden knowledge, focus in-depth — without the competing pressures of classes and other course work. More importantly, conducting research serves a larger purpose and is beneficial to society.

“One value of the research to me was that I got to work on a project that is important to our local area,” said Amanda Nienow, a chemistry professor at Gustavus who conducted research on the photodegradation of pesticides. She worked with junior Mallory Richards and the University of Minnesota.

“We were examining the degradation and pathways of degradation of pesticides commonly used in Minnesota when they are exposed to UV light (such as they would be by the sun),” Nienow said.

“The value of this research to the community in general is to gain a better understanding of what organic compounds are likely to remain in our ground and surface waters after the application of these pesticides,” she explained.

Geography professor Mark Bjelland worked with senior Bradley Utecht to map the locations of members for eight Lutheran churches in the Minneapolis area. In the end, each church received maps, a report, and a Google Earth file showing where their members live.

Varied Projects

Following is a list of some of the summer research projects conducted by Gustavus students and faculty members during the summer of 2007.

• “Research of Ojibwe and Lakota Art in Walker” by Linnea Wren (art and art history) and Erin Dinsmore.
• “Video collaboration with Teens Rock the Mic in Minneapolis” by Priscilla Briggs (art and art history) and Nicholas Hansen.
• “Studying Sarms in Nature: A Biophysics Project” by Paul Saulnier (physics) and Eva Cornell.
• “Effects of Restored Wetlands on Nitrate Levels” by Jeff Jeremiason (chemistry) and Nicholas Hefty.
• “Conservation Genetics in a Potentially Endangered Streamfish” by Joel Carlin (biology) and Rochelle Molitor.
• “Heterocyclic Compound Synthesis” by Scott Bur (chemistry) and Nina Serratore.
• “Metal Binding Specificity and Metal Site Assembly in Metalloproteins” by Brandy Russell (chemistry) and Veronica Taylor.
• “Minneapolis ELCA Synod Geographic Mapping Research” by Mark Bjelland (geography) and Bradley Utecht.
• “A Genetic Screen for Sperm Fate Determinants in Female Fruit Flies” by Margaret Bloch Qazi (biology) and Isaac Weeks.
• “Photodegradation of pesticides commonly used in Minnesota” by Amanda Nienow (chemistry) and student Mallory Richards.
• Three different projects on moonwort ferns by Cindy Johnson-Groh (biology) and students Amy Waldner, Whitney Hohman, and Stephanie Erlandson.

Some projects were made possible by the Gustavus Presidential Faculty/Student Collaboration Grants program. The program fosters engaged learning and signals the College’s commitment to support faculty in achieving their potential as teachers and scholars and to help students attain their full potential as people—developing in them a capacity and passion for lifelong learning, and preparing them for fulfilling lives of leadership and service in society.