Trotti was from Oneonta, N.Y., and was a 2012 graduate from Oneonta High School.  During his time at Elizabethtown College, he played ultimate frisbee, baseball, lacrosse, flag football and dodge ball. He also participated in the College’s News Orleans service trip.

Trotti’s peer mentor, senior Megan Steber said, “He was a great asset to our peer group right from the beginning. Jared was always very sweet and polite [...] and was very friendly to all of the other students in the group. I really enjoyed his jokes and he really knew how to make everyone smile—that is something I am sure that everyone will miss about Jared.”

The funeral service is scheduled for 3 p.m. Wednesday, May 15 at the United Methodist Church, 66 Chestnut St., Oneonta. The College is sponsoring a bus, so that students, faculty and staff may attend the service. Those interested should contact Susan Lehman at 717-361-1196 to reserve a seat.

The turtle lab activity is also part of a larger, multi-institution research project called TurtlePop, which is led by Bowne through the Ecological Research as Education Network (EREN).  The TurtlePop project allows for students from 30 institutions across the United States to share similar experiences and data about the world around them.

In preparation for the lab, student volunteers and Browne set five hoop traps in Lake Placida and six hoop traps in “Weird Pond,” which is adjacent to the Etown baseball stadium.  Students from each of the four biology labs then checked the traps for turtles by wearing waders to walk into the pond and retrieve the traps.  If the trap contained turtles, the students brought the trap to land and measured each turtle which helped determine its sex.  The unique “name” of each turtle was recorded by observing notches on the side of the top shell.  All of the turtles caught this year were previously caught and marked by Bowne.  After collecting all of the data, the turtles were released back into their natural habitat.

“The purpose of the lab was to demonstrate to students a simple technique to estimate the size of a wildlife population,” Bowne said. He explained how most wildlife are difficult to count because they hide from predators.  “The mark-recapture technique allows us to estimate population size,” Bowne said.  “Knowing population size is an essential aspect of understanding anything about a species and how to manage it.”

The students also gathered this information to contribute to the TurtlePop project.  “In TurtlePop, we are testing the hypothesis that as urbanization increases, the turtle population characteristics will change,” Bowne said.  “Specifically, we expect turtle populations to become more male dominated because females may die more as a consequence of car collisions or predation in more developed areas.”  Populations are also expected to be adult-dominated because terrestrial nesting habitats may be damaged.

“As a learning goal, we want students to understand how ecological processes around a habitat can influence what happens within a habitat,” Bowne said.  To test these hypotheses, one must study numerous turtle habitats in a variety of settings.  The collaborative nature of TurtlePop allows these researchers to conduct a study that would be impossible for any one researcher to gather and record all necessary information by him or herself.

The TurtlePop project is exciting for Bowne because it allows students and faculty to participate in something that is new for them.  It gives faculty the chance to share their knowledge with their students.  Bowne believes the students enjoy the project and find it worthwhile.  “Because of TurtlePop, we have roughly 30 faculty and nearly 900 students out studying turtles and experiencing hands-on wildlife research that would not otherwise have had that opportunity,” Bowne said.  The goal of this data collected by the students is to make a meaningful contribution to the advancement of science.  As TurtlePop progresses, Etown students will have the ability to interact with professors and students from other institutions involved in the project to learn about ecology across large areas.

First year Elizabeth McManus, a double major in biotechnology and psychology, helped set the turtle traps for the lab.  “This has to be one of my favorite biology labs, because we were helping collect data for a large scale cooperative study,” McManus said.  “I also just really love working with animals, so handling the turtles was definitely a plus for me.”  The traps have shown McManus how one must think critically about every aspect of research, and the lab has helped her realize the importance of academic collaboration.  “Through enlisting professors at other colleges, the research from this project will be more extensive and useful,” McManus said.

First year biotechnology major Steph Staniforth shared how the lab helped her academically by emulating the process that an actual science research field would use.  “My favorite part of the lab was being able to go into these interesting ecosystems and study turtles, which are fascinating organisms,” Staniforth said.

Bowne created TurtlePop as a pilot project for EREN.  “I have studied freshwater turtles since 1998 and so I have a lot of experience with them,” Bowne said.  He is a founding member of EREN and proposed the study of turtles, which many of his colleagues supported to make this project a reality.  Bowne has been involved with EREN since 2008 and created the TurtlePop project in 2011.

Professor of Biology Dr. Thomas Murray is also participating in an EREN project. He worked on a stream temperature project and is a co-principal investigator on a grant submission to the National Science Foundation to further that research.  “It’s exciting to have colleagues and our students at Etown benefit from EREN aside from my personal involvement,” Bowne said.  “For them to participate in TurtlePop, they have to learn new things, which is exciting for them and meaningful to me.”

The event coordinators were Dr. Joseph Wunderlich, associate professor of engineering, and Dr. Tomas Estrada, assistant professor of engineering and physics. “It’s in the College’s and president’s strategic plans to do more things sustainable,” Wunderlich said.

Emily Vogel, senior mechanical and sustainable design engineering major, gave three presentations at the symposium. Vogel worked with seniors Jillian Casey, Jennifer Hughes, Eleanor McCarthy, Joshua Rowlands, Julia Ward and Nicholas Young on her first presentation. “We had a panel discussion about developing technology and a sustainable business model for solar powered cell phone chargers for people in the small West African country Republic of the Gambia,” Vogel said.

Her second project was her property design to replace her family’s vacation home on Long Beach Island, which was destroyed by Hurricane Sandy. She designed the home to be green and sustainable while meeting Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards.

“Buildings are the biggest consumers of energy both in construction and operation, making it important to design buildings to be constructed with little waste and to operate on minimal energy,” Vogel said.

She hopes that people left this presentation with an understanding of “how simple it is to design a green residence by using energy efficient products, building with local resources and optimizing natural light.”

Vogel and fellow seniors Deborah Bartyczak, Josh Rowlands and Nick Young talked about how a new field house on campus would affect water runoff into Lake Placida.

“Lake Placida is where all the water drainage on campus collects, and since being renovated last year, it can now hold an additional 500,000 cubic feet of extra storm water,” Vogel said. “We also researched ways to mitigate the runoff by using methods such as green roofs and permeable pavement for the parking lot.”

Vogel’s presentations only covered a few of the topics discussed at the symposium.  Other presenters included the concept of sustainable urban housing, an analysis of sustainable entrepreneurial ecosystems in Costa Rica and computer controlled hydroponic gardens.

Students have been working with Wunderlich to create hydroponic gardens, which are gardens without soil. Plants absorb nutrients faster with hydroponic gardening because there is more oxygen and they don’t need to search for nutrients in the soil, as there is no soil. The plants are able to save energy in this way, and they put that extra energy into growing faster and producing a greater yield. Hydroponic gardening is also known to have fewer issues in regards to bug infestations, funguses and diseases. Fewer pesticides and less water are needed to maintain hydroponic gardens, which also helps the environment.

“We hope that our sustainability symposiums will help unify the many initiatives of our students, faculty and staff,” Wunderlich said. “Our institution can sometimes become fragmented.  However, I’m convinced that collectively we can match most any other institution when it comes to sustainability, service and related real-world learning. An event like this can only make us better.”

Sustainability is especially important in the United States because our industry is based on fuel, metal and other limited resources. Not only is there a limited supply of them, they also pollute the planet. Technology has been developed that uses unlimited resources such as the sun, water and wind to fuel the planet.  However, not everyone has embraced these methods. “As you look back on the United States and Pennsylvania from far away, you see that we need to do more.  The global world is in on this and we need to do more.  Everybody needs to do more,” Wunderlich said.

“If buildings were designed to optimize nature, such as minimizing heat islands and orienting them towards the sun, much energy could be saved,” said Vogel. “I believe that sustainability in engineering is very important because engineers have the resources and skills to design systems to be more efficient and produce less waste.”

Next year, Wunderlich hopes to hold the symposium with GreenCon 2014.  GreenCon is an all-day green conference with speakers from around the world. “If we could do this concurrently with the symposium, I think there would be a good benefit to that,” said Wunderlich.

This event is called “Down Time with a Dog.” Her dog’s name is Maggie and is a cavalier King Charles spaniel. Several other therapy dogs will join her as well, including Labrador retrievers, a sheltie named Amber and a golden retriever named Holly. According to the Office of Marketing and Communication’s press release, “This will give students an opportunity to relax and rejuvenate with ‘fur-therapy’ during the hectic finals week.”

These dogs are trained specifically to help ease the stress of people with whom they come into contact. All of their trainers will be along for the event as well to educate students about all of the fascinating abilities that these dogs have to evoke positive emotions. Students can pet the different dogs and spend time on the main floor of the library during the two-hour event.

Director of the High Library BethAnn Zambella stated that the idea for “Down Time with a Dog” began when she was looking through the discussion lists that she follows for librarians. Many of Elizabethtown College’s peer libraries mentioned that they used pet therapy as an outlet for stress relief during finals week.

Last fall, Zambella asked some of the other library staff members what they would think about using pet therapy with the Etown College students. They were all very enthusiastic about the idea and immediately began planning. Beth Young, head of reader’s services, became the leader of the event. Jamie Vallis of Student Wellness and senior Hannah Reagan also became involved, and they set out to coordinate the new program for spring finals. “As a library, we are particularly cognizant of the stresses that final exams and paper deadlines place on students. We love to help in ways both intellectual and social/emotional,” Zambella said.

The library usually likes to put out board games and coffee to help students de-stress, and they are constantly looking for new ways to make things easier on students spending their days and nights at the library preparing for difficult exams.

When asked about the possibility of the dogs disturbing students, Zambella expressed hope that this will not be the case. Because the dogs will only be on campus for two hours, she feels it will not create too much of a problem for students studying in the library. Due to the fact that they have never held this event in the past, it is a new experience that they will have to evaluate after the fact. Reagan, who aided in coordinating the program through the Wellness Center, feels that it will definitely be more positive than negative for students studying. She hopes that the event will not be disruptive because it is on Reading Day and is in a very confined area. Zambella agreed. “The dogs will be in the Winters Alcove on the main level, so if folks aren’t canine fans, there will be plenty of other spaces in the library for them to study.”

The High Library staff members and the Wellness Center are very eager for the event and foresee an extremely positive outcome. “I know I am personally really excited to have the dogs at the library, and I am hoping students will see the benefits of ‘Downtime with a Dog’ on keeping their stress levels low going into their final exams,” Reagan said. “We’re excited about bringing pet therapy to students who may be missing their own dogs, or who just know that stroking something furry will lower their blood pressure and keep their synapses firing,” Zambella said. Students are encouraged to stop by the main floor of the library on Wednesday, May 8 to take a break from studying and spend a little “Down Time with a Dog.”

“The creation of PPLS should have little impact on current students,” McClellan stated. “There are no changes in major requirements and students will continue to have the same faculty advisors. Associate Professor of Political Science Dr. Kyle Kopko is working on revising the legal studies major (formerly named political philosophy and legal studies), but those changes will be for new students.”

Dr. April Kelly-Woessner, associate professor of political science, will serve as the PPLS department chair and Kopko will remain the director of the pre-law program. The three majors recognized within the new department will be political science, philosophy and legal studies.

1. Combining two smaller departments with shared curriculum interests.
2. Increasing attention to legal studies and the pre-law program.
3. Promoting interdisciplinary scholarship and collaboration between students and faculty members.
4. Enhancing the performance of administrative functions.

Although the change in the 2013-2014 course catalog will not severely impact current students at the College, future incoming students will be provided with additional resources and faculty members because of the department merger. “The new department should have an even brighter future as it searches for new faculty in comparative politics and Asian studies and applied global ethics next year. If these searches are successful, the number of full-time faculty in PPLS will grow from six to eight in 2014-15,” McClellan said.

“Most, if not all, of our Blue Jay teams end their season with a team dinner, banquet, tailgate party or picnic to honor their seniors and celebrate the team’s successes,” Director of Athletics Nancy Latimore said. “My staff and I thought that it would be fun to bring all of the teams together for one big celebration so that they can celebrate one another’s successes as well.” All student-athletes, staff members of the athletic department, parents of senior athletes and members of the BJAA were all welcomed to attend the event. Senior athletes were honored for their dedication to the athletics program and the head coach of each athletic team presented a Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award to one of its members. Seniors Dillon Tagle and Nadine Yunginger received the Distinguished Student-Athlete Awards, which recognize students who have excelled not only in athletics, but in service, leadership and academics as well. Seniors Lindsey Cooper and  Paul Whitman also earned the Dr. Clair R. McCollough Award.

This is given to the most improved senior student-athletes who “exemplifies a maturity in the skills, knowledge and competitive spirit of the game,” as described on the award’s nomination sheet.

“We aren’t in a position to host a banquet for our 450-plus athletes and coaches, so we planned a reception in Thompson Gym instead,” Latimore stated. Because of this, the event was invite-only and offered refreshments, music, a slide show and “swag bags,” which included snacks and Etown apparel. “We have much to celebrate. In addition to our conference champions and All-Americans, we celebrate our many scholar athletes, including Jill Casey, who was recently awarded a Fulbright Scholarship, and Jenna Neidermayer, who is receiving an NCAA Post-Graduate Scholarship,” Latimore said.

If you are willing to spend some money then you will get to do more things this summer! You can:

• Go to an amusement park
• Go out to eat
• Hang out at the boardwalk
• Go mini golfing
• See a concert
• Go tubing down a river
• See a professional sports game
• Watch a show or performance
• Sit in the nice cool movie theatre
• Walk to a nearby ice cream shop
• Get involved in a fun run
• Buy some water balloons at the 99 cent store and have a water balloon fight all over town.

If you are thinking to yourself, “Well, I don’t have enough money to do any of this,” then keep reading because the completely free stuff is about to come.

Some free things that you and your friends can do this summer include:

• Going swimming
• Having a bonfire (Tip: most people will expect food, so make each friend bring something)
• Starting pickup games of your favorite sport
• Going stargazing
• Camping out in your backyard
• Going for a walk
• Making a collage
• Finding out what free events your town has (or if your town is boring, the town next to yours).

There are always fun things to do in the summer if you really think about it. Plus, if you have friends around, then you will have fun just being with them. If that is not the case, they can help come up with ideas too. If all else fails, Google things such as “fun things to do this summer” and hopefully Google can help you out!

People all over the country were watching what happened after the bombings in Boston. I myself watched the news several times a day in Myer Residence Hall, hoping that the loss of life would not escalate and praying for the families of those who were lost.

However, what we saw in Boston after the bombings was inspiring. People of all races, genders, classes and cultures tried to save the lives of their fellow humans and helped people cope with the tragedy.

Even politics was put aside. President Obama stated in a speech given in Boston after the attacks, “We reaffirmed that on days like this, there are no Republicans or Democrats. We are Americans united in concern for our fellow citizens.” He was absolutely right.  However, we must ask ourselves why the politics were put aside. Was it because politicians really felt compassion and unity, or was it because they thought it would hurt them if they tried to use the tragedy for their own political benefit? I’ll leave that for you to ponder.

We have had our own tragedy at Elizabethtown College – hate crimes.  Our tragedy isn’t as bad as the Boston bombings by a long shot, but it still provided an opportunity to show that in times of crisis. We can come together and work for the common good.  For example, students, instead of ignoring what was happening or leaving it up to the administration, took action. Students and faculty members showed up on a Friday night for a candlelight vigil in honor of the students who have been the victims of hate crimes.  Our professors and President Strikwerda did their part to set the right tone and atmosphere on campus. We all came together, for the common good.

No one welcomes a crisis, and we should actually do our best to avoid them. People of good character will try to make the best of bad times.  People of good character will try to learn and grow, and most of all, people of good character will try to show their humanity by helping those in need, those less fortunate and vulnerable. Here at Etown, we are an institution that values good character. So when times are difficult, we put aside our differences, be they political or otherwise, and pull together for the common good.

Another good practice to get into while at an internship is to write down everything you do and to be specific. Write about the software you work with, the presentations you witness and anything else you experience, as this can be used to update your resume. “Even if it’s not in people’s major, it’s great to keep a detailed list [of activities] so you can choose the best examples to show potential future employers,” Tina MacKenzie, the assistant director of internships at Elizabethtown College said.

However, the most important thing to do while at an internship is to take full advantage of the opportunity. While working at an internship you will have many chances to interact with functional experts at their place of work, and this is your chance to not only see what they do in person, but also to learn how they got that position. After all, people enjoy talking about themselves, and the stories they tell may inspire you to reevaluate your future. Ultimately, though, the real value of an internship is what you put into it, and the more you immerse yourself in that world the better you can grasp the reality of the job, whether you like it or not.

The old adage “Networking, networking, networking” is not just a cliché. Networking is one of the most powerful tools that we should develop not only at the college level but also throughout our professional life. It brings together information, knowledge and communication for the individual to employ resources effectively. I saw the dynamic of social interactions among the business professionals at the council meeting. They exchange information and news from their individual organizations to update each other about opportunities. As for myself, I had an opportunity to introduce myself to the council and know some executives with whom I could contact for my career interests.

For many students who were like me at one point, you would have wondered or are still thinking about the importance of academic concepts or how much of the classroom education we are going to remember after the semester. There are a lot of successful people out there who never went to college. It is true that we do not use 100% of the college concepts into the real world setting, but our education has provided us with a framework from which we could use to adapt to different scenarios. Especially in this meeting, I was able to observe the business application in the real world setting.

At the meeting, the council brought in a new business which is partnering with a small German footwear company to enter the US market. Since the owner has little business experience, the executives helped her by asking necessary questions and suggestions on the market assessment before establishing a venture. The questions and suggestions asked were, in fact, what we learned in our classes such as the target market, pricing, financial structure, liability and ownership and distribution issues. Classrooms provide a valuable lab for us to experiment before we make expensive mistakes and decisions in the actual businesses. Application means bringing the framework we learn in class to build customized solutions for an individual business’ needs.

After the meeting, my mentor invited us to go back to his company to see the operations. We had a factory tour to see sophisticated machines at work to make company’s products. It was a great opportunity to have a site visit since we were able to understand what it really means to run a business, manage a team of diverse workers with different skill sets, and most importantly, how to make a business profitable. Now a profitable business, he told us the story of his company almost went bankrupt 10 years ago. He and his partner turned the company around through a management buyout. As a finance student, I was very fascinated to listen to how the process works in practice.

The trip reminded me of an important fact that students usually forget. Learning happens everywhere, and especially beyond the classroom: maybe a school trip, a conference, an interview or a meeting. We are usually caught up with our college life of never-ending assignments, projects that we usually do not think about ourselves outside the classroom. We do learn from our classes, but actual learning comes from applying what you know. It was a great opportunity for me to be able to attend to such a meeting as a student.  I was able to witness the dynamic networking of international executives as well as the efficiency of business meetings. I was also able to expand my professional network through the meeting. In addition, being able to interact with the professionals and talking in front of them helped me build my confidence in presenting for a business setting.

If nothing else, these two things should be your takeaways from this article.

Networking is key to position yourself well in the job market. Being a well-rounded student does not stop in being a good student in the classroom. I’d like to encourage our students to start networking with professionals in your field as early as the first year. Networking opens many doors along the way throughout our college career. If you don’t know how to network, start with your professors, and advisors. Explain them your interests, career inspirations, and goals in life. Go to career fairs and social events where you could meet professionals in your field. Be ready to present about yourself clearly and effectively. The ability to communicate and express well comes from practice.

Apply classroom concepts into the real world experience: Learning happens everywhere, and beyond the classroom. It is important to have an internship in your field where you would be able to apply your classroom education in a real business. Even when you are learning in class, expand your thoughts to more than an assignment or obligation. Imagine yourself as a businessperson conducting real business. Think what you would do in that situation if it were your money, and your career. You will see how much you will be able to improve your work by not limiting in the framework.

By

Min Han Tun