Duke bioSTEMs began in Spring of 2021 under the Duke University Marine Lab Scholars Program with the help of Nicholas School MEM student Rabiya Dar. We ran very successful programming from March – May of 2021 and received positive feedback from all mentors and mentees within the club. In the spring, we focused our attention on Ms. Rachel Owens’s AP Environmental Science class, but this year we are expanding into all STEM-related courses at Northern High School. In Spring of 2021 our modules were an introductory program, Marine Science, Citizen Science, and College/ Career Prep.
In our introductory module, we presented the organization to interested students and matched Duke mentors with Northern mentees.
In our Marine Science module, we completed an activity entitled Designer Fish in which students were taught about features of marine organisms such as fish and sharks that allow them to move around in marine ecosystems according to their life history strategies. In this interactive module, groups of students then were tasked with designing a fish according to criteria given by us. The results are below!
In the Citizen Science module, students were taught about the field of citizen science in which volunteers partner with scientists to answer real world questions. Students were introduced to the app iNaturalist to record images of wild species and share them with a network of other volunteer citizen scientists. They were also taught about herping, looking for wild reptiles and amphibians, as a method to capture images for iNaturalist.
In our final module of Spring 2021, we covered college/ career prep by bringing a Duke admissions officer in for a presentation. The students were able to learn more about the college admissions process, finding financial aid, and were able to ask numerous questions. We also brought guest speaker and Duke researcher Jason Somarelli to speak about his path in college and developing his career path. Finally, we hosted a panel of Duke students to answer questions from Northern students and speak about their college admissions process and college experiences!
