Internship Helps High School Senior with Environmental Science Research
Contact: Howard Patterson, 581-1178, George Manlove, 581-03756
ORONO — Bangor High School senior Anne Marie Lausier has been immersed in some pretty sophisticated, college-level research this summer at the University of Maine, thanks to a national research internship for high schoolers. She says she’s loving every minute of it.
Lausier won a seven-week MERITS (Maine Research Internships for Teachers and Students) internship in UMaine’s Department of Chemistry this summer, helping researchers study algae levels in a local lake to measure pollution to see if remedial measures are required. Under the supervision of chemistry Professor Howard Patterson and graduate student Qiong Wang, Lausier works routinely with tiny sensors and a spectroflourimeter, a device that uses light of different wavelengths to compare and measure chlorophyll, found in algae, and see how adding copper sulfate to water samples can improve water quality.
Some of the research also has included testing water for pharmaceuticals contamination resulting from improper disposal of medications.
“Participating in the MERITS program has been an amazing opportunity for me,” says Lausier, who has now decided environmental chemistry is what she wants to study when she gets to college. “This has been a perfect chance for me to conduct real research and to determine if chemistry is something I would like to do as a career. I love that I can take what I have learned and apply it in a positive way. With the algae project we’re going to be able to protect water and it’s going to make a difference for people. “
High school students in Maine apply for MERITS research internships and are evaluated by administrators at the Maine Space Grant Consortium, part of a national network funded by NASA through its National Space Grant College and Fellowship Program. If accepted, the students are paid for the work they do.
Patterson is particularly pleased with the selection process that matched Lausier with UMaine, and says she has been a quick study in a scientific world typically occupied by researchers with advanced college degrees. He would like more school students, teachers, parents and guidance counselors to be aware of the MERITS research program. The more exposure the program receives, the easier it is to attract funding from a variety of sources, he says.
Patterson adds that if qualified high school students contact him, he will do his best to find a way to get them into college-level research here.
“This is a chance for providing high school students in the state of Maine a way to see what real science is about and to give them a push to get into real science,” he says.
Patterson adds that programs like the MERITS internships demonstrate that talented local students don’t have to leave the area to obtain first-rate research experience. The program also places high school students in other research facilities and laboratories throughout the country, including about 20 Maine students who have a choice of more than 75 technology-based businesses and research institutions in Maine.
“I think the program is super successful and one of the few programs that makes a difference in career possibilities in the future,” he says. “I also think it’s a program that very few people know about.”
More information about the MERITS program can be found at the Maine Space Grant Consortium website (www.msgc.org). Patterson can be reached at (207) 581-1178.