On July 30-August 1, NOAA Office of Education held our annual Student Science and Education Symposium. This exciting 3 days of sessions and information sharing is the culmination of internships at NOAA locations around the United States for 133 Ernest F. Hollings and Educational Partnership Program (EPP) Undergraduate Scholarship student scholarship recipients.
These highly talented undergraduates selected scientific projects designed by NOAA scientists, and spent 9 weeks this summer contributing to research and analysis associated with these projects. During their 10th week, all of them participate in this opportunity to share a summary of their results with the NOAA community.
NOAA scientists and policy staff judge each oral and poster presentation. Scholar presentations were grouped in concurrent sessions according to NOAA's long term goals and enterprise objectives: healthy oceans; resilient coastal communities and economies; a weather-ready nation; climate adaptation and mitigation, and science and technology enterprise.
The event is conducted in the same manner as numerous professional conferences, providing many of these students their first opportunity to experience an oral or poster presentation before an audience. To see the topic of each student's research, please click here. The judging process has clearly-defined criteria, with numeric scores awarded. Winning presentations for each category are based on the highest point score, and first place winners receive a cash award. These scores, along with judges' comments and suggestions are subsequently provided to each student, to assist them in improving their presentation skills. Furthermore, each year, students are surveyed about their experiences during the summer internship and at the Symposium, to ensure that each subsequent gathering provides the best possible experience for these ambitious student scholars!
David Kennedy, NOAA Deputy Under Secretary for Operations, was the keynote speaker at the awards ceremony. He provided a summary of NOAA accomplishments during the 9 weeks of the students' internships, helping them envision how their dynamic summers were contributing to NOAA's achievements. He congratulated all the student scholars for a job well done, gave kudos to Office of Education staff for a successful scholarship program, and posed for a photo with each student award winner.
Award winners
Poster Presentations
Weather-Ready Nation
1st Place - Elizabeth Smith, California University of Pennsylvania, California, PA
Healthy Oceans
Honorable Mention - Gretchen Stokes, North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC
Science & Technology Enterprise
Honorable Mention - Derrick Jones, Mississippi Valley State University, Itta Bena, MS
Oral Presentations
Weather-Ready Nation
1st Place – Jacquelyn Ringhausen, Saint Louis University, Saint Louis, MO
Honorable Mention – McKenna Stanford, University of South Alabama, Mobile, AL
Climate Adaptation and Mitigation
1st Place – Mali'o Kodis, Brown University, Providence, RI
1st Place - Conor McNicholas, University of Oklahoma Norman Campus, Norman, OK
Honorable Mention – Michelle Frazer, Cedarville University, Cedarville, OH
Resilient Coastal Communities
1st Place – Amanda Tine, Massachusetts Maritime Academy, Buzzards Bay, MA
Honorable Mention – Ariana Meltvedt Snow, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR
Healthy Oceans
1st Place - Paige Pruisner, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO
Honorable Mention – Alexander Jensen, University of Maine, Orono, ME
Honorable Mention – Grace Young, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
