Senior Integrated Project Archives

Student Chronicles Dad’s Bosnian War Survival

Posted on March 12, 2026March 18, 2026

Emma Kovacevic ’26 finds that not many of her Kalamazoo College peers are familiar with the story of the Bosnian War, although she knows it well. The conflict, prompted by the fracturing of the former Yugoslavia, lasted from 1992–95. About 100,000 people were killed, and more than 2 million people were displaced in the fighting. It was the deadliest conflict in Europe since World War II. And Emma’s Bosnian father, Ruzmir Kovacevic—the subject of her Senior Integrated Project (SIP)—suffered as a prisoner of the Serbians during the hostilities.

“I would describe my dad as my hero,” Emma said. “He has gone through so many things in his life. I don’t know of anyone that’s gone through so much, and he’s still cracking jokes about random things all the time. I haven’t seen that kind of resilience in anyone else, so it’s inspiring and I’m grateful to have him in my life. He’s the bravest person I know and my biggest role model.”

Ruzmir grew up in the small town of Doboj in Bosnia. His mother was an elementary school teacher, and his father worked as a salesperson at a local store. His childhood was centered on family, school and a tight-knit community where everyone knew each other. He was an outgoing and natural leader, his daughter said, the kind of person who was always surrounded by family and friends.

Bosnian War survivor with family — Emma Kovacevic ’26 (second from right) with her family, including her dad, Ruzmir.

Neighbor vs. Neighbor

After high school, Ruzmir attended the University of Sarajevo, where he studied sports medicine. Like many young men in the former Yugoslavia, he also completed mandatory service in the Yugoslav army. His leadership ability stood out so much that military leaders asked him to stay beyond his required service as he ascended to the rank of first lieutenant.

A few years later, the country began splitting apart. When fighting broke out, Bosnia descended into violence and ethnic conflict. In towns like Doboj, neighbors suddenly found themselves on opposite sides of a brutal war.

“It was really interesting to hear about it because during the war, he was fighting against these people who taught him how to fight, how to clean his rifles and how to figure out the best ways to go about a war,” Emma said. “From what he told me, he had a lot of trouble going through that. He was fighting against some people that he knew in his hometown because it was all Yugoslavia.”

There was no official Bosnian army, so Ruzmir and the men of his community formed what they called the Patriotic League. They counted their rifles, took inventory of their weapons, made a plan and held their line as long as they could.

University of Sarajevo student ID belonging to Bosnian War survivor — Ruzmir’s student ID from the University of Sarajevo shortly before the Bosnian War.

Brutality from Former Friends

Ruzmir was captured by Serbians after being wounded by a grenade that badly damaged his right leg. The Serbians wrapped the wound in a cast and refused to let surgeons remove the shrapnel. He was taken to a concentration camp where Bosnian prisoners were subjected to brutal treatment. Emma said he played sports growing up with some of the Serbians, who ended up beating him and denying him food for long periods of time.

At one point, a twist of fate briefly freed Ruzmir. A relative of his girlfriend, who held a high-ranking position in the Serbian military, arrived at the camp and escorted him out under the pretense of questioning. For a few days, Ruzmir stayed with family members who were packed into a tiny studio apartment. Fifteen people shared the cramped space, but he described it as heavenly, Emma said.

The freedom didn’t last. Serbian officers soon discovered he was missing and recaptured him, sending him back to the camp for an additional two and a half months. In all, Ruzmir spent about nine months in captivity. By then, many prisoners had died or disappeared. When Ruzmir first arrived, more than 50 men were held in the camp. By the end of his imprisonment, only about a dozen remained.

The prisoners were rescued almost by accident. After hearing reports that Bosnians were being held in the old prison facility, the German Red Cross scheduled an inspection. To hide the evidence, guards forced the remaining prisoners into a conference room and cleaned the cells. The prisoners heard the inspection happening and began screaming for help.

After recording their names, the Red Cross inspectors warned Serbian authorities they would return in two weeks. If conditions had not improved, the prisoners would be taken out of the country as refugees. Two weeks later, the Red Cross inspectors kept their promise.

Bosnian War memorial images — This gallery is a permanent memorial dedicated to the Srebrenica genocide that occurred on July 11, 1995, during the Bosnian War. Gallery 11/07/95 aims to educate visitors and preserve the memory of the genocide through photography and personal artifacts.

Free at Last

Ruzmir boarded a bus to Germany and spent a few years there with his younger brother and father. He later arrived alone in Grand Rapids, where a significant Bosnian refugee community had already taken root. Ruzmir had been a year and a half away from finishing his sports medicine degree at the University of Sarajevo when the war interrupted his education. The credits didn’t transfer to the U.S., but he became a massage therapist. Emma said he loves his career and wouldn’t trade it for anything, though. He also helps resettle other refugees arriving in Michigan from all over the world.

Ruzmir’s father survived the war but died in 2001 when he had a heart attack and stroke simultaneously caused by PTSD. However, he met a Bosnian woman, Amra, who had also fled. They had two daughters, including Emma. He built a life with his family.

“I’ve had a really supportive family, and as my parents are two immigrants, they have always wanted the best for my sister and me,” Emma said. “They’ve always wanted for us to have the education that they didn’t really have access to. They made a lot of sacrifices to support my sister and I in growing up to have access to the things that were taken away from them. I chose K because I just love it. I love what it stands for, the liberal arts education and the relationships I can have with my professors.”

55 Minutes

Emma and her father had talked for years about writing a book together. It was a “someday project”—something to tackle after a master’s degree or maybe a Ph.D. There was time.

But in 2023, Ruzmir went into cardiac arrest. He was technically dead for 55 minutes.

“I saw the strongest person I know die for that long,” Emma said.

He recovered. The nurses called him their Christmas miracle despite 13 broken ribs from the CPR, so Emma started thinking about the book differently, and yet was still hesitant. It was big material. Heavy material.

Then, three days before the spring term of her junior year, her father went into cardiac arrest again. She realized she needed to make her dad the subject of her SIP.

“I thought, ‘OK. It’s time. I can’t wait any longer,’” Emma said.

He has since turned 56 and the SIP is finished.

“He has a pacemaker and defibrillator,” Emma said. “They’ve saved him twice now, so I’m just grateful that I’ve been able to do this with him and talk to him about it, even though I could see how hard it was for him. He continuously says that he is so grateful for this opportunity. I hoped that I’d be able to do it later in my life, post-K, but with the inclusion of the SIP in the K-Plan, I’m just grateful that it gave me that push to start sooner.”

Her advisor, Professor of English Marin Heinritz ’99, has guided her through the entire process. Emma first took Introduction to Journalism with Heinritz in her sophomore year, and the two have been close since.

“I know that’s not true at other universities,” Emma said. “My sister goes to Michigan State, and her professors just don’t connect with her as an individual.”

The view of Sarajevo looking down from Trebević Mountain.

A Light at the End of the Tunnel

Emma said Ruzmir wanted the story to be told because the Bosnian War is not something that gets taught much in the U.S., because it happened recently enough that people are still grappling with it, and because it happened distantly enough that many Americans don’t know it happened at all.

She knows he’s proud of her. He has been sending the PDF of her SIP to his friends and massage therapy clients. One of them printed it out and put it in a folder to share with others.

Emma has been accepted to a master’s program in teaching at the University of Michigan. She wants to be a high school English teacher. She also wants to keep writing, and eventually, when her father is ready, to turn the SIP into the book they always planned.

“He just needs a little break first,” she said. “I would hope that it will help people understand that even if they think their life is over with any horrible thing that happens, there’s always a light at the end of the tunnel.”

A pedestrian area in front of the Sacred Heart Cathedral in Sarajevo, near the Gallery 11/07/95 memorial site.

Baščaršija bazaar and Sebilj fountain in Sarajevo.

Student’s Book Reviews Show Human Costs of Court Rulings

Posted on March 12, 2026

While some pre-law students focus on statutes and precedents, Ella Miller ’26 has spent her senior year exploring the emotional truths and human lives that exist in the gaps between court rulings.

As an English major at Kalamazoo College, Miller’s Senior Integrated Project (SIP) began as an ambitious challenge to bridge the plain reasoning of the U.S. Supreme Court with the realities of immigrant experiences. Her Race, Law and Politics class, along with her Advanced Nonfiction course, inspired her to pair four major Supreme Court cases on immigration with four books written by authors deeply connected to the decisions’ impacts. Through the combination of case briefs and literary analysis, Miller examined how legal reasoning resonates beyond the courtroom.

“It was stylistically interesting to insert a Supreme Court opinion while also providing facts, and the organization intrigued me,” she said. “I thought it would be interesting to write reviews about books that were influenced by these major Supreme Court decisions, some of which I was learning about in class.”

Connecting Law and Literature

Miller organized her SIP around four immigration-related groups and eras: Chinese immigrants during the Chinese Exclusion Era, Japanese Americans during World War II, Latin American immigrants affected by contemporary policies, and refugees impacted by the 2018 Trump v. Hawaii ruling.

She selected landmark cases associated with each topic, then sought books across genres that offered lived perspectives on the decisions’ consequences. Her final author list included:

John Okada, No-No Boy, paired with Korematsu v. United States.
Erika Lee and Judy Yung, Angel Island: Immigrant Gateway to America, tied to the era of Chinese exclusion.
Sandra Uwiringiyimana and Abigail Pesta, How Dare the Sun Rise: Memoirs of a War Child, connected to modern refugee issues.
Areli Morales, Areli Is a Dreamer, linked to DHS v. Regents of the University of California, related to the recent Deferred Action for Child Arrivals (DACA) case.

By examining fiction, nonfiction, a memoir, and even a children’s book, Miller highlighted the diverse ways personal stories illuminate historical and legal realities.

“What makes them all special is the different ways a story can be told,” she said. “A historical nonfiction book offers documented evidence, while a novel can convey emotional truths through fictional characters. And the children’s book, which was my favorite, brings hope and understanding.”

Bringing Clarity to Complex Cases

Drawing on skills from her constitutional law coursework, Miller began each book review with a one-page case brief, which is a concise summary designed to make a legal case accessible to any reader.

“Case briefs can be eight pages long, so I wanted to take the most prominent parts and briefly summarize them with background, the main issue, and the court’s ultimate decision,” she said. “I talk about the author, how we can see some of the big issues in society reflected in how the decision was reached, and how that decision was then felt by the people impacted by the decision.”

Ella MIller in Salamanca, Spain, before studying court rulings — Ella MIller ’26 stands in the historic inner courtyard of the Colegio Arzobispo Fonseca in Salamanca, Spain, during her study abroad experience.

Miller with a group in León, Spain, before studying court rulings — Miller with a group at the joined cathedrals of Salamanca in Castile and León, Spain.

With that foundation in place, she used each book to explore how the court’s rulings were experienced by real people. For Miller, the contrasts revealed what legal texts alone seldom show.

“I think each of these books is valuable, and you can take away a lot on your own,” she said. “But having a real understanding of how the court was reasoning through these decisions adds another layer to how people are affected. In Korematsu v. the United States, for example, the decision allowed for Japanese internment to be held constitutional for domestic safety. But when you read No-No Boy, you can see that Japanese Americans on the West Coast were not a threat in any way.”

Ichiro, the protagonist of No-No Boy, returns home from years in an internment camp and has to come to terms with his dual heritage and how to build a future in the country that imprisoned him.

A Project That Shaped a Future Career

Although the SIP more than satisfied academic requirements, it also reshaped Miller’s confidence and confirmed her path toward law school.

“K is great with giving you lots of creative control in your work, and I’ve never felt stifled,” she said. “But to be given a blank slate where I could choose the topic and my sources while exploring what’s interesting to me gave me a lot of confidence as a writer. It made me feel more prepared for the next steps in my life because I plan to go to law school, and writing is super important. I need to think argumentatively and critically, so I feel my SIP was valuable in giving me the confidence to know that I can produce something like this.”

Faculty mentors played a key role. Miller credits Associate Professor of English Shanna Salinas for ongoing guidance, Associate Professor of Political Science Justin Berry for deepening her interest in law, and Professor of English Amelia Katanski ’92, her advisor, for helping her explore connections between law and literature.

Outside the classroom, Miller holds leadership roles in K’s student organizations related to law. She’s the president of the Phi Alpha Delta law fraternity chapter and the secretary for the Aspiring Law Students Organization. She said the experiences strengthened her sense of purpose.

Next Steps: Spain, Service and Law School

After graduating this spring, Miller hopes to spend a year teaching English in Spain through a Fulbright grant. If she’s not selected, she will teach through the North American Language and Culture Assistants Program (NALCAP), which is also based in Spain. She studied abroad in Madrid and hopes to return to deepen her language skills and global perspective.

“International relationships are really relevant to law,” she said. “The experience would help shape the kind of legal career I want.”

Law school applications will follow next year. But if there’s one lesson Miller hopes readers take from her SIP, it’s that Supreme Court decisions are not abstract.

“The law impacts people in enormous ways,” she said. “If you’re not directly affected, it can be hard to understand that. Literature gives us a way to see what those impacts look like in real life.”

36 Jars, 45 Poems and 4,800 Miles for Mom

Posted on March 10, 2026March 10, 2026

Monica Berlin holds baby Eliza Karlin - 45 poems — Eliza Karlin ’26 and her mother, the poet Monica Berlin. Berlin was the Richard P. and Sophia D. Henke Distinguished Professor of English at Knox College. Her poems and essays were published in several journals over the years including *Bennington Review*, *The Cincinnati Review*, *Colorado Review* and *Midwestern Gothic*.

Monica Berlin and Eliza Karlin - 45 poems — Berlin authored two chapbooks—*“Your Small Towns of Adult Sorrow and Melancholy”* and “*Maybe to Region”*—along with two volumes of poetry in addition to “No Shape Bends the River So Long”: “*Elsewhere, That Small”* (2020) and *“Nostalgia for a World Where We Can Live”* (2018), which won the Crab Orchard Open Poetry Prize.

On an August morning last year, Kalamazoo College student Eliza Karlin ’26 pulled onto the highway outside Galesburg, Illinois, driving a silver Mini Cooper—just like the one her mom once had—and began a 4,800-mile journey along the Mississippi River.

For her mom, poet Monica Berlin, the same trip over a decade earlier—routed spontaneously with paper maps—provided inspiration and collaboration with her longtime colleague Beth Marzoni. Together, they coauthored Berlin’s first book, a volume of poetry titled No Shape Bends the River So Long, which won the 2013 New Measure Poetry Prize.

No Shape followed Berlin’s 2013 journey in a collaborative “we,” a voice that felt expansive and fluid, Karlin said. She would travel the same route carrying something heavier: Berlin died unexpectedly in November 2022, during Karlin’s first term at K—making hers a journey of grief, memory, self-discovery and enduring connection.

“I obviously didn’t know what to do when she died,” she said. “I took a leave of absence shortly thereafter. I remember thinking, ‘How would I ever be able to manage my grief?’ I thought that following in her footsteps would be one of the best ways to do that.”

Karlin’s trip became the foundation of her Senior Integrated Project (SIP), a poetry collection titled Bend the River Out of Shape No More, molded by travel, memory and a search for healing.

Mapping What Came Next

Karlin began planning the trip as a junior. Logistics required careful mapping, estimating mileage and costs, choosing stops and deciding whether to travel alone. Ultimately, she realized solitude mattered.

“While it may have been safer to do it with someone else, it was more impactful to do it by myself,” she said.

She woke up early, sought out unfamiliar food, and wandered through large cities such as Memphis, St. Louis, New Orleans and Minneapolis, and smaller towns including Cairo, Illinois; Natchez, Mississippi; and La Crosse, Wisconsin. The rhythm became steady: drive, listen, observe, write. She also created a soundtrack of albums she had never heard before.

“Memphis was Daft Punk,” she said. “The bottom of the river was Cat Stevens. The headwaters were Big Thief.”

Those sounds fused with place. Now, she said, the emotional contours of each region are linked to distinct sonic landscapes in her mom’s memory.

Her Mom as a Passenger

In a way, Karlin’s mom was by her side the whole time. The Mini Cooper’s passenger seat held 36 small jars, each containing some of Berlin’s ashes. During the 25-day trip, Karlin scattered them at different points along the river and wrote a poem after each stop.

“It wasn’t perfect, but it was really something to follow in her footsteps—to travel that distance by myself with her in my passenger seat, with her ashes,” Karlin said. “The whole experience helped so much. I feel like a completely different person after the trip. I feel stronger, braver, more … cool.”

Berlin had drafted much of No Shape while riding in a passenger seat. Karlin cherished the parallel.

“It was a two-person adventure for them,” she said. “The dominant pronoun became ‘we’ or ‘us’ during their trip. Mine was just ‘me’ or ‘I,’ but I was writing all the poems on the road. It felt like I was writing with her.”

Karlin wrote 42 of the 45 poems included in her SIP during the trip itself, often pulling over to walk, reflect and write. Her SIP opens with three deeply personal poems she wrote beforehand. These earlier poems, she said, served as grounding context for the ones that followed.

The rest unfolds as reflections on space, meditations on grief, portraits, odes and moments of clarity. Half share the title Ashen—a sequence of sonnets written after each ash-scattering ritual and modeled after Berlin’s final book, also a sonnet collection.

Across states and landscapes, Karlin found her internal landscape shifting, too. Some days she wrote five poems; other days, she wrote none. At one point early on, she noticed her tone becoming cynical.

“I realized I didn’t want to be cynical on this trip,” she said. “This was a beautiful opportunity to grieve my mother, find joy in the world, and move on.”

‘There Was So Much Love’

The trip held joy, sadness, anger, confusion and love. But as the miles passed, something in her softened. There were practical challenges as well. As a trans woman driving alone through parts of the American South, she expected to feel afraid. Instead, she found compassion.

“Even strangers had so much care,” she said. “There was so much love in the people I interacted with day to day. I thought that was beautiful.”

Together, the poems trace a young writer’s emotional landscape as she moves toward acceptance—not by leaving grief behind but by carrying it differently.

For Karlin, the project’s success is measured in feelings first: relief, transformation and gratitude. She also points to the stories she carries now and the ones she is still learning to tell.

“Storytelling is huge for me,” she said. “It can be anything. It can be poetry, improv theatre, even Dungeons and Dragons. And this trip helped further my storytelling ability.”

The ambitious trek was supported by a Hearst Foundation Undergraduate Research Fellowship, a grant administered through the Provost’s Office. Over the past three years, these fellowships have provided a total of $125,000 to assist 10 students annually in support of their research.

“I would like to say I’m grateful to all the people who supported me as a student, at K and elsewhere,” Karlin said. “It would have been impossible without them.”

Her SIP, she said, was fun, but also sacred, transformative, life-altering, irreplaceable and unattainable through anything but her educational journey at K.

“I have a more profound outlook on life because of it,” she said. “Going forward, I think it will guide me emotionally and personally. I grew up around a lot of poets, but I’ve liked interacting with the poets here even better. I saw a lot of pretentiousness when I was younger. Here, the experience has only felt real. I think that authenticity is a lot more about what poetry means and I love that.”

Lake Itasca, Minnesota, features the headwaters of the Mississippi River.

Chickasaw Heritage Park in Memphis, Tennessee. - 45 poems — Chickasaw Heritage Park in Memphis, Tennessee.

Abraham's Oak at Memorial Park Cemetery in Memphis, Tennessee. — Abraham’s Oak is a concrete sculpture at Memorial Park Cemetery in Memphis, Tennessee.

45 poems — A sunset in Natchez, Mississippi.

Scenic overlook of the Mississippi River valley - 45 poems — An overlook of the Mississippi River valley in Iowa.

An Excerpt From Eliza’s SIP: Ashen (Final)

Friends of yours tell me stories of how you came to
the Headwaters of the Old Man. You drove, solo, like me,
through the night only to see the state government shut
down & with it, the state park. Barricades couldn’t stop you. Your small self
pushed them away, & drove through to the welcome center. A year later, you would go
again with a friend & ask her, “Why are there so many people here?”
I follow you, as I always will, & walk the same
path & I have the same thought &, in addition “Why are there so many
naked babies?” A man asks me to take his picture & I watch the others,
working up courage to drop you off. & I realize, this place, this River
is not my own. It belongs to the millions who have followed it,
up & down, up & down, up & down. I release
you one last time & I think “she’s gone” but know
you never are.

Shell Yes! Student’s Technology Helps Nature Center Track Turtles

Posted on October 22, 2025November 5, 2025

Kalamazoo College student Joe Caton ’26 has turned his lifelong interest in radio technology into an innovative conservation project at Sarett Nature Center in Benton Harbor, Michigan. For his Senior Integrated Project (SIP), Caton built a low-cost telecommunications system to help the center monitor its population of Eastern box turtles.

Sarett is home to several types of turtles, and some, including the Eastern box turtle, are listed as threatened species in the state thanks to humans changing their habitats and predators threatening their safety.

Eastern box turtles play subtle but significant roles in their ecosystems. As omnivores, they help control insect populations and disperse seeds from berries and other wild plants. Their presence affects the food web as both consumers and prey, and their nesting habits intersect with larger environmental issues. At Sarett, turtles have contributed to booming raccoon populations, which can overconsume eggs and disrupt long-term turtle survival.

Sarett staff and volunteers have long tracked the reptiles using older analog equipment that emits radio pings, requiring searchers to walk toward the sound to locate individuals.

Caton, who is a computer science major with a telecommunications background, saw an opportunity to modernize the process and make it more accessible for conservation groups with limited resources.

“Once I found out Sarett was still tracking these turtles, I reached out to see if I could help,” he said. “The receiver technology was the area with the least work being done, so that’s where I focused.”

Caton sourced a software-defined radio device called a Hack RF, which can detect signals across a wide frequency range. He paired it with a screen for visualizing the turtle transmitters’ radio signals and built a homemade antenna using PVC pipe and a metal tape measure. When he and Sarett staff tested the system in the field, they were able to match pings to specific turtles based on recorded frequencies.

The equipment offers Sarett a flexible, open-source alternative to commercial radio trackers, which are costly and difficult to replace or replicate. Caton’s prototype can be produced at a fraction of the cost by printing circuit boards from existing online plans, making the approach scalable for other nature centers, research projects or youth-education programs.

Although Caton’s role focused on technology, he says his work has changed how he thinks about conservation.

“I hadn’t given a lot of thought to how computer science could be used this way,” he said. “Now I realize you don’t just have to use tools that already exist, you can make them yourself and tailor them to the work.”

Caton grew up in Three Rivers, Michigan, and first attended Glen Oaks Community College in nearby Centreville. He originally planned to pursue another degree path, but when Glen Oaks launched a computer science and cybersecurity program in 2020, he became one of its first computer science students. After completing his associate degree, Caton worked for a few years before deciding he wanted to finish a bachelor’s degree.

He had always been intrigued by K.

“When I was younger, I just wanted to go to K because everyone I knew was going to Western (Michigan University) and I wanted to be different,” Caton said with a laugh. “But as I got older and actually started reading about it and hearing graduates’ stories, it sounded like a place I would actually want to go.”

On a whim, he applied to K, assuming it would be too expensive. But the opposite proved to be true.

“I got this financial aid package in the mail that made it not only an option, but the cheapest option,” he said. “That pretty much answered the question for me.”

As a non-traditional transfer student at age 40, Caton expected to feel out of place at K. Instead, he again was surprised.

“The only person who ever brought up my age was me,” he said. “Once I stopped mentioning it, nobody else did either. Nobody looked at me funny or treated me differently. That made it a lot easier to just be a student.”

He quickly connected with computer science faculty including Professor Pam Cutter and Associate Professor Sandino Vargas-Pérez. Their accessibility and encouragement built his confidence to take on projects like the one at Sarett. Caton has also worked on campus in Media Services while balancing coursework and his home life.

Eventually, his SIP provided opportunities that Caton didn’t expect. He has been networking with professionals at the intersection of ecology and technology, and he plans to continue refining his prototype with Sarett. Using a Raspberry Pi—which is a low-cost, credit-card-sized computer—he hopes to combine radio tracking with image-recognition software being developed by WMU students to identify turtles by their unique shell patterns.

Caton’s SIP is complete, but the project continues and so does his enthusiasm.

“If you assume something like the conservation of Eastern box turtles doesn’t matter just because you don’t see the connection right away, you’re going to miss something important,” he said. “We don’t always know what role a species plays until it’s gone. That’s why this work matters.”

Q&A with Sarett Nature Center
Executive Director Nate Fuller

Sarett Nature Center—less than an hour from Kalamazoo College between Benton Harbor and Coloma—is a nonprofit conservation organization dedicated to providing quality environmental education to the community. It has more than 1,000 acres along the Paw Paw River and is home to several state and federally endangered animals in addition to a rich variety of flora and fauna, representing much of what can be found in southwest Michigan. Children are free and admission is $3 for adults who want to hike the trails and visit the welcome center, which has animal displays and feeding stations that are enjoyable for all ages.

Executive Director Nate Fuller answered some questions for us about the nature center, the importance of eastern box turtles and Joe Caton’s contributions to their conservation efforts.

Question: Why are eastern box turtles important within their ecosystems?

Answer: Eastern box turtles are important because they act as seed dispersers, regulate prey populations, and serve as an indicator species for environmental health. Their role in dispersing seeds helps maintain plant diversity, while their omnivorous diet helps control insect and other small prey populations. Because they are so sensitive to changes in their environment, their presence or absence can signal the overall health of their woodland, wetland and field habitats.

Q: How threatened are these turtles?

A: Eastern box turtle populations are declining at all levels—nationally, regionally and locally. They can be found across much of the eastern United States, but they have some level of protected status in nearly half of the states where they’re found. In Michigan, the eastern box turtle was recently moved from “special concern” to “threatened” status due to their increased decline.

Eastern box turtles seem to be doing much better at Sarett Nature Center than anywhere else that they’re studied. By studying Sarett’s population, officials hope to better understand what the turtles need to thrive.

A homemade antenna that Kalamazoo College student Joe Caton designed to help Sarett Nature Center track turtles — Caton built a homemade antenna using PVC pipe and a metal tape measure.

Software equipment says Hack RF One, Great Scott Gadgets — Caton sourced a software-defined radio device called a Hack RF (above), which can detect signals across a wide frequency range, and paired it with a screen for visualizing the turtle transmitters’ radio signals (below).

Telecommunications device helps track turtles on a screen

Joe at Sarett — Fuller had this to say of Caton’s work: “Joe’s work has the potential not just to make the research being done on Sarett’s box turtle population more effective and efficient, but it could also be a game changer for conservation efforts for all projects using telemetry.”

Q: Why is it important for Sarett to protect them?

A: Box turtles seem to be doing much better at Sarett Nature Center than anywhere else that they’re studied. By studying Sarett’s population, we hope to better understand what they need to be successful. Also, Sarett’s population is large enough that we have an opportunity to study their behaviors in a way that just isn’t possible at sites with smaller populations.

Q: What hands-on work is being undertaken at Sarett to help these turtles?

A: Work started a few years ago when Sarett hired John Rutger and his turtle dogs to help us find turtles. The idea was to demonstrate how working dogs help with conservation. We had no idea how many turtles he would find! The dogs found more than 60 turtles in four days at the nature center, and we had an inkling we were onto something special. Over the years since, we’ve documented more with few repeats while drawing attention from conservation professionals and researchers.

Maarten Vonhof at Western Michigan University is overseeing multiple research projects that are looking at genetics, shell patterns, habitat use, range sizes, nest-site selection, scent communication, disease and social behaviors. Watervliet High School Robotics Club members are working on micro-GPS trackers to add to turtles that already have transmitter beacons on them to better understand their daily movements. Sarett staff and volunteers are working on invasive plant species control to improve nesting and foraging habitats. And we are making plans for students, staff and volunteers to help identify, mark and monitor box turtle nests this upcoming spring.

Visitors to the nature center have been helpful in documenting box turtles. We also worked with WMU to set up an app for anyone who finds a box turtle to add them to our project. They can use their phone to take its picture and upload it to our database so we can build up our image catalogue and track locations of individuals.

Q: Has Sarett reached any important milestones in protecting the turtles?

A: We have hit some impressive milestones regarding the numbers of individuals we’ve identified at Sarett Nature Center. After four years of one-week surveys, we identified more than 300 individuals. After four weeks of intensive surveys in 2025, we were able to add more than 250 individuals to our inventory! We are still working on the data, but it looks like we have 600 individuals catalogued, which is many times more than any other single location documented anywhere.

The bloodwork collected this summer marks the largest genetic assessment of a box turtle population ever. The scent data collected is also the largest ever and will be the most comprehensive study ever done looking at box turtle communication via scent.

Q: How would you rate Joe Caton’s work and the importance of it in Sarett’s efforts?

A: Joe’s work has the potential not just to make the research being done on Sarett’s box turtle population more effective and efficient, but it could also be a game changer for conservation efforts for all projects using telemetry.

The costs of tracking are not just in designing the equipment used. A bigger expense comes from the time it takes humans to use the equipment, everything from training on how to use it to time in the field spent tracking down the animals. With more than 70 transmitters, it’s easier and more efficient to find transmitters in the field, and it will save us thousands of dollars. If you project that out to others using this technology, it could be a huge benefit for wildlife conservation.

Food Justice Research Bears Fruit at Sustainability Symposium

Posted on June 3, 2025June 3, 2025

It’s easy to think of issues that revolve around plant and animal life, greenhouse gas emissions and clean drinking water when it comes to studying sustainability and environmentalism. But what about food justice?

The food justice movement examines disparities in food access and health outcomes while seeking ways to provide all with nutritious, affordable and culturally appropriate food. At the same time, it promotes sustainable food systems that prioritize local and ethical production, reducing reliance on industrial agriculture and its associated environmental costs including reducing greenhouse gas emissions, water usage and land degradation.

Enter Tali Deaner ’25. With her Senior Integrated Project (SIP) addressing food justice, she was among 12 Kalamazoo College students who recently presented their research at the 2025 sustainability SIP symposium, sponsored by the Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center and K’s environmental studies concentration.

SIPs at K are capstone experiences, a lot like a senior thesis. Students are free to design their own project within their personal and professional interests in partnership with an advisor, and they’re always presented within a department symposium that aligns with a student’s major or chosen subject matter.

In Deaner’s case, she first highlighted her work through the Department of Anthropology and Sociology. However, students like her also find opportunities to present in additional specialty symposiums, if they so choose, leading to Deaner’s participation in the sustainability seminar.

“We have a lot of people who care about sustainability at K, but they don’t always know what to do about that,” Deaner said. “This symposium helped me talk to new people and they seemed to react well to my research. I’m glad I had the opportunity to do it.”

Deaner first got interested in food justice at K while working as a Civic Engagement Scholar for Club Grub through the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Center for Civic Engagement. Founded in 2009, Club Grub is an afterschool program at Kalamazoo Public Schools’ Woodward Elementary that explores healthful eating and gardening. Woodward and K students share experiences and ideas about what they eat and where their food comes from. Each week they make a snack or meal together, often inspiring the K and Woodward students to try a new food for the first time.

In her research, though, Deaner examines food justice from a historical perspective by looking at issues such as real estate redlining, food access and food apartheid, which have contributed to food injustice up to the present day. She hopes an examination of the past could help the city gain a better understanding of what Kalamazoo can do in partnership with local organizations going forward, so residents can have equitable access to nutritious, affordable and culturally appropriate food.

“My message to the city of Kalamazoo would be to listen to the people who are already doing the work,” she said. “Organizations like the foodbank Loaves and Fishes, Chartwells—which is the Kalamazoo Public Schools food provider—and the Kalamazoo Valley Community College Food Hub are doing some great things. But there’s a job for everyone. We need the involvement of people who pass out food at food banks, the fundraisers for local organizations, and the people at the Western Michigan University medical school, who map food access for the sake of pediatrics.”

Deaner’s project is one example of how the sustainability seminars are growing while including projects from various disciplines and continuing to build momentum through students and their advisors. This year alone, for example, Brooke Dolhay ’25 conducted research in the Philippines examining coral reefs there and why so many of them are dying; Lucas Priemer ’25 measured the circumference of specific trees at the Lillian Anderson Arboretum to estimate how much carbon they capture, showing the value of a forest in sustainability; and Westin Grinwis ’25 integrated traditional ecological practices into outdoor orientation programs such as K’s LandSea.

“I couldn’t have been prouder of this year’s presenters,” said Binney Girdler, a professor of biology and the director of K’s environmental studies program. “They worked really hard on their posters and narratives, and it showed. They knew their projects backwards and forwards; not one used or needed notes to give their presentation. After the event, I heard from several College and community members about how professional and engaging the students were. We had great turnout from younger students, friends, family, faculty, staff and community members. The fact that the event had such positive vibes when the subjects covered included so many dire problems humanity faces is entirely due to the passion and caliber of our sustainability minded students.”

Tali Deaner presents her food justice research at the 2025 Sustainability SIP Symposium — Tali Deaner ’25 was among 12 Kalamazoo College students who recently presented their research at the 2025 sustainability SIP symposium, sponsored by the Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center and K’s environmental studies concentration.

Student presents his sustainability Senior Integrated Project — Noah Pyle ’25 presents his research at the sustainability symposium.

Student presenting her sustainability poster — Ivy Walker ’25 presented her SIP on how the survival of Earth relies on a holistic approach to preserving and restoring nature’s most delicate and crucial biological systems.

Professor of Biology Binney Girdler addresses SIP projects including one on food justice — Professor of Biology and Director of Environmental Studies Binney Girdler addresses attendees of the 2025 sustainability SIP symposium.

City Events, Off-Campus Studio Draw Art Students Downtown

Posted on May 23, 2025May 23, 2025

A visit to the off-campus community studio and several Senior Integrated Projects (SIPs) painted a picture of life at Kalamazoo College during the city’s Art Hop festivities in May. During the monthly celebration that draws crowds to downtown Kalamazoo, the Park Trades Center, 326 W. Kalamazoo Ave., was the ultimate place for the local arts community to be.

Located only about a mile from campus, the Park Trades Center has been leasing space to artists and artisans for more than 30 years. A former manufacturing facility, this 105-year-old building has 95 studio spaces, including space used by Kalamazoo College since about 2010. Art students from K gather there throughout their senior year beginning with their SIP-preparation class in fall. That continues in winter as they work independently, and in spring when advisors meet with students. Every so often, the facility hosts Art Hop, giving students a spotlight within the city.

Josie Checkett ’25 was among the seniors who exhibited her work and benefited from the Park Trades Center this year. Her SIP, titled Shooting the Moon and Other Failures, represented her journey with growing up and the big changes that took place when she left behind her teenage years to become a young adult.

“When I became a senior and got studio space in the Park Trades Center to start working on my SIP, going there almost every day to work shifted my mindset from being an art student to being an artist,” Checkett said. “You get exposed to more opportunities to show work, you meet other people who work or have studios in the building, and you’re not beholden to the hours and resources of the Light Fine Arts building. If you do it right, it’s almost like doing a residency.”

The main area of K’s community studio at the Park Trades Center is used as a classroom and a critique and exhibition space, with the rest split into individual spaces for each studio art major or SIP student to work. In a typical year, about 12 to 15 students conduct studio SIPs in the department, Professor of Art Sarah Lindley said.

“Students have 24-hour access throughout the year, and many use the studio throughout the long winter break, which provides continuity in addition to an accessible workspace,” Lindley said. “The space is managed by a post-baccalaureate fellow, who is a working artist and also has a studio in the space. The fellow serves as a liaison between on- and off-campus resources, a mentor for students, a safety monitor for tool use, an exhibition coordinator and a helper with other essential programming in the department.”

Jacob Converse is the current post-baccalaureate fellow and he relishes his studio manager title. He said students and faculty are lucky to share the Park Trades Center with many working artists and people in trades of several varieties. The professionals include glass blowers, furniture and cabinetry makers, book binders, papermakers, barbers and photographers. It even has a wallpaper-printing studio.

“Art Hops are an exciting event with many Park Trades Center members opening their doors to the public to explore, shop and meet others interested in the arts,” Converse said. “It’s a hallmark experience for our students who gain vital exhibition experience along with the benefits of sharing ideas and receiving constructive feedback for future endeavors.”

Art Hop is an important part of the student experience for all levels of students. The studio hosts art hop exhibitions for seniors in fall and winter, which highlight the different stages of SIP development, and the spring features the department show. There were even a few non-art majors included this year because the students enjoyed their art classes and were proud of what they created.

“I know many of the students who attended this year’s Art Hop enjoyed meeting some local alumni, and many of the recently declared art majors are looking forward to working here, as they appreciated this exciting introduction to the studio space and its multifunctionality,” Converse said.

Art Hop displays at the Park Trades Center studio — Kalamazoo College art students gather at the Park Trades Center throughout their senior year beginning with their SIP-preparation class in fall. That continues in winter as they work independently, and in spring when advisors meet with students. Every so often, the facility also hosts Art Hop, giving students a spotlight within the city.

Josie Checkett with artwork from her Senior Integrated Project — Josie Checkett ’25 was among the seniors who exhibited her work at and benefited from the Park Trades Center this year.

Lindley said the Gilmore Foundation supported the Park Trades Center for several years, and there have been numerous community collaborations there over the years, including partnerships with the Mary Jane Underwood Stryker Center for Civic Engagement along with some student-run community projects. The pandemic changed that somewhat. But the annual student show remains a highlight, with many students venturing off campus to share their work and participate in the local arts community.

Checkett says she hopes that students will continue to push their arts horizons there.

“It’s easy, especially when you live on campus, to forget we are living within an entire community, and one that has a very active art scene at that,” Checkett said. “Both showing work at Art Hop and attending other parts of the event gets students out into that community. When you’re an art student and your studio time, your critiques, most of the other art you see on a daily basis is all made by your direct peers, it’s good to broaden that scope. The Park Trades Center provides a valuable experience.”

Student, Faculty Research Partners Earn National Recognition

Posted on May 12, 2025May 12, 2025

Maxwell Rhames ’25 and Daniela Arias-Rotondo, Kalamazoo College’s Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science, are receiving national recognition for their three years of work together that culminated in Rhames’ Senior Integrated Project (SIP).

Arias-Rotondo’s synthetic inorganic chemistry lab works to find ways of converting light into energy. In Rhames’ SIP, that meant examining what alternative metals could possibly be used to make things like solar panels less expensive, one day assisting a global shift toward renewable energy.

“When you have some sort of inorganic complex that absorbs light, that light can get transformed into chemical energy in the form of electricity,” Rhames said. “A common example is with solar panels, but the metals that they use in them are rare, and as a result, incredibly expensive. We were looking at taking some cheaper metals that you could find anywhere in a much more sustainable way and asking whether they can work.”

For their efforts, the two have received an honorable mention in the 2024 Division of Inorganic Chemistry Award for Undergraduate Research, which recognizes research that students and faculty perform in tandem. The award, given through the American Chemical Society, has three divisions between national labs, research universities and institutions that primarily consist of undergraduates. Rhames and Arias-Rotondo were honored in the primarily-undergraduates category, which covers scientists from hundreds of schools across the country.

“The traditional photoactive metals are iridium and ruthenium, and we’re looking at manganese, which is the third-most abundant transition metal on Earth,” Rhames said. “In the state we use it in, it’s stable and nontoxic, so it’s a great alternative. We’re looking at how we can bridge the gap between saying, ‘this could be really cool,’ and actually getting it to where we could apply it in some of these areas.”

Arias-Rotondo said she and Rhames use spectroscopy to understand what kind of light the compounds they create absorb and what happens after they absorb it.

Student and professor with national Undergraduate Research Award — Maxwell Rhames ’25 and Daniela Arias-Rotondo, Kalamazoo College’s Roger F. and Harriet G. Varney Endowed Chair in Natural Science, have received national recognition with an honorable mention in the 2024 Division of Inorganic Chemistry Award for Undergraduate Research, which recognizes research that students and faculty perform in tandem.

“One of the problems that we’re finding is that once our compounds absorb light and get to what we call an excited state, that excited state doesn’t last long enough yet for them to be useful,” she said. “But Max’s work has been instrumental because he was the first one in the group to make these kinds of compounds. Now that we’ve been able to understand their properties and investigate some of them, other students in our lab can understand how to make them better. We are making a name for ourselves by laying the groundwork for making these compounds.”

Rhames has discussed his SIP at the Inter-American Photochemical Society and American Chemical Society conferences, where his fellow scientists were enthused about his work on a national scale.

“That’s been the coolest thing, because when you put something out there, you don’t know what people are going to think of it,” he said. “And generally, their reactions have been super rewarding. I enjoy doing the work myself, but it’s even cooler to know that other people find it equally exciting. It’s an added bonus.”

Rhames won’t be the first or the last in his family to graduate from K when he walks the stage at Commencement in June. Both of his parents, Frank ’92 and Jody ’92, are alumni, and his sister, Claire ’27, is a current student. However, he’s clearly found his own path having performed research in Arias-Rotondo’s lab ever since his first year on campus. In addition, he will start a Ph.D. program at the University of Delaware in fall, and he hopes to one day serve as a faculty member at an institution like K.

“K is small, so you get to make a lot of good connections with your professors,” Rhames said. “I was three or four weeks into my first term as a college student, and all of a sudden, I’m in a lab doing the work with the research. There are no post-docs or graduate students. It is just the undergraduates and the faculty doing all of the work. That would’ve been a lot harder to do had I not gone to K.”

2025 Sustainability Symposium to Welcome Local Activist

Posted on April 21, 2025April 21, 2025

A local activist known for constructing the first legally built tiny house in the county will be a keynote speaker for the 2025 Sustainability Senior Integrated Project (SIP) Symposium at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, April 23, at the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership.

Ben Brown will address the symposium in a lecture titled Rumors of Hope. A writer and international speaker, he will discuss his years of public engagement through social justice movements, urban farming, food sovereignty, energy sovereignty and economics.  

Brown, who grew up on a family farm in Southwest Michigan, is also an expert in the affordable-housing movement and is a founding member of the Kalamazoo Electric Vehicle Association (KEVA). He continues to be involved in environmental and conservation work and is credited with helping to preserve several cultural resources. 

In 2017, Brown provided WMUK Radio with a video tour around his tiny house, which measures less than 270 square feet. Kalamazoo Valley Habitat for Humanity assisted in the house’s construction. 

The SIP Symposium will feature student presentations representing a variety of academic departments at K and include research on topics such as food access, marine eco-systems, sustainability transitions for public transportation in Kalamazoo, sheep grazing and soil health, carbon sequestration and more. K recently featured one of the SIPs, a project on coral reefs in the Philippines by Brooke Dolhay ’25, on its website. 

Local food from Of the Land will be provided at the free event sponsored by the Larry J. Bell ’80 Environmental Stewardship Center and the environmental studies concentration. For more information, please contact Sara Stockwood, the director for the Environmental Stewardship Center and Lillian Anderson Arboretum, at Sara.Stockwood@kzoo.edu.

Image says Keynote Speaker Ben Brown, Rumors of Hope: You in the Community, April 23, 6:30 p.m., 2025 Sustainability SIP Symposium — Writer and international speaker Ben Brown will discuss his years of public engagement through social justice movements, urban farming, food sovereignty, energy sovereignty and economics at the 2025 Sustainability SIP Symposium at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday at the Arcus Center for Social Justice Leadership.

Student’s Concert to Debut ‘Lavender Bushes’

Posted on April 15, 2025April 15, 2025

Join vocalist, multi-instrumentalist, producer and songwriter Isabella Pellegrom ’25 when she shares new music from her upcoming second album, tentatively titled Lavender Bushes. The event—at 7 p.m. Friday, April 18, in Recital Hall at Light Fine Arts—will serve as her Senior Integrated Project concert performance.

Pellegrom released her first album, Nomadic Tendencies, in 2022. She said she decided to produce a second album for her SIP with inspiration from her brother, Jory, who she says is a fabulous guitarist and songwriter himself.

“I have distinct memories of sitting beside him as he played and wrote,” Pellegrom said. “There are three songs on the album—For a Cent, Oil Spills and Lines in Between—that were originally written by him. As he never had a chance to produce them himself, I wanted to take his songs and make them my own, whether that be in the arrangement for the studio version or getting to collaborate with him on finalizing lyrics. The album was then filled up with songs that I wrote throughout my years at Kalamazoo College.”

Pellegrom notes that some of the songs, such as the title track and In My Back Pocket, have been stashed away for an album since her first year at K, meaning they’re more polished. Others—such as Rainbows, So Sweet, Ocean Tides and Better Left Unknown—she fell in love with because they had a certain lyric or feel while going with the healing, introspective nature of the new album.

Pellegrom is a biochemistry and music double major and a member of the Chemistry Club at K. She’s also been a President’s Student Ambassador, representing the College at formal events for community leaders, alumni and donors as an extension of the president’s office. Plus, she has participated in inorganic chemistry research and completed a summer clinical research program at the Institute for Exercise and Environmental Medicine at the University of Texas Southwestern.

As a musician, Pellegrom is a member of the Academy Street Winds, the Kalamazoo Jazz Band, the College Singers and the Limelights a cappella group. However, the songs on her SIP album are special, she said, because they are a representation of the creative growth she has experienced over the past four years.

“I wrote them during experiences of joy, sadness, confusion and clarity; all the while discovering more about who I am and who I want to be,” Pellegrom said. “Since writing my last album, I have continued to feel grounded in songwriting and I’ve found inspiration in nature.

“The biggest difference from the last album is that this one feels even more rooted in my personal emotions and events. I want to keep finding my voice through my lyrics and my sound through how I am feeling. This album is an exploration of the beauties found within the world. Even more, to me this album represents healing in its many forms and the ways in which I heal. I find healing through joyous moments with friends, through love felt in relationships, through support during moments of hardship and most of all through music. I hope that these songs are in any way healing for those who listen as well.”

"Lavender Bushes" songwriter Isabella Pellegrom playing a guitar and signing with a microphone in front of her — Isabella Pellegrom ’25 sang music from “Nomadic Tendencies” during Founders Day in 2023.

Lavender Bushes Demos

Get a taste of what Pellegrom will perform
at 7 p.m. Friday, April 18:

Concert poster says "Lavender Bushes," Isabella Pellegrom, 7 p.m. April 18 — Pellegrom’s second album, tentatively titled “Lavender Bushes,” will be available this summer.

SIP Search Spurs Scuba Skills, Sea Life Science in Philippines

Posted on March 17, 2025March 17, 2025

Three scuba divers including Brooke Dolhay after a dive in the Philippines — Brooke Dolhay ’25 (center) was accepted into a summer program at the Institute for Marine Research (IMR), where she performed her Senior Integrated Project while scuba diving and researching corals off the small island Negros Oriental in the Philippines.

A view of the coral reef and sea life in the Philippines — Dolhay had daily scenes like this to look forward to after taking a week to receive advanced certification in scuba diving.

Equipment prepared for scuba diving in the Philippines — Dolhay’s work is helping IMR research how it can help coral reef, which are dying as a result of warming waters caused by climate change.

Growing up in Chicago, Brooke Dolhay ’25 enjoyed reading about the world’s oceans, but her Midwest location never allowed her to take much of a deep dive into them.

That continued into college as she followed her parents, Amy ’95 and Kevin Dolhay ’94, to Kalamazoo College. From a distance perspective, the move got her only marginally closer to making waves along saltwater shores in her chosen field of biochemistry. Then a whale of an opportunity came along for her Senior Integrated Project (SIP).

Influenced by her study abroad experience in Oaxaca, Mexico, Dolhay decided to investigate programs overseas.

“I saw the SIP as an opportunity to do exactly what I wanted to do and create my own experience, so I started randomly Googling phrases like ‘diving internships,’ and I came across the Institute for Marine Research (IMR), which is in the Philippines,” Dolhay said.

She decided to apply to the institute and was accepted into IMR’s summer program, conducting research into the coral reef there and why so many of them are dying. The only issue she needed to resolve in advance was funding an experience in the Philippines, which she discussed with her SIP advisor, Regina Stevens-Truss, a professor of chemistry and department co-chair.

“She said the college actually has a lot of different ways to fund a SIP experience, so I emailed a bunch of people about it,” Dolhay said. “I talked to the Center for Career and Professional Development. They had an unpaid internship stipend, so I applied to tha.t. The Center for International Programs has a list of grants on its website for SIP-related funding, so I also applied for the Hough Grant through the Hough Foundation. That helped me, too, and the experience ended up being fully funded, which was awesome.”

A waterfall surrounded by trees and rocks in the Philippines — Dolhay had days off from her research to visit waterfalls, hike on a mountain and explore rain forest.

A street view of Negros Oriental in the Philippines — Negros Oriental’s remote location, where cars are uncommon, required her and some of her fellow diving researchers to ride around on a moped with the nearest town being about 40 minutes away.

A view of Negros Oriental — Negros Oriental is known for its natural beauty along with Apo Island Marine Sanctuary, the Manjuyod White Sandbar and Mount Talinis, a dormant volcano with old-growth forests and five lakes in the vicinity.

With financing concerns behind her, accepting the one-month opportunity was a no-brainer.

“I was excited because I also traveled to Europe with family, but I’d never been as far away from home as the Philippines,” Dolhay said. “I really loved my study abroad experience, too, so I knew I could travel alone, and I thought ‘why not?’”

IMR is located on the small island of Negros Oriental, which required her to take flights from Chicago to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to the Philippines capital of Manila, and Manila to Negros Oriental. The remote location, where cars are uncommon, forced her to ride around on a moped with the nearest town with a mall being about 40 minutes away.

Once settled, though, Dolhay found her first order of business was to prepare for her research by earning an advanced certification in scuba diving. For her first six days, she completed two dives in the morning and two in the afternoon in a physically demanding process.

Then came her research. Going in, she knew that algae and corals have a symbiotic relationship. Typically, algae provide corals with food and photosynthesis, and the corals give algae access to sunlight and a protected environment. Climate change, however, is warming ocean waters. That causes corals to bleach and then expel algae. The processes are killing off some varieties of fish and are affecting humans, too, as island communities have less fish to eat and less protection from disasters such as hurricanes and tsunamis.

Armed with this knowledge, it was Dolhay’s job to operate a variety of underwater cameras while scuba diving before using software to collect data and analyze the pictures.

Brooke Dolhay examining the ocean floor while scuba diving in the Philippines — Most of the methodologies Dolhay and her fellow researchers used while scuba diving involved varieties of cameras including a GoPro to examine the ocean floor.

An underwater view off Negros Oriental in the Philippines — Climate change is warming ocean waters and causing corals to bleach and then expel algae. The processes are killing off some varieties of fish and affecting humans, too, as island communities have less fish to eat and less protection from disasters such as hurricanes and tsunamis.

Dolhay swimming in the Philippines — Dolhay received advanced certification in scuba diving during her time in the Philippines.

“We were looking at the corals, the fish and also the ocean floor,” Dolhay said. “Nearly all of IMR’s methodologies involved a kind of camera. For the fish, we had a long metal bar that had two cameras on either side of it. For the ocean floor, we had a GoPro we used along a transect line where we would take pictures about every meter or so. For the corals, we would swim along a transect line and look for different obstructions.”

IMR will continue the research that she helped start for a few more months yet. But within the data, a variety of scientists like Dolhay are finding reason for hope.

“There are labs at different universities that are trying to genetically modify corals so they can grow in the increasing water temperatures,” she said. “IMR also is growing baby corals under water in a coral nursery and using the larvae to try to respawn areas that haven’t been doing well. There’s a lot of cool science going on between genetic modification and artificial development with scientists dropping cages like the ones fishermen use to replant corals using zip ties. A lot of the fish are attracted to that because it works like a real reef.”

The opportunity in the Philippines, Dolhay said, clearly wouldn’t have been available to her had she decided to attend a school other than K.

“I’ve talked with friends who have gone places like the University of Tampa and the University of Illinois,” she said. “They don’t have this kind of experience at all. They might work in a lab with a professor, but I don’t hear of them speaking about outside opportunities where they can get involved and be supported by the college at the same time. I really love that I could do that.”

Coral reef are key to protecting beneficial algae and fish in the Philippines while also protecting island communities during hurricanes and tsunamis.

Dolhay performing research while scuba diving in the Philippines — Dolhay expects the experience she had in the Philippines to be beneficial as she applies for master’s programs in environmental science at institutions such as DePaul University, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and the University of Illinois Chicago.

Dolhay swims while scuba diving — Dolhay said some scuba diving scientists are introducing artificial coral reefs in ocean environments by dropping cages, like the ones fishermen use, to replant corals using zip ties.

And now, she expects the experience will be beneficial as she applies for master’s programs in environmental science at institutions such as DePaul University, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and the University of Illinois Chicago.

“I’m really interested in decarbonization and the chemical side of being a biochemistry major because the CO₂ that we emit is directly affecting the oceans and the way that the corals grow,” she said. “I’m also looking into ocean acidification and how we can try to mitigate that because it just keeps happening as a result of our carbon emissions. In the meantime, I’m trying to find ways to educate others on the importance of being aware of your carbon footprint and doing the little things throughout the day that can help the planet.”