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Build up to Fall Break

October 26, 2008

I can’t believe it is already the middle of October and Fall Break is just around the corner! Making it to Fall Break is always the tough part. Last week was full of midterms, projects, and more midterms. While campus may seem dead as you walk around, the library is packed with students at every computer, table, and cubicle, prepared to spend some quality time in “Club Olin.” It seems as if the Bookmark Café in the library doesn’t ever stop making coffee or restocking the red bull supply as students spend sleepless nights studying and writing papers.

This last week I spent many hours studying for my Biochemistry exam and working on my Microbiology project in the lab. Fortunately my Biochemistry exam was a take home test and our professor, Professor of Biology Stephen Klemann, gave us one week to return it to him. I really enjoy the flexibility that this gives us because we are able to take it anytime during that week when we feel that we are prepared. Once we are ready to take the exam we isolate ourselves in a quiet area and are allotted two hours to complete the test. I also appreciate the trust that our professor has in his students to allow us to take unproctored exams. This level of trust helps foster the development of a community based on honor and integrity, which Rollins prides itself it maintaining.

The Academic Honor Council at Rollins strongly encourages professors to administer unproctored exams to demonstrate the trust the faculty has in the students. This then allows faculty-student relationships to be developed on a foundation of honesty and trust, which I think is an important characteristic.

I also spent a lot of time last week working on my Microbiology project. At the beginning of the semester we were each given a description of a microorganism and were told that our project was to eventually find and grow an organism in the lab that meets the given description. The beginning of the semester was spent researching our assigned microorganisms in search of learning where they can be found, how they can be grown, etc.

My organism is one that is capable of using starch as it sole carbon source. I began researching by finding organisms that were able to accomplish this. I then tried to figure out where I could find a sample that would contain this organism. My research showed that soil is a good place to begin looking. I also had to determine the best type of media that contained the needed nutrients for the organism to grow and also limited the carbon source to only starch.

Once I had all of this information I set out to spend an afternoon in the lab. After several hours I had made my media for my soil samples and my agar plates for isolation of an organism. I gathered soil from Lake Virginia, the rose garden on campus, and the Rollins College Greenhouse. I added the samples to the media and allowed the organisms to grow for a couple days. Once the broth was turbid, I streaked a few agar plates in hopes to isolate an organism. As soon as I have isolated an organism I plan to perform a couple of tests to prove that the organism is capable of degrading starch.

I have really enjoyed working on this project because it has allowed us to work independently in the lab and get a lot of good hands-on experience. I was able to make the media for my project on my own, which allowed me to learn where everything is located in the stock room and how it is prepared.

It also has made me appreciate the work that is done to prepare our labs each week. Although this project is a lot of work and is a semester long project, it has taught me so much that reading the text book and sitting in lecture never could have. I think it is a great experience for students to learn what being a scientist is really all about and giving them a real hands-on experience. Independent projects such as this one also help improve students’ time management, forcing them to figure out how and when they can set aside time to come into lab and work on their projects. It has been such a great experience for me and our Microbiology professor, Professor of Biology Eileen Gregory, is always there to help us when we need it!

Now that both my Biochemistry exam and Microbiology project are taken care of, I can finally head home for Fall Break and relax with my family and fiancé. Time to pack my winter clothes, leave my flip flops behind, and head to the frozen tundra of Wisconsin!

Picture 1: Rollins College Greenhouse
Picture 2: Streak plate inoculated with broth 1 containing a sample from the rose garden on campus

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