TRAIN Scholar Evelyn Rivera Elias' Blog

  This semester has gone by quickly, but it's exciting! I was finally able to submit my FAFSA form and am still awaiting the form review, though I am not too worried since I heard ASU has barely started processing the forms. I have made an appointment with my academic advisor to create my academic plan, but so far, I will only be taking 12 credits next Fall. I don't want to be overwhelmed with classes while adjusting to a new campus. I have applied for additional scholarships so I don't have to work for the first semester, so I'm very excited to finally take it easy and solely focus on my classes for at least one semester. 

Now that the conference is over and the research project is essentially done, things have been calm. There will need to be more time to create the artificial intelligence program to automate the microplastic counts since taking the pictures and creating the circles to identify the plastic beads and fibers is very time-consuming. We may be able to get some pictures, but it would work as a foundation for next semester if any new TRAIN scholars decide to take on the project. I have talked to Dr. Cotter about how I can write my research paper, so I'm not stressed about it.   

  Saturday we all went to Glendale Community College for the Arizona-Nevada Academy of Sciences conference. The room for the poster presentations was a lot bigger compared to last year but we had almost double the amount of presenters compared to last year. Johnathan & Olneya and I put in a lot of practice for our poster presentation and it really paid off! Cassandra and Hannah even won one of the student awards and they announced everyone on the poster. It will be a great addition to put on our resumes but aside from the win, it was a fun event and there were a lot of great research posters.

  Last Thursday, the team (Johnathan, Olneya, and I) completed and submitted our final draft for the poster to Josh. This Saturday will be the Arizona Nevada Academy of Sciences conference, so it'll be my second year as a poster presenter. I am much more excited about this year's conference because I learned much from my public speaking class last Fall. On Friday, we divided sections of the poster so everyone knew what they would talk about during the poster session. We will prepare more on Friday, but in the meantime, I'm gonna finish up my microplastic counts and get the research paper done.

  This week the team's (me, Johnathan, and Olneya) focus is to get the microplastic counts done before Thursday morning, when Josh will want our final draft of the poster for the Arizona Nevada Academy of Sciences poster. Johnathan and I met with Dr. Cotter to go over what discrepancies we should include in the poster, as well as formatting. We have collectively decided to do three counts per stage and we'll look back at the spreadsheet to see if anyone is overcounting or undercounting.  I am not sure I'll be able to automate the microplastic counts this semester but Dr. Cotter said that if I do the pictures then it'll be great foundational work for someone who decides to take on the project.