Undergraduate students at the Gump Research Station participate in all facets of marine science activity, from collecting and managing specimens to gathering and processing data. They are an integral part of their respective research teams. Interacting and working with their faculty and graduate student mentors they learn that science is an ongoing process in which one question inevitably leads to another.
Many of the undergraduates who come to Gump Research Station have never lived away from home, outside of their years at UC Santa Barbara, so coming to a research station in a foreign country — and in the middle of the ocean — is a brand new experience and one they will never forget.
Gallery
Image
Ph.D. candidate Kelly Speare teaches undergraduate interns Maya Gorgas and Ally Aplin about the tile used in her studies of coral growth and survivorship.
Image
Returning from a morning dive, professors and MCR LTER principal investigators Sally Holbrook and Russ Schmitt are assisted by undergraduate intern Kera Heimlich.
Image
Cleaning scuba tanks is one of the many tasks interns such as Maya Gorgas perform at Gump Research Station.
Image
A sunset visit to the Belvedere overlook on Mo’orea caps off a long work day at Gump Research Station.
Image
In one of Gump Research Station’s science laboratories, undergraduate intern Ally Aplin measures the growth of young corals and algae.
Image
An undergraduate student helps to fashion a wire cage for use in coral reef research underwater.