Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources / Oklahoma State University
OKAMP/SMETE sows the seed . . .
Oklahoma reaps a harvest of minds
By Fred Causley
helps mentor Doug Hamilton take bacterial samples
from a swine lagoon as part of her OKAMP-
SMETE research program.
Lisa Fields had not even planned on going to graduate school due to finances, but now she is on the President’s Honor Roll at Oklahoma State University and is planning a Ph.D.
Thomas Jones started out for veterinary school, but decided it wasn’t for him. He took an animal science biotechnology option instead and is now planning a graduate program.
Lana Stout worked in a laboratory as an undergraduate at OSU, and is now a first-year graduate student in a cancer research program with a five-year plan to a Ph.D.
These students have more in common than the fact that they are minority citizens, part of a group traditionally under-represented in the sciences. They also have being very good students in common; they are people with academic accomplishments and a strong work ethic to their credit. However, it was help from a program called the Oklahoma Alliance for Minority Participation in Science, Mathematics, Engineering, Technology, and Education (OKAMP-SMETE) that helped them get a firm grasp on their own bootlaces and pull.
The OKAMP-SMETE program at OSU was initiated by a five-year grant from the National Science Foundation in 1995. OSU is the lead institution in the alliance, which also includes the University of Oklahoma, East Central University, Northwestern Oklahoma State University, Southeastern Oklahoma State University, Northeastern State University, Langston University, and the University of Central Oklahoma.
Besides this core of eight, there are 19 affiliate Oklahoma institutions in the alliance, and to date, OKAMP-SMETE has supported students at 10 of these.
Three programs serving under-represented minority undergraduate populations are incorporated into OKAMP-SMETE: the Summer Bridge Program for rising freshmen, the Scholars Program, and the Summer Research Internship Program.
The residential Summer Bridge Programs provide college freshmen with a bit of a head start on college-level mathematics and freshman composition. The students are required to spend one hour after the math class with a teaching assistant. This is to enable them to develop the discipline of reaffirming class materials while they are fresh.
Key selection criteria are an exemplary academic record, a sincere interest in a SMETE field, high academic goals related to SMETE, strong academic values, a personal record of peer-oriented/cooperative service to their home community, and plans to attend one of the alliance institutions. At OSU, tuition, textbooks, fees, and campus housing are provided by OKAMP.
Peer-mentoring activities help Bridge Program students learn the daily routines of scientific investigation and help make them more aware of "real life" as a SMETE undergraduate. Bridge scholars learn how to continue their participation with OKAMP and are encouraged to compete for fall and spring semester traineeship stipends.
Common features of the Scholars Programs at all eight OKAMP universities are academic tracking, awareness meetings, study groups, tutoring, workshops, SMETE-related seminars, guest lectures on careers, and field activities.
Semester scholars participating in the model program at OSU are organized into academic major or discipline-related groups known as "cadres." Members participate in activities encouraging retention, high academic development, and raising the level of preparedness for graduate study through interaction and projects with SMETE department faculty or others.
"I would like to take my hat off to faculty from across the campus for their help with OKAMP-SMETE students," says Earl Mitchell, Project Director.
"Faculty in the Division of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources have been extremely cooperative. The departments of Plant and Soil Sciences, Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, and Entomology and Plant Pathology have all had our students in their labs. The Animal Science Department recently became involved, working one of our students in a lab there."
with zoologist Karen McBee, her OKAMP-SMETE mentor
for her summer research project. They were making
tissue comparisons of the cotton rat, with the goal
of understanding how exposure to environmental
pollutants affect genetic makeup and health
of animal populations.
Summer Research Internship Programs
The Summer Research Internship Programs offer continuing undergraduates quality mentored investigations in a wide array of SMETE fields. A research plan is developed and submitted to OKAMP for review and consideration. This year, students carried out the work during the summer session and then presented their accomplishments in either oral or poster form at the Summer Research Symposium held in the Noble Research Center on campus last July.
Often, interns form support and resource groups to discuss progress and share information on departmental seminars, workshops, symposia, and so on. Interns also may volunteer to peer-mentor Summer Bridge Program freshmen by hosting visits to their research/work sites and by participating in a panel at the Forum for Bridge Scholars.
"I am excited about the students’ response to this initiative to get them to take responsibility for their own education. I believe our students are making a significant impact on undergraduate research around the campus, simply by providing them with the opportunity to make that impact," Mitchell says.
Judy Batson, OKAMP-SMETE program manager, concurs. "We are providing more students with an undergraduate research experience in the sciences," she says. "We are also having an impact on the state by increasing the number of under-represented minority graduates coming from Oklahoma."
Batson says about a fourth of the scholarships awarded have gone to OSU, but some half-million dollars annually is reaching students throughout the alliance.
Will the program be able to continue when it reaches its grant expiration date in two years? Mitchell says that all depends on financial support.
"A grant renewal will depend on our performance—and on the commitment made by member institutions in the form of state and institutional financial support, as well as on faculty involvement. Our current phase concentrates on the early transition into the sciences, whereas the second phase will concentrate on seniors entering graduate programs."
Which brings us full circle back to the students.
Juan Rochas, a junior in biology, is an exchange OKAMP-SMETE student who attended OSU during the 1997 Summer Research Internship Program. He came from the University of Texas-Pan American at Edinburg, Texas.
"I learned that we use scientific reference sources and we have no idea how hard it is to get them from the brain into the scientific literature," Rochas says. "I was fortunate to be placed in the lab with Dr. (Michael) Mitas, one of the best researchers I have ever met. His patience and insight was so helpful."
Mitas, an assistant professor in the OSU Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, said he was very happy with Rochas’ performance. Their project was aimed at trying to understand and prevent Huntington’s Disease by manipulating the DNA in bacteria. In Huntington’s Disease, triplicate sets of nucleic acids in DNA occur more often than normal. Mitas and his associates figured out how to manipulate the bacterial DNA so that the triplicate sets also would increase.
"Juan’s contribution was that he put a ‘marker,’ or mismatched base pair, into the DNA sequencing. We were able to show that the reason the sets of triplicate pairs of nucleic acids increase is due to an error-prone DNA sequencing process. We now think we can identify that process. Ultimately, we hope to use the same steps on human DNA and strike at the heart of the cause of Huntington’s Disease."
Thomas Jones, an animal science major from Oklahoma City, helped with the identification of toxicity from a Norman, Oklahoma, landfill. Jones’ mentor was zoology professor Jack Bantle. They correlated the absence or decline of frog populations around the landfill with toxicity problems occurring because of the landfill.
Jones carried out toxicity tests in the laboratory using frog embryos. The ultimate goal of this research is to understand why frog populations are declining and what is the role of environmental pollutants in the decline of the amphibians.
"I am hoping to work in the biotechnology field as a researcher," Jones says. "While the OKAMP program definitely helped me financially, the opportunity to work with Dr. Bantle gave me a solid science background."
presented his research efforts at the OKAMP-SMETE Summer
Research Symposium held in the Noble Center in July.
Jones is currently working with OSU food microbiologist Peter Muriana helping to conduct food pathogen research.
Even though Lana Stout had already worked in a research laboratory for two years, she says she still learned a lot with mentor John Cushman, assistant professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology.
"Dr. Cushman was a good mentor with a lot of patience. I worked on helping to establish an expressed sequence tag database in the common ice plant. I think internship programs such as this one are wonderful ways for students to see if research is for them. Experiences like this also are what graduate schools look for in applicants."
Stout is currently a first-year graduate student in the Cancer Biology research program at the University of Arizona. She is looking forward to securing her Ph.D. degree in five years.
Lisa Fields was one of two 4.0 students in the summer program. Working with water quality specialist Mike Smolen in the OSU Department of Biosystems and Agricultural Engineering, Fields studied the relationship between well maintenance and water contamination. Using Smolen’s assessment program as a guideline, Fields, a member of the Pawnee Indian tribe, tested wells on Pawnee land.
"We assessed the different types of potential groundwater contaminants stored near wells. This involved going into buildings, looking for backflow devices on faucets coming from wells, and sampling for pH, hardness, alkalinity, and fecal coliforms. I even found a snake under one well covering," she recalls.
A junior in the College of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources Environmental Sciences program, Fields plans to work with natural resources preservation with Oklahoma Indian tribes. A single mother trying to get through college, Fields had not considered going on for a graduate degree.
"I credit my counselors and mentors for getting me interested. They helped me with a resume, and gave me something to think about for the future," Fields says.
Fields certainly has exhibited that uncommon quality shown by many OKAMP-SMETE students: she has learned how to get a tight hold on the boot laces and pull—very hard.
Agriculture at OSU Fall / Winter 1997
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