Welcome to my home page. My name is Wendy Slijk, I have been a science
educator for the last 17 years and an environmental educator for the last
eight. Being born in Yosemite National Park I have always been involved with
studying the natural sciences. I followed this passion to California
Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo where I obtained my bachelor's
degree in Environmental and Systematic Biology. Currently I am in the Masters
of Biology Program at the University of Arizona in Tucson. It is here that I am
learning new teaching methodology as well as being updated in biological
science academia.
I have taught mostly in the life and earth sciences both at
the junior and high school level. I have the pleasure of being from "America's
finest city," San Diego, and am currently teaching at La Costa Canyon High
School. La Costa Canyon is one of three high schools in the San Dieguito High
School District located in the beach community of Carlsbad . In 1999 we were
honored with being one of California's most Distinguished Schools. Through the
support of my district I
have the opportunity to parcticipate in many programs aimed at taking science
education outside the classroom and infusing the learning content with various
ecological issues facing our community. These projects have presented me with
many honors including the national recognition in the form of the Toyota
Tapestry grant as well as other awards and grants fostering the connection
between the students and other community members (see web page url to be posted
soon). To help me obtain these goals I have had the wonderful support of having
been involved with the Calif. Science Project as well as several science
institutes sponsored through the University of California. None of these
held me
back from playing the original Ms. Frizzle in the San Diego Natural History
Museum's Magic School Bus program.
To be a scientist in education is a constant endeavor and one I have yet to
grow tired of. This passion has lead me to explore all seven
continents, seeing for myself some of the last wild places on earth. Some of
these experiences have included visiting with the mountain gorillas in Rwanda,
banding fairy penguins in Australia, swimming with sharks and other
creatures in
the Galapagos, and attending a conservation workshop in the rain forest of the
Amazon. None of
these compared to my visit to Antarctica. As a tourist, I only had a glance of
this incredible world. The experience left me in awe of the wildness and
fragility of this vast continent. I vowed then to go back and help
contribute to
it's understanding. Thanks to TEA I will have my wish. At each place I visit I
am compelled back to education as the only secure method to create a difference
through time. Working with people (especially the generations behind my own) to
study the causal factors underlying environmental issues , and then helping to
empower them to create change, however small, has been the zenith of my
career.
When I am not out to change the world I am hiking with my dogs,
learning to rock climb as well as cooking with the help of my friends. I enjoy
all music from Bach to Smashing Pumpkins. Any type of physiological discussion
is a welcome challenge. I love to watch sunsets at the beach and am always
looking for castles in the sky.
Dr. Amy Leventer, Colgate University
I am involved in a research cruise that will examine and sample the seafloor around Antarctica for clues to past climate and the history of glaciers and ice sheets. Dr. Amy Leventer, of Colgate College in New York, will lead the science team. This team includes researchers and students from several institutions in the United States and Australia. We are working to develop an understanding of climate and oceanographic change during the Quaternary -- the last 1.6 million years. To do this, we will gather two types of data.
The first type of data includes images of the seafloor collected using acoustic instruments. Somewhat like the echo-sounding used by bats, we will use instruments to create soundwaves. The soundwaves bounce off the seafloor and the return signals are recorded by "listening" devices. The information we collect allows us to map the features on the ocean floor. As an ice sheet moves across the seafloor, it scrapes the rock and reorganizes the sediment; the features we observe should help us determine how far the ice sheet moved across the seafloor. The images also help us select where we want to collect sediment cores.
The second type of data we will collect includes sediment cores from the seafloor. This sediment comes from many places, such as material carried by glaciers and icebergs, and from plankton that that settle to the seafloor. The sediment layers that slowly accumulate on the sea floor reflect changes in the types of material and plankton, which record changes in the environment. We hope to obtain a sediment record that allows us to observe climate changes of 100 to 1000 years.
To select our core sites, we will use the seafloor maps to identify deep holes, or basins. The deeper the basin, the thicker the sedimentary record and the more likely the ice sheets did not completely scrape the sediment out of the basin as they moved across the seafloor.
While parcticipating in the cruise, I will be studying living phytoplankton that we collect from the ocean around Antarctic . We do not know what groups of phytoplankton occur where, and we do not know the factors that control their distribution (such as amount of sea ice, water temperature, etc.). By knowing more about the phytoplankton, we can better understand the record of phytoplankton we collect from the sediment cores. The results from my investigation will be used by others to quantify our observations.
Our cruise will journey from Hobart Tasmania across the Southern Pacific Ocean to the eastern side of Antarctica. Much of our work will be around Prydy Bay and the Mac. Robertson Shelf. We will end up in Cape Town, South Africa after being at sea for 60 days aboard the N.B. Palmer (Check out National Geographic VOL.189,no.5 May 1996). Join us for a fantastic expedition!
