Students to share findings with Congress

Three Slippery Rock University students will meet with members of the U.S. Congress after making new discoveries in the Badlands National Park in South Dakota. Bradley Erney of Dover, Michael Jahn of Butler and Erin Heffron of Minersville were members of a team of seven students and two professors including Dr. Patrick Burkhart and Dr. Jack Livingston, who went on a research trip last May to study climate change and examine the origins of the landscape.

According to Erney, the group drove for three days to reach their destination and the trip lasted two and a half weeks. He said they spent nights in tents, went days without showering and had to deal with winds sometimes over 60 mph. The group moved from place to place and their main focus of study was within a one mile radius.

The main objective, Erney said, was to study distinctive old buried soils, known as paleosols, which could be dated and used to correlate sod tables at different locations. Nine sod tables were studied and three radiocarbon dates are being interpreted and may assist in placing the study in the context of climate change on the high plains, he said.

"We were looking at the relationships between sod tables, which are like miniature plateaus that rise four to eight feet off the ground and have grass on the top of them," Heffron said. "Before we went, we talked about these tables and everything in my mind remained pretty abstract. But when we actually got there and saw the tables and actually started doing fieldwork, things started to come together."

Jahn said that during the day much of the research involved a lot of digging, extracting soil samples and carrying the material back to the van to be brought back to SRU.

He said the group was allowed freedom to visit other sites and landmarks on their own time and that many animals that you wouldn't normally see everyday were encountered, including buffalo and coyotes. Jahn said the group visited Mount Rushmore, The Black Hills, Devil's Tower, Buffalo National Grass Lands, Hot Springs, and some museums.

Meeting people on the trip was another plus to the adventure, according to Jahn. The students had the opportunity to meet with Oglala Lakota, Native Americans who belong to the Sioux tribe. The students are trying to get funding to be able to work with the Lakota Tribe, who have better knowledge of the area through living there and have better access to the surrounding sites, Jahn said.

The three students were accepted to present in front of Congress upon their abstract which is titled "Magnetic Susceptibility Studies of Paleosols to Advance the Understanding of Paleoclimate in Badlands National Park South Dakota."

The Council on Undergraduate Research invited the students to participate in its "Posters on the Hill" program. Posters on the Hill provides an opportunity for presenting exceptional undergraduate research annually to the nation's lawmakers.

The students will give a summary of their work to Congress and will attend a reception in Washington D.C. on April 1.

Erney and Jahn, environmental geoscience majors, and Heffron, a member of the Environmental Studies Program, are very excited and are looking forward to meeting with members of Congress.

"You learn so much more than in the classroom and nothing is like having a professor sitting right next to you explaining things first hand," Jahn said. "It's not too often in one's lifetime that the opportunity to meet with Congress on a one-on-one basis comes by. "

" Knowing that, I plan on taking advantage of this opportunity to ensure future research and job possibilities for myself as well for SRU," he said.

The trio presented a poster of their Badlands research in Denver at the National Geological Society of America meeting in October 2002 and feel they will be prepared for Congress.

"Anybody can go on these trips as long as you go through the process with the professors and show a true interest in the work," Erney said.