REU Site: Understanding Coastal Ecosystems - From the Everglades to the Coral Reefs

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This REU Site award (Understanding Coastal Ecosystems - From the Everglades tothe Coral Reefs) to Florida International University, located in Miami, FL, will support the training of 10 students per year for 10 weeks during the summers of 2019-2021. The research theme is coastal ecosystems ecology and environmental aquatic chemistry. Specifically, this research looks at the connectivity among the Everglades wetlands, coastal mangrove forests, seagrass beds and shallow water coral reefs. The overall goal is to detect the sources, transport and transformation of environmental stressors and the ecosystem responses under rapidly changing climate and land use. The program integrates researchers across 10 departments and 4 colleges university-wide, to build interdisciplinary projects and convergent research experiences. REU students will be co-mentored by teams comprised of faculty, graduate students and postdoctoral researchers. The program will provide professional development activities, including workshops on research methods, responsible conduct of research, communicating science and others, as well as field experiences and career pathways panels. It is anticipated that this REU Site will train a total of 30 students recruited from a nationwide pool, primarily from schools with limited research opportunities, and with a majority of those from groups traditionally underrepresented in science. Students will learn how to develop an independent research project, the various research analysis methodologies, and how to communicate science to multiple audiences. Students will present their results at a final research symposium, and will have the opportunity to present their work subsequently at scientific conferences.A common web-based assessment tool used by all REU Site programs funded by the Division of Biological Infrastructure will be used to determine the effectiveness of the training program. Students will join a LinkedIn group dedicated to the program and will be contacted annually after the program to determine their career paths. Students will be asked to respond to an automatic email sent via the NSF reporting system. More information about the program is available by visiting https://crestcache.fiu.edu/opportunities/index.html or by contacting the PI (Dr. Rita Teutonico at rteutoni@fiu.edu) or the co-PI (Dr. Crowl at tcrowl@fiu.edu).This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.