Blog 24: Exit Interview Questions

(1) What is your essential question?  What is the best answer to your question and why?

•  My essential question is: How can scientists effectively reduce the anthropogenic effects dealt to the ocean? My best answer to this question is to put a cap limit on the amount of pollutants that we allow into the ocean, because this solution will have the most beneficial results in the end. By putting a cap limit on the amount of pollutants manufactured, there will be a decrease in the amount of pollutants that are put into the ocean.

(2) What process did you take to arrive at this answer?

• I received my initial answer from my mentor, Kiersten Darrow, and then I later researched all the types of regulations that have been implemented to reduce the amount of coastal pollution going into the ocean.

(3) What problems did you face?  How did you resolve them?

• One of the biggest problems I faced was finding research on coastal runoff, but after specifying my search to "Coastal runoff regulations" from "Coastal pollution levels", I was able to find better research on the regulations being implemented.

(4) What are the two most significant sources you used to answer your essential question and why?

• One of the most significant sources I used to answer my EQ, was my mentor, Kiersten Darrow, because she would always give me examples in her answers whenever I asked her my essential question. She would spew out a variety of related facts and other resources I could use to help further my research,
  My second best source was a book called Killing Our Oceans by John Kunich, because it explained the few legislation that have been passed to help protect marine waters, but how ineffective these legislation are.

(5) What is your product and why?

• I have not yet come up with a product for my senior project.

Blog 23: 2014 Interview

1. Yesenia Martin
2.She wants to do something with business/sales, because that's what her father does and it interests her.
3. She'll work with her dad for her 10 hour summer mentorship.
4. In the 2-Hour presentations,she wants to see ideas that could possibly help her with her senior project, and information on varying subjects.
5. She asked me if her choice in studying business/sales had to be specified towards a single type of business, and I told her most likely, because studying business is a general area.

Blog 23: 3 Column Chart

3 Column Chart

Feeding My Octopus!

So, I decided to share my experiences with feeding my two-spotted octopus at the Cabrillo Marine Aquarium.

This is Hercules, the octopus. In this picture, he's eating a pretty big shore crab that was about 6 inches in diameter. The crab was a sad opponent for this Octopus Bimaculoides.

If you look close enough, you can see the legs of the crab... inside the octopus' mouth.

Blog 21: Independent Component 2

Literal

• I, Eric Reynolds, affirm that I have completed my independent component which represents 30 hours of work.
• The Cabrillo Marine Aquarium has allowed me to continue to volunteer, and has me doing a variety of things that increase my knowledge of marine biology.
• Log (incomplete)
• I completed an extra 45 hours of mentorship with the CMA. 

Interpretive

• I spent a majority of my hours feeding and taking care of the octopus. Ever since I started volunteering at CMA, I immediately fell in love with the octopus. Feeding the octopus takes about 20 minutes for each octopus, and there are a total of 10. I also go out into the rocks and catch crabs to feed the octopus. This takes about 45 minutes.
• 
  

Applied

• The component helped my support my answer of monitoring the levels of pollution more precisely, because all the time I spent out on the rocks, I noticed a lot of pollution going into the water from sea-doos, boats, and people just littering. I feel like if there were people out on the rocks to regulate this type of pollution, we could increase the health of the boat launch water.

Blog 20: Three Column Chart

3 Column Chart

Blog 19: Senior Project and ESLRs

1. I think I have excelled the most in the "Effective Learner" ESLR.
2. One of the subsets for "Effective Learner" is "expresses personal creativity". At the aquarium I volunteer at, I'm always trying to find out different ways to help the aquarium, or introduce something new. A while ago, I conducted a plankton-tow for science fair, and I found a mysterious hydromedusa in my water. The aquarists hadn't seen anything like it before and told me that I could possibly raise it. I like to explore the beach on my own to see if I can find anything interesting, and in the past week, Elijah and I have managed to save the aquariums wolf eel population. We were collecting crabs for the octopus, and I was being curious and discovered a colony of pregnant ghost shrimp, ideal food for the wolf eel eggs. The aquarium was very thankful for what we had done, and I felt proud of myself for saving the wolf eels.
3. This is a picture of a sea hare that I found while exploring the tide pools.