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Cathy Wargo |
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2008 Heather Campbell Chaney Environmental Fellow
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Cathy Wargo is from Pennsylvania and is majoring in Pre-Health Biology while attending Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania. She is involved with Lambda Sigma Honor Society, Allegheny Pre-Health Club, Gator Rowing, and will be a Resident Advisor in the Fall 2008. She has participated in Creek Connections since high school and has spent numerous summers in Northern Canada fishing and enjoying the wilderness.
The following is a short biography of Cathy's summer 2008 experience as the Heather Campbell Chaney Fellow.
This year, I was awarded the Heather Campbell Chaney Environmental Fellowship after finishing my freshman year of college. I am from Cranberry Township, Pennsylvania: a small community just north of Pittsburgh. In the fall 2008, I will be a sophomore at Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania where I will be majoring in Biology and minoring in Economics. After finishing my undergraduate work I plan on attending Medical School to become a surgeon.
It is hard to describe how working at Catamount Institute has impacted my life. When I left home at the beginning of the summer, I was still a somewhat naïve teenager. But Catamount has changed that. This summer I learned how to work in a small office and adapt and coordinate ideas and programs with people whom I had never worked with before. Part of my responsibilities at Catamount was to help design the programming for the three summer camps: Wild About Wilderness, Creek Connections, and A Bug's Life as well as help create the curriculum for the Fall 2008 Young Environmental Stewards program. In addition, I was a counselor and photographer at the camps. These camps taught me a lot about myself - boundaries, strengths, and weaknesses especially working in a new and ever changing environment.
My specific task as the Heather Campbell Chaney Environmental Fellow was to retrofit the Handbook for Water Quality Analysis of Western Pennsylvania Waterways to Colorado State Education standards. In order to complete my project I researched topics including: Colorado Watersheds and how different chemicals affect Colorado Watersheds like nitrogen, sulfates, or iron. In addition to completing the handbook, I also created a Teacher's Manual to accompany the handbook for teachers that participate in Creek Connections.
Becoming the Heather Campbell Chaney Environmental
Fellow provided me dozens of opportunities that will help further my career. It has allowed me to work in Environmental Education and sustainability. I did not have a strong background in these specific areas even though I am a Biology major. By gaining this experience I am diversifying my knowledge I was able to apply what I know of Biology to Environmental Science. Additionally, working at Catamount has provided me unique opportunities that I would not have been offered in Pennsylvania.
Thank you to everyone who made this opportunity available to me. It was the perfect way to spend my summer. It was a great way to enter the "working world". I have learned just how strong of a person I am and I have become more independent. |
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