The Friends of the Mendocino College Coastal Field Station and Natural Sciences are pleased to announce the awarding of the 2019 Brandon Pill Memorial Mendocino Coast Audubon Society $1000 scholarship to biology student Jasmine Martin. Jasmine has been studying marine biology at Mendocino College.

“As part of my biology studies, I have visited the Mendocino College field station in Point Arena, CA,” explains Jasmine. “There, I conducted fieldwork on marine organisms and plant life.”

Jasmine has been active with the MESA (Mathematics, Engineering, Science Achievement) program at Mendocino College. In 2018, she was awarded a U.S. Department of Transportation Dwight D. Eisenhower Fellowship. “I conducted my own scientific dive research and studied sea stars along the Mendocino County coastline.”
Jasmine has also been active with the NOYO Center for Marine Science in Fort Bragg, California. “I took part in a necropsy study of a male Orca that had washed up on shore at MacKerricher State Beach.” Jasmine was awarded a scholarship to join a team tasked with articulating the Orca skeleton. “The skeleton is now on display in downtown Fort Bragg,” she says.

“Our committee is ‘over the moon’ happy,” says Judy Steele, Mendocino Coast Audubon Society Scholarship Committee Chair. “We have a Fort Bragg student who is going on to be a research scientist and has affiliation with the Noyo Center–I don’t know how it could be better.”

Jasmine has been accepted to Humboldt State University for Fall 2019 where she plans to study marine fisheries management.

“The field research I have done has had a monumental impact on me,” says Jasmine. “My enthusiasm for field work has increased dramatically and I finally feel like a real scientist. I have no doubt in my mind that scientific field work is my career of choice.”

For more information about the Friends of the Mendocino College Coastal Field Station and Natural Sciences, please contact earth science professor Steve Cardimona at (707) 468-3219, scardimo@mendocino.edu