A small boat in water, shrouded in fog — Getting the boat ready in the morning fog.

An Unforgettable Experience at BML

An SRJC-BML Internship Story

by Elijah Lewin
November 14, 2024

A view from the coastal bluffs looking out over the ocean with ribbons of white foam across the waves — Can’t beat a view like that!

I’m Elijah Lewin an SRJC student majoring in biology and planning on transferring to CSU Monterey Bay in 2025 where I hope to earn a bachelors in marine science. I worked with Robin Roettger and Nicholas Trautman in the Coastal Oceanography Group this summer.

I love the coast, from the weather to the plants and animals everything about it is so special to me and it's always been a reason I’ve wanted to pursue a career in the sciences. When I learned about this internship through a fellow student at SRJC I couldn’t believe how perfectly it aligned with my interests and applied hoping to experience a bit of what a career in marine science would actually be like. Not only did I get exactly that, I got to meet so many amazing people with so much passion for what they do and all while taking in the amazing sights of the northern coast of California. In my time with the Coastal Oceanography Group (COG) at BML I got to experience a variety of things like field work and data processing, I’ve also learned how fundamental their work is to much of the research done there as well as in our communities!

The edge of a boat with a person's arm in view, dropping a sensor over the side — Nicholas dropping one of the weighed down sensors into the Russian River.

If, like me at the beginning of this internship, you aren’t exactly sure what coastal oceanography is its the study of both biological and physical aspects of the coast meaning the COG lab looks at things like currents, water quality, and ecological interactions along estuaries and coastline tracking their changes and reporting on the data they collect and process. This data goes on to help inform studies on things like ocean health as well as help people and businesses minimize their impact to the environment. While there I got to assist in doing some of this work, over the course of my internship I continued work on an ongoing project to organize data on the plankton concentration in the seawater being used in the lab as well as learning to visualize the data using python, a programming language. Keeping track of the quality of the water being pumped into the lab is key to ensuring the health of the tanks, if there's too much plankton it could be potentially toxic so having information like that well organized and easily accessible is important. While data analysis like that is a big aspect of coastal oceanography going out and gathering that data is just as important and a few weeks into my internship I got the opportunity to go out on the Russian River to set up sensors which will record things like the oxygen and salt content of the water.

This summer has been full of incredible experiences. Getting to meet the many different people of BML, hearing their stories and learning about their research, even getting to participate in some of it, is something that has helped me gain a deeper appreciation for nature as well as gain confidence in myself as a scientist and given me many new connections with people I hope to stay in contact with far into the future!