July 7th and 8th we had the opportunity to travel to Bethel, MN to visit the reserve, which is a veritable oasis for  anyone interested in Natural Resources or Science. 5,500 acres of mostly undisturbed landscape, everything from the grass plains to Boreal forest, to marsh land and swamps. From what I gathered was that the students that were there; were either second year or first year, ranging from bachelors to masters studies. The way everyone talked was with a highly educated scientific knowledge.

I asked them how they found their topics of research, did they just spin the wheel and say “Mold species found on trees” or “Invasive insects”? They said they had to tie into what they were really passionate about. We did learn quite a bit about how the scientific world works now, from the students there and the instructors. It seems to me the higher in education you become the more apt you are to teach or mentor as they say.

But they also learned from us as well; Mary Goggleye schooled them on some Indigenous knowledge. They were interested on our take on Science and research as well, as our mindset is more caretaker version, where theirs it is more straight to the point leave no room for error hypothesis. I’m sure that is what they are taught and just a brief peek into what we will be included in, in the future.

One day was clearly not enough for me anyways, you would need at least a week just to check out all the different biospheres. Very ,very interesting field trip to say the least. Shows us that there is a much larger scientific community out there if we are willing to venture out and be a part of it.