Tag Archive : Andrea Eastes

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[New Year, New Staff] Graduate Assistant, Academy Alum Tyler Clark to Assist with Academic Success

September 20, 2011 | 5Q, Academics, Alumni, News, People, Staff | No Comments

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With the start of a new year at the Gatton Academy comes several new personalities to the staff. We are excited about these passionate and dedicated individuals who have joined our team. They come to us from different parts of the country with a host of varied experiences. Over the last few weeks, the staff has had a chance to get to know each other. It’s now your chance to meet the new faces behind the Academy. Each day this week, we’ll profile a new staff member.

Academy Avatars sat down with each new staff member to post ten questions in hopes of getting to know them better. Avatars came up with a few questions that they asked each person. Each Avatar also posed unique questions of their own choosing to ask as well.

Interview by Andrea Eastes, Academy Avatar

1. Tell us a little bit about yourself.

I am 21 years old and currently pursuing my masters in mathematics. I graduated from the Honors College in May 2010. My thesis, entitled “Counting Locally Convex Topologies on a Totally Ordered Finite Set,” was directed by Dr. Tom Richmond and my second reader was Dr. Dominic Lanphier. I enjoy playing piano, reading, web design, etc. I am also senior editor of the AMS Grad Student Blog. — You can access my CV at http://tylerclark12.com/TylerClarkCV.pdf

2. Why did you decide to join the Gatton Academy staff?

Tim Gott offered me the position a bit ago. I met with him to discuss the position and found it a good fit. I will be able to help Gatton students learn and I will be able to do math simultaneously.

3. Are you excited for the coming year?

I am very excited for the upcoming year. I look forward to meeting all of the students and growing with them.

4. What role do you wish to play in the Gatton Academy students’ lives?

I want to be able to help mold students’ student skills to help them become more successful college students.

5. What are you looking forward to this year?

I am looking forward to getting to know the students and seeing them mature academically and emotionally.

6. How did being an Academy student affect you?

The Academy allowed for me to get a head start on college courses. Furthermore, it opened a lot of doors that provided me the opportunity to perform undergraduate research.

7. Do you think that having been through the experience of the Academy will help you to better serve the needs that students may have?

I feel that my experiences in the Academy will allow me to better understand needs of students. This will allow me to guide them to optimal learning.

8. Is there any advice that you’d like to give to students?

Students should take advantage of the resources on campus. Make sure you get involved in research you enjoy with a professor with whom you work well. Research is what will set you apart from other students.


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By Gatton Academy

Eastes and Brothers Explore Materials Research, Grad School Options at UTSI

August 30, 2011 | Academics, News, People, Research, Students, Summer | No Comments

Lydia Brothers records notes from a heat experiment at UTSI.
Lydia Brothers records notes from a heat experiment at UTSI.

by Michael Crocker, Academy Avatar

Two students at Western Kentucky University’s Gatton Academy of Mathematics and Science in Kentucky spent time over the summer exploring materials science with advanced medical applications.

Andrea Eastes (’12) and Lydia Brothers (’12) served as student researchers at the University of Tennessee Space Institute doing  focusing their explorations on determining the applications of ZBLAN glass in medical fields.

The University of Tennessee Space Institute is a graduate study and research institution with a campus located “practically in the woods” Eastes said. “It was really nice to be around nature all the time.”

Eastes was also glad she “was able to get a little perspective on what grad school is like.” Academy students were part of a seven-week program at the  UTSI where they worked alongside graduate and undergraduate students to characterize a particular type of glass ceramic, explained Brothers.

ZBLAN glass, or glass made of Zirconium, Barium, Lanthanum, Aluminum, and Sodium, was the topic of research “because it has capabilities of a storage phosphor which we were working with so that it could be used as an alternative to typical x-ray films,”  added Eastes.  She went on to explain that this allows the x-ray result to be stored digitally and removes the inconvenience of one-time-use x-ray films.

The research team, which included Eastes, Brothers, and several undergraduate and graduate students, worked with two types of the glass.  According to Brothers, they worked to “evaluate how much light would be emitted from each particular sample at a number of different temperatures and percentages of a variable element.”

As well as the research that was done on the trip, Eastes also “really enjoyed getting to meet all the amazing people” on the campus, and she got to do everything from “singing like crazy people on karaoke night” to “canoeing and kayaking.”

Brothers enjoyed the experience as well and said she even got to “sit in on someone’s doctoral defense.”

Eastes says she learned the most about “the physics that is involved with something as simple as glass.” She also found  that being able to work with such a variety of machines and being able to decipher the readings  a great learning experience.

Both Brothers and Eastes  enjoyed learning more about what graduate work will be like and getting to meet and become friends with other people interested in their fields.

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By Corey Alderdice

Students Gain First Impression of Faculty, Academic Explorations at Annual Research Fair

August 23, 2011 | Academics, News, People, Research, Staff, Students, WKU | No Comments

by Andrea Eastes, Academy Avatar

As Adventure Week continues, juniors were exposed to even more aspects of the Academy, in particular, research.

On Monday afternoon, faculty from many academic departments at WKU including Psychology, Chemistry, Mathematics, Biology, and Physics, joined together in Florence Schneider Hall for the annual research fair.  During this time, professors set up boards about their research on the second and fourth floor common areas so that students could not only learn more about what they are doing but also become involved in it.

Junior Erica Plummer said that she found the research fair “very helpful, and it assisted in motivating me to want to participate in research this semester at the Gatton Academy.”

She also commented on the wide diversity of the fields of study represented and how well professors explained their respective fields.  In fact, there are not very many places where one can find a professor discussing his work on knot theory alongside one that is displaying his dung beetle collection.

Attending the fair also allowed students to talk to professors face to face about their research and ask any questions that they might have.  Henry Uradu, a junior, commented that being able to have those conversations in person gave him a better idea about professors’ personalities and the meaning of their research.  He also added that those connections are superior to just reading about research because he could “see exactly what they were working on and how many hours I would be required to put in weekly.”

While Henry found the diversity in the biology department which ranged from ecology to cancer research to nanobiology, Shane Masuda found the geology research and physics research to be particularly fascinating.  Other students, such as Plummer found mathematics research to be where their interests lie.

Derick Strode, Coordinator for Research, Internships, and Scholarships, was the staff member behind this gathering twenty-five faculty members for the fair.  He and Residential Counselor Sue Meador began organizing the fair in early July.

Strode spoke to the “display of their commitment that we had so many faculty join us on Monday.”

He also commented on the importance of the experience for both students and staff: “For Gatton Academy students, I want research to be a means of career exploration–a way to confirm what they’ve always wondered if they would enjoy.  I want our students to find the thing that they love studying.  Students who find this passion have fun with their research.  It becomes an outlet, like a hobby.  For the faculty who work them, it’s an awesome feeling to mentor a student who shares their same passions.   In fact, many faculty say that having a Gatton Academy student work with them is like having a graduate student researcher.”

All in all, the research fair was a success for both faculty and students.  Both were able to make meaningful connections with each other and many doors were opened for the possibility to do research this semester.

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By Corey Alderdice