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Although many children spend their summer vacations playing with bugs, few college students can say they get paid to do the same. While conducting an independent behavioral study of Madagascar hissing cockroaches may not exactly be “playing,” Emma Anderson ’17 is enjoying it nonetheless. Anderson, a prospective biology major, is working under the guidance of Visiting Assistant Professor of Biology Heather Mallory to examine the relationship between the cockroaches and the mites that live on them.

Ernest Williams, the William R. Kenan Professor of Biology, discussed the decline in the monarch butterfly population on a recent Morning Edition broadcast. The segment, titled “Upstate NY sightings of monarch butterfly in danger,” aired locally on NPR affiliate WRVO on June 14.

The Arthur Levitt Public Affairs Center recently announced the 2014 Levitt Summer Research Fellows. To enhance student research around issues of public affairs, the Levitt Center funds student-faculty research through its Levitt Research Fellows Program. The program is open to rising juniors and seniors who wish to spend the summer working in collaboration with a faculty member on an issue related to public affairs. Following are this year’s recipients.

Felipe Garcia’s interest in animals took a more serious turn as he prepared to begin college.  Garcia has long been passionate about animals, spending his summers working at Jungle Island, an interactive zoo located in Miami, Fla. During the summers of his sophomore and junior years at Hamilton Garcia attended the University of Pennsylvania Veterinary Medicine Program for undergraduates.

Recipients of the 2014 Emerson Summer Grants were recently announced. Created in 1997, the  program was designed to provide students with significant opportunities to work collaboratively with faculty members, researching an area of interest. The recipients, covering a range of topics, are exploring fieldwork, laboratory and library research, and the development of teaching materials. The students will make public presentations of their research throughout the academic year.

Ernest Williams, the William R. Kenan Professor of Biology, presented “The Endangered Migration of Monarch Butterflies” on May 15 at the Cazenovia Public Library in Cazenovia, N.Y.

Professor of Biology Sue Ann Miller served on the Grants-in-Aid of Research (GIAR) Committee of Sigma Xi, The Scientific Research Society April 4-6 at the society’s headquarters in Research Triangle Park, N.C.

Associate Professor of Biology Mike McCormick presented at a meeting of the Dark Energy Biosphere Institute held at the University of Southern California, April 9-11. McCormick discussed the results of a high-resolution survey of the microbial communities and geochemistry throughout the water column and sediments of Green Lake in Fayetteville, N.Y.

The Huffington Post published an opinion piece co-authored by Dean of Faculty Patrick Reynolds titled “The Liberal Arts Contribution to edX.”  The piece explored the fact that “the residential liberal arts model that our institutions and many other liberal arts colleges have embodied for two centuries has something to contribute to the open online platform: promoting a wide exploration of knowledge and the reciprocal illumination of seemingly disparate disciplines through critical thinking, discourse and writing.”

Elisabeth MacColl ’16 has been named a Barry M. Goldwater Scholar for the 2014-15 academic year. She is among 283 scholars from across the U.S. to receive the Goldwater, the premier national undergraduate award in the fields of mathematics, the natural sciences and engineering.