BHS senior tries hand as marine biologist

Editor's note: This is the second article in a two-part series on an interest in marine biology at Bigfork High School. Read about the new science class at Bigfork High School in the Jan. 7 edition of the Bigfork Eagle.

With the backing of the Bigfork community, one local girl got to spend this past summer living out her dream.

Tia Bakker, a senior at Bigfork High School, spent 10 weeks as a research assistant at PISCO Interidal Field Station at the University of California at Santa Barbara.

"Every single day I was out of my comfort zone," Bakker said. "I did something new every single day."

One of the highlights was collecting tuffies, which are objects researchers put out in the ocean for one to three months at a time and then collect to see how the ocean is changing.

Bakker, like the tuffies, tried to soak in as much as she could during her time.

"I talked to everyone I could," Bakker said.

By doing so, she was able to join in on a few other projects, including urchin dissection to make sure they were healthy enough to be served in restaurants, studying starfish and smurfing, which involved a collection object that simulated kelp that Bakker and other researchers would free dive to pull up and shake into a boat to collect rock fish.

She started her assistantship by studying microorganisms and learning how to identify them by looking at them under a microscope. She got to spend a week in the field, starting her days at 3 a.m. for low tide and then heading back to bed by noon.

She also learned a lot about herself ranging from her tendency to encounter bouts of sea-sickness to the fact that she prefers field work to the more tedious lab work which left rings under her eyes after hours of staring through a microscope.

"It helped me a lot," Bakker said of the experience. "I know lab work is essential, but I want to be out in the water. I don't want to be stuck in the lab."

Bakker said what was most surprising was how welcoming and receptive the researchers she worked with were. Bakker was one of very few high school students in the program. She often was asked what college she attended.

"Everyone was so surprised," she said.

Bakker is hoping this program will help her chances to receive scholarships and to study marine biology in college.

As much as she liked UCSB, Bakker said the cost of living is a deterrent for her attending there. Instead, she's looking at colleges around the Portland area or Texas Maritime Academy. Her goal is to get into a college near the coast where she can also afford to live.

Bakker has long wanted to be a marine biologist, having fallen in love with the ocean early in her life.

Bakker had the opportunity to chat with Chris Gotschalk, a Bigfork native who has worked for more than a decade as a marine biologist and graduated from UCSB to feel out how good of a fit the career field might be. He put her in touch with the school. The hitch in the program was that while the time and expertise of the school's staff were offered free of charge, there was no money for lodging in the beachside community or travel to and from Santa Barbara. Bakker said she was shocked when, only a day or two after receiving the offer, Bigfork School District Superintendent Russ Kinzer presented her with a check for $800 from an anonymous donor to cover the airfare.

Bakker said she made many close friends and gained a lot of knowledge she brought back and hopes to share with the community. The main way she is doing this is through the new marine biology class, taught by Hans Bodenhamer at BHS. She was able to bring tuffies back as a way to collect specimens, this time in lake water. The class put some out this fall and will collect them in the spring.

"The community has been really supportive," Bakker said. "It meant the world to me."

Bakker said the Bigfork community was key to this experience. When she first got the offer, she didn't think she would be able to attend due to the costs involved.

"I couldn't have done it without the community," Bakker said.