Student Presentations Carry Successful Annual Meeting

Student presentations once again carried a successful Tidewater Chapter annual meeting. Volunteer judges scored a total of 30 student presentations—18 posters and 12 oral papers. Winners received cash prizes at the awards banquet on the evening of March 24th at the Chesapeake Ranch Estates in Lusby, Md.

In the poster category, the judges selected these winners:

• First Place: Nina Santos, a doctoral student advised by Ryan Woodland at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES) for research assessing the prevalence and ecological consequences of habitat connectivity between Maryland’s coastal lagoons and coastal ocean for juvenile fish.
• Second Place: Grace Loonam, a master’s student at East Carolina University (ECU) co-advised by April Blakeslee and Rachel Gittman for identifying non-destructive indicators of trematode infection in Littorinidae hosts.
• Third Place: Amanda Bevans for working to improve our understanding of habitat changes in the Chesapeake Bay with a York River ecosystem model, a doctoral student under the advisement of Tom Ihde at Morgan State University.

Oral presenters were equally as talented, and in the student oral paper category, the judges selected these winners:

• First Place: Ryan Tharp, a master’s student advised by Jeff Buckel at North Carolina State University, for examining fine-scale movements and habitat use of recreationally important reef fishes at North Carolina artificial reefs.
• Second Place: Shannon Smith, a doctoral student under Mary Fabrizio, faculty at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, for research on habitat quality in two seascapes: as seen by juvenile summer flounder.
• Third Place: Kohma Arai, a doctoral student in Dave Secor’s Lab at UMCES, for identifying partial migration in Hudson River striped bass.

Thanks, again, to all of the volunteer judges. Making decisions this year was no easy task!