Trainee Update: Jessika Mesa
Aug. 17, 2023
Jessika Mesa is a second-year accelerated masters student in the Department of Environmental Science under the mentorship of Dr. Mónica Ramírez-Andreotta. She has assisted in the field with soil sampling, works alongside community members, and continues presenting her work.
In her first year, she supported laboratory research through meetings, extra support sampling soils, and attending community events. She assisted in the soilSHOP held in Superior, Arizona, by tending to community members' needs. She also organized science education efforts during summer school at Naco Elementary School.
For her second year, she has been focusing on supporting lab research and her thesis research. She worked with lab members to collect soil samples from Miami/Globe, Arizona, and assisted in processing the soil samples in the lab for an upcoming lab project.
Jessika Mesa presented her co-created community-science work at the 2022 ASA, CSSA, SSSA Annual Meeting in Baltimore, Maryland, in November 2022. with a poster titled, “Co-Created Community Science to Action: Environmental Health Literacy Outcomes.”
Her thesis project focused on the impact of Project Harvest on environmental health literacy levels. Project Harvest, a co-created citizen science project, was initiated with environmental justice (EJ) communities that neighbor sources of pollution. Community scientists were trained to collect samples, then attended informal science education activities and data sharing events. She worked through survey data and participation efforts to determine the measured outcomes and changes in numeracy; scientific knowledge; self-efficacy for learning science, doing science, and environmental action; project motivation; and community-based actions.
Jessika Mesa presented her Master's Report “Co-created Community Science to Action: Environmental Health Literacy Outcomes” on July 28, 2023! Congratulations Jessika!!!!