Interview by Susan
How did you get interested in paleontology?
I came to paleontology through the back door - I never
really studied paleontology - or even thought about
studying it. My introduction to paleontology came when
I was in college. I had an opportunity to choose a science
course and I chose to take a course in evolution and
paleobiology.
The real reason I took the class, though, was because
it gave an introduction to geology - ROCKS! It might
seem strange, but I had always been curious about rocks.
The course also included a trip to Texas and that first
expedition to the field was where my passion was born.
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Photo © Mike Hettwer
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I had been studying history up to that point. Well, geology
is the history of the earth and if you study geology you learn
how to read the landscape - it tells a story of great forces
and powers at work. Mountain building, massive erosion carving
rivers and streams into the skin of the earth, pressures of
plates colliding and deforming the earth's surface. This was
really powerful stuff. Well, after that trip I never looked
at the outdoors in the same way again. After the college trip,
I was invited to be a member on a dinosaur expedition to Africa.
I was asked to be the official expedition "scribe." My first
field experience was a three-month expedition to Niger. Since
then I have been a team member on expeditions to Argentina,
Morocco, Niger and China.
How did you pursue that career?
Even after the incredible experience I had during the1993
Expedition to Niger, I still didn't pursue paleontology as
a career because there were so many things I was interested
in. At the time, I returned, finished my college degree and
a Master's in History. Then I spent some time substitute teaching
in public schools in Chicago. After about a year, I received
a fellowship at Teaching Tolerance magazine in Montgomery,
Alabama. I spent a year learning writing and editing with
the educational magazine, and learning about a non-profit
organization.
After a year, though, I returned to Chicago and ended up
immersed in the small schools movement in Chicago. I worked
at the Small Schools Workshop at the University of Illinois
at Chicago helping schools restructure into small learning
communities - and helping teachers find ways to help students
be academically successful. A lot of what I learned about
effective learning environments, theme-based curricula and
personalized instruction has affected the way Project Exploration
works with kids in our youth development programs.
After four years of working at the Small Schools Workshop
- and going on expeditions and working to take kids into the
field on the side - I decided to start a non-profit organization
with my husband, Paul Sereno. It was clear to me that I could
combine a lot of my interests in writing, science and education
- AND incorporate a desire to work for social change - through
an organization dedicated to making science accessible to
city kids. So we launched Project Exploration.
What inspired you to work with kids? city kids in particular?
There are so many answers to this question I hardly know where
to start! There are a few reasons. One of the reasons is that
I find it a wonderful experience and very satisfying experience
to be with kids. It's a great thing - from a very selfish
point of view - to have a chance to share your excitement
and wonder about the world with young people because they
respond. I find that I am my best self when I am with kids
-I am more patient, more generous, more curious about the
world around me - when I am with kids. Also, kids laugh at
my jokes!
But why city kids?
Well, a lot of the kids I get to work with because of Project
Exploration are true city kids. They often haven't had a chance
to spend a lot of time outside or in a natural environment.
They may never have had some wonderful experiences - to sit
on a rock surrounded only by sky and trees; to walk for a
long distance with only REAL dirt under their shoes; to see
a sky full of stars at night.
These experiences all help a person to have some perspective
on life - to realize there is a world - and even living and
non-living things - that are bigger than they are and their
specific lives. Project Exploration uses the description of
city kids to mean kids that live in a city - but also as a
way to describe kids who are likely minority kids, kids who
may be living in poor neighborhoods, or come from poor families.
When you combine all of these things - kids who may be minorities,
poor and living in Chicago there is a very good chance that
these kids are the very people who might experience the greatest
wonder for the natural world around them -and are the same
people who have the least likely chance to have any kind of
meaningful experience with science. When you take this scenario
one step out, this has some pretty stark repercussions - kids
who come from populations historically underrepresented in
science professions may keep on being underrepresented - to
date there are no professional African American paleontologists
- despite the fact that paleontology is a popular field that
most of the public is familiar with and a field that gets
a lot of media attention.
What are your feelings towards being involved with the
media?
The media can be a powerful tool. I think that a lot of the
time the media reinforces stereotypes - I love the challenge
of taking stereotypes apart! For example, most documentary
films about science or expeditions focus on one person, when,
in fact, it takes a whole team of people to make scientific
discoveries come into being.
OUR media efforts with Project Exploration - especially our
website - try to show a more diverse picture of how science
works, and give a fuller picture of who is involved in scientific
discoveries and what it takes to bring them to life. As the
executive director of Project Exploration, it is important
to me that we have good stories about our work in newspapers,
magazines and on TV. These stories raise the profile of the
work we do and can even help us raise money for our work.
As an educator I LOVE when people write stories about our
work because it is a chance for kids to be in the limelight.
We live in a world where being on TV or being in a newspaper
means a lot. When a story features our kids, it means that
the kids - and even their families and their schools - have
a chance to stand out, to be recognized and most importantly,
for the kids to feel special.
What did you feel with the find of Sarcosuchus?
One of the highlights for me during the 2000 Expedition to
Niger was the moment I walked up a sandy rise and spotted
a pinkish, grey mound on the horizon. When I came up close
on it, it turned out to be a mass of fossilized bones, many
broken, but many still in good shape.
As I cleaned up the hill, I found more bones going into
the ground. I realized that I had come upon a site preserving
a good part of a body of a huge crocodile. We had found many
sites preserving skulls and parts of scutes (bony plates that
sit under crocodiles' skin) of Sarcosuchus, but very
little in terms of the skeleton. We ended up excavating the
site. Later, back in the lab in Chicago, it turned out that
that the jackets from the site I discovered contained parts
of the shoulder girdle and legs of Sarcosuchus. That
was an incredible feeling to know that something I had discovered
in the Sahara helped us to reconstruct the body of this ancient
animal.
Why was it important for you to have students involved
in the Sarcosuchus announcement?
One of the truly great things about paleontology is that it
is so interdisciplinary - it involves anatomy, geology, art,
geometry, and math. Paleontology is a great hook for learning
under any circumstance. With Sarcosuchus, we had created opportunities
for kids to visit the lab while Sarcosuchus fossils were being
cleaned, repaired and reconstructed. Some of them even tried
their hands at cleaning Sarco fossils - so it was a natural
next step to have them involved in the announcement - to have
them there at the historic moment when this incredible discovery
was unveiled to the public. After all, they'd had the "inside
scoop" all along. From Project Exploration's perspective our
whole mission is about making science accessible. So often
the only people who get to participate in these kinds of experiences
are specialized researchers or journalists. It says something
to the rest of the world to see that a group of 10 kids from
Chicago public schools are not just attending the announcement,
but are knowledgeable about the crocodile, the significance
of the discovery, and are excited about science.
What's on your agenda for the next five years?
My number one goal is to establish a Project Exploration teaching
and learning center on Chicago's south side where kids and
families can come any time they want. The center will be a
home for the kids who are already in our programs who want
to maintain their relationship with us and with science on
a regular basis. We want to have exciting free exhibits that
showcase new discoveries, free labs for kids and families
to learn about natural science, a resource library, a place
where scientists can interact with the public. That means
that Project Exploration has to be a stable organization -
we have to be able to raise a lot of money, put it to good
use, and do a better and better job of working with kids and
providing great science experiences! I am also hoping to travel
to as many places as I can - I love to travel!
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