Julianna Rose is an undergraduate student at Cornell University pursuing a major in Plant Sciences and a minor in Environment and Sustainability, with specific interests in plant adaptation to environmental stress. Julianna brings her own sci-comm experience to the YVoS program as a writer for the Cornell soil science extension platform, working to translate peer reviewed journal articles into more digestible formats, specifically for farmers to use. The topics she wrote about included phytoremediation, biochar production, and the interactions between PFAS, organic matter and human health.
For her outreach project, Julianna taught a class on hydroponics at a Cornell Campus event called Splash! Splash is a one-day event where high school and middle school students come to Cornell’s campus to learn about absolutely anything! The majority of Splash teachers, administrators, and volunteers are Cornell students, and provides an opportunity for students to gain experience creating, planning, implementing and teaching a class on a topic of their choosing. Julianna’s lesson provided an overview of what hydroponics are, how they are used for growing food and other plants, and included a hands-on activity where students got to make their own small scale, easy to maintain hydroponics system that they could take home and grow. Speaking from her own experiences, Julianna hoped to inspire young students to pursue scientific careers, lowering barriers and anxiety for entering into an academic career in science.
“When I was in 8th grade, I had the privilege of taking an elective course in my middle school. I chose a course about hydroponics and aquaponics which my earth science professor had set up as a passion project in a closet in our school. By the time I was in high school, he started offering a more advanced version to high schoolers as well, which I was able to take, and at this point he had expanded into a larger classroom to serve as his “lab.” I fell in love with plants and hydroponics in his course, and this led me to pursuing a plant science major, which I am immensely grateful for. I want to help inspire kids who were around the same age as I was when I fell in love with hydroponics to start working hands-on with plants in a different way than they may be familiar with. Working with plants in this hydroponics course showed me that I could, indeed, pursue a scientific career – prior to this, I had not thought science was a field that I, personally, could work in. Thus, I hope to inspire students to pursue scientific careers and to realize that it is not as daunting as it may appear.” – Julianna Rose, reflecting on her experience with science at a young age and her drive to inspire others, as she was inspired by her high school science teachers hydroponics project, leading to her pursuit of a plant science degree.
