Summer is upon us (where did the year go?!) and our applied archaeology students are off to many exciting places and experiences. We are very proud of the hard work of our recent grads and current students, and pleased to see that nearly all of our current students are employed! Here are some highlights:
May 2018 graduation
Recent grads: Samantha Taylor (MA, ’18) recently completed her thesis on the ceramic assemblage at the African-American diaspora site of Pandenarium. She is currently working as the Assistant Site Director at The Germanna Foundation. Danielle Kiesow (MA, ’18) recently completed her thesis investigating land use and gardening practices on the Ojibwe reservation from 1854 until 1930 to analyze the relationship between the Ojibwe at Grand Portage and the Indian Agents from the Bureau of Indian Affairs. She is currently working as an Archaeological Technician for the Grand Portage Reservation Tribal Council. Undergraduates Harley Burgis (BA, ’18) and Eleanor Schultz (BA, ’18) recently graduated with Honors. Harley, whose thesis explored prehistoric cooking technologies at the prehistoric site of Dust Cave, is off to work as a field technician for TRC while she takes a gap year between college and grad school. Eleanor, who won this year’s Olin-Fahle award, will begin a graduate program in museum studies at Johns Hopkins University this fall. Congrats Grads!
Year 2 cohort: these guys are off running! Gen Everett (who has been running this blog admirably for the last 2 years), is working as an archaeological technician for the National Park Service at Isle Royale, enjoying scenery the rest of us are envious of. Britney Elsbury-Orris, Heather MacIsaac and Zane Ermine are serving as crew chiefs on several phase I and geophysical surveys for IUP’s Archaeological Services Center. Zaakiya Cua is working as an archaeological technician for the Allegheny National Forest-Bradford District during the week while writing her thesis on the weekends. Matt Bjorkman is utilizing his GIS certificate training by working part time for IUP’s IMAPS (Institute for Mine Mapping, Archival Procedures, and Safety) program, and conducting fieldwork at the Squirrel Hill site as part of his thesis research. Patrick McGinley is conducting his thesis research using geophysical survey to locate Ft. Halifax along the Susquehanna River in central PA, and Mesfer Alqahtani will soon be defending his thesis, which uses GIS to model the distribution of stone circle structures in northern Saudi Arabia. Mesfer recently won the Dean’s Award for best poster at the 2018 IUP Scholar’s Forum. Congrats to Year 2!
Zaakiyah Cua in the field at the Allegheny National Forest-Bradford District (left) and Sami Taylor diligently taking field notes as the assistant site director for the Germana Foundation (right).
Year 1 cohort: Not to be outdone by the Second Years, the Year 1 cohort is also doing impressive things this summer. Ross Owen, whose thesis explores the management of metarhyolite stone quarries in central PA (funded in part by the South Mountain Partnership), is once again serving as supervisor for the PHAST (Pennsylvania Highway Archaeological Survey Team) program. Assisting him as the PHAST crew are fellow first-years Stephen Campbell, Kristina Gaugler, and Sam Edwards. Andrew Malhotra is interning with the Department of Conservation of National Resources’ forestry division, and Chris Thompson is working as a field technician out in the Badlands region of North Dakota. Joe Bomberger works for the Allegheny National Forest, where he worked prior to matriculating into IUP’s MA in applied archaeology program. Finally, Jessie Hoover has begun research on her thesis at the Mary Rinn site and Anthony Gilchrist is taking an underwater archaeology field school hosted by Lake Champlain Maritime Museum before heading to upstate New York to serve as a crew chief for Dr. David Starbuck’s archaeological field school at French and Indian War site of Rogers Island.
Danielle Kiesow in the field at Grand Portage (left) and Anthony Gilchrist sporting the latest style in underwater archaeology (right).
Keep up the awesome work everyone and can’t wait to hear about your summer adventures at the first Fall Graduate Colloquium!