My Summer in Northfield

Despite this week having temperatures in the high 80s, summer is now behind us as fall term is in full swing. That being said here is what I got up to during the summer as a Carleton student.

Summer in Northfield

This summer I lived in Northfield (in an off-campus house) because I was doing research on campus. I found a friend who was also doing research in the summer and we decided to try and get together a group of people to live in a house. Carleton has an on campus option but we were looking for a place where we could have our own kitchen, controllable AC, and somewhere that gave a little distance from where we were working.

Research !

I was lucky enough to work on a research project with one of my favorite professors Sarah Titus (yes, as a geology major this is geology related research). We have been looking at papers written in the 1990’s related to drilling wells in California around the San Andreas Fault. Each well is referred to as a “borehole” and fallout of the material surrounding the borehole can have implications regarding directions of crustal stress within the Earth. Data from borehole breakouts can be included on the World Stress Map, which is used globally by structural geologists. The reason we are looking at the San Andreas Fault specifically is because the stress directions can potentially give insight on to how the fault functions an its composition.

I had a lot of fun doing research. Though it was mainly on my computer analyzing and processing data from wells, it turns out I enjoy it! I learned a lot about Excel as well as R Studio, and Adobe Illustrator. The whole experience definitely made me feel more confident about my major choice, and has built confidence in my potential interest in grad school.

Friends !

This was my first time that I haven’t spent a summer with my family, but luckily I had friends to keep me company. I decided to room with friend who was also on campus for research, Thea. She was doing computer science research related to biology, which makes sense as she is a double major in both of those disciplines. Thea is on the women’s soccer team at Carleton, so we were able to coordinate some of our summer workouts together and she even played pickup frisbee with me and other Northfield summer Carleton students from time to time.

Thea and I got really into baking, reading and going to the Northfield public library, and playing cards with our friends Shira and Adam.

Frisbee !

On top of my summer research, I knew being active and getting outside would be a key part of making a satisfactory summer. As someone who is pretty new to frisbee–I have been playing a bit less than a year–I had tryouts and played on my first frisbee club team this summer. I learned a lot playing on a mixed gender team (as opposed to Syzygy, my college team, we play in the women’s division) and got a chance to work on my defensive skills. It was so great to meet new people of multiple ages as well (our team ranged from 19-31!).

Downtown Northfield !

Though I am from Minnesota, it was still fun to explore a town in the summer that isn’t my home town. Thea and I took full advantage of the weekly Saturday farmer’s market, getting ice cream at Blast, and lunch at Hogan Brothers. I really like the various shops of downtown as well (which you can read more about here).

What now?

If you do research or an internship over the summer it is pretty common to present it at Carleton’s Undergraduate Research and Internship Symposium in fall term, which I will be doing! On top of that I am continuing to work with my professor this fall and we will be presenting our research at a conference in California over winter break, and doing a week of field research  as well (which I am very excited for!).

Hannah is a junior majoring in Geology and minoring in Classics. As a Minnesotan she considers herself somewhat of an expert on MN winters. At Carleton, she fills her schedule with writing for the Admissions blog, working as a CCCE Communications Fellow, doing geology research and TAing geology classes, and increasing voter engagement on campus. When Hannah isn’t in class, she can be found tossing a frisbee with Syzygy, crocheting, reading, walking and skiing in the Arb, thrifting, and hanging out with her besties. Meet the other bloggers!