Employment

2015 – Present: Professor of Earth Science, Penn State Brandywine

2007 – 2015: Associate Professor of Earth Science, Penn State Brandywine

2001 – 2007: Assistant Professor of Earth Science, Penn State Brandywine

2000 – 2001: Professional Academic Adviser, Department of Environmental, Population, and Organismic Biology, University of Colorado at Boulder

1998 – 2000: Senior Lecturer, Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Mary Washington

Education

1998   Ph.D. in Marine Geology & Geophysics, University of Miami – Rosenstiel School of Marine & Atmospheric Science, Viginia Key, FL

1992   B.A. in Geology, Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA

My interests

As my interests and passions for teaching and learning have changed over time, so have my research goals and directions. When I was an undergraduate student, my favorite project was exploring mudcracks and the different patterns of cracking. In graduate school, researched the Late Cenozoic sea-level record as recorded in continues cores drilled in the Florida Keys and Everglades National Park. But I’m also very interested in researching ways that students can learn and engage with Earth science content, from improving their geographic and technical literacies to successfully connecting with and sharing their Earth science knowledge.

But if you really want to know more about my background, wide-ranging interests, and what drives me as a scientist, check out…

Dr. G’s Top Five Coolest Field Experiences

Here is a list of what I would classify as my favorite academic/research experiences out in the field.

• Spending the summer before my junior year in Wallops Island, Virginia. Many undergraduate geology programs require students to spend part of a summer fully immersed in a field program (aka “field camp”). My field camp was a little different from a traditional geology program, as I spent my time on the water doing field methods in oceanography. Having the opportunity to engage in everything from beach profiling to using oceanographic equipment for collecting everything from water chemistry to sediment samples was the confirmation I needed that oceanography was a career direction I wanted to pursue.
• Spending the fall semester of my junior year in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. Some undergraduate students study abroad for a semester – but for me, I spent a semester on Cape Cod at the Marine Biological Laboratory as part of Boston University’s Marine Program. I had the opportunity to immerse myself in courses such as Organism/Sediment Relations, Mass Extinctions & the Changing Biosphere, Microbial Geology, and Marine Pollution. Each course also had a research and field component that took us from fossil sites in New York to microbial mats in the Florida Keys. I encourage all students to strongly consider spending time away from campus exploring our planet through either short fieldtrips that are part of conferences or short-term programs in the United States and/or abroad.
• Participating in a GPS survey in Baja California, Mexico. In graduate school, I was able to join a field party led by one of the Univ. of Miami faculty that visited the seismically-quiet northern Baja California region – a region filled with identified faults yet right along the Pacific/North American plate bounday. I was able to work alongside researchers from UNAVCO and NASA/JPL with GPS technology to record movement. This was my first time working with such sophisticated technology in such rural areas. It was quite a field experience and exciting to be a part of the team.
• Carbonate sedimentology of Great Bahama Bank. The weather conditions were not ideal, as the storm named “Andrew Jr.” (after Hurricane Andrew) was coming through Florida and the Bahamas, but that provided us even more time in the field with carbonate sedimentologist Dr. Robert Ginsburg to learn about sand, shells, ooids, and more. Who knew science in a storm could be so much fun (and still productive and educational!).
• Hydrographic surveying on the NOAA Ship Thomas Jefferson. To provide a more recent example, I was able to spend three weeks in Fall 2014 on a hydrographic survey in the northern Atlantic Ocean about the NOAA ship Thomas Jefferson. To live and work on a moving ship adds an entirely new dimension to doing field work, but the spectacular sunsets made all of the hard work worth it!

Dr. G’s Top Five Random Geologic Experiences

• Visiting Iceland and standing across tectonic plates! Every geologist does this… when you visit Iceland, you can actually visit a spot where you can have one foot on the North American Plate, and one foot on the Eurasian Plate. How many people can say they have stood on two tectonic plates at once?
• Touring the Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii! If you know about the record of atmospheric CO2 measurements since 1958 that show an increasing trend, then you have heard of the Keeling Curve. The NOAA laboratory on top of Mauna Loa allows visitors to learn about the over 200 instruments and experiments being conducted on top of this volcano.
• Jurassic Morrison Dinosaurs of Utah and Colorado! Right after I graduated with my Ph.D., I presented at an AAPG conference and decided to treat myself to a pre-conference field trip that went through western Colorado and eastern Utah to explore dinosaur sites and discoveries. The field trip was led by Dr. David Gillette, dinosaur paleontologist known for his work on the Diplodocus (formerly known as the Seismosaurus). Visiting Dinosaur National Monument and visiting an active dig site are just some of the incredible memories I have from this adventure that I still share today with anyone interested in dinosaurs.
• Eating lunch in Arches National Park! During the dinosaur field trip I just described, we stopped in to Arches National Park to relax and have lunch. It was my first time in a national park in Utah, and I was in awe of the incredible features across the landscape (especially the sense of scale – much different than any features I’m familiar with on the east coast!). I found a spot at the base of the trail up to Delicate Arch and just sat on the ground and stared up at the Arch, knowing that I would come back one day to fully explore all that Arches has to offer (and I did!).
• Hiking to the top of Stone Mountain, Georgia! At a Southeastern Geological Society of America meeting, I participated on a one-day field trip to Stone Mountain. The group learned about the geologic history of this feature, visited a quarry, learned about the mountain carving of military leaders and rock-carved graffiti by quarry workers, and then headed up the trail to the top of the mountain. This trip may not sound as exciting and adventurous as my other explorations, but the personal and professional connections I made on this field trip still hold strong today. Nothing brings people closer than hiking a mountain together!

How I became a scientist

Never when I was younger did I think I would have all of these amazing adventures and be so passionate about our planet and teaching others about Earth science! In elementary school, growing up to be a scientist wasn’t a thought I ever entertained. Although I do have a wonderful memory of my first science experiment – growing radish seeds in Mrs. Somerfeldt’s 5^th-grade class – I didn’t know anything about becoming a scientist or really what scientists did besides wear white lab coats. In junior high school, I was even less interested in science, unfortunately being turned off in my science classes from collecting bugs and doing experiments with test tubes, and not understanding why it mattered. But thank goodness for Mrs. DeThomas, my 11^th grade chemistry teacher. She made chemistry so much fun and encouraged me to explore my science passion in college and beyond. I explored various science and non-science degrees in my first two years of college, but after taking my first physical geology course, I knew I found the right major for me. Every time I look back to my undergraduate geology days, I appreciate even more the courses, the field trips, and the amazing community the department created among the faculty and students. My summer experiences and semester away from campus provided me valuable exposure to the ocean sciences, complimenting my undergraduate geology degree and confirming my desire to continue on to graduate school to study the oceans even more.

My graduate research focused on the examination of continues cores drilled on the south Florida platform, in the Florida Keys and Everglades National Park. I completed a lithostratigraphic and integrated chronostratigraphic investigation on approximately 30 million years of mixed carbonate and siliciclastic sediments. Establishing the sea-level record and documenting the movement of quartz sands down the Florida platform was fascinating work, and I learned many skills that ranged from preparing XRD samples to running a magnetometer to paleomagnetic analyses to “picking” and identifying planktic foraminifera.

How my work benefits society

Dr. Guertin visits a glacier in Iceland

I will never lose my passion for marine geology & geophysics – I love learning about the latest-and-greatest scientific discoveries when it comes to our oceans. But I also have a passion for getting students not majoring in the sciences (in fact, for getting all citizens) to learn about our planet and why Earth science matters. I conduct a variety of hands-on, inquiry-based projects with students, and research the approaches I use with students, that address improving their literacy in science, technology, and information access and evaluation. I want students to not only understand why Earth science is important, but to understand the process of science and how to evaluate news sources and articles reporting on important topics such as climate change, energy, water, etc. One of the best ways to immerse students in learning about the Earth is to get them outside for field trips, undergraduate research experiences, and to carry out projects with community-based partners. This is why I also continue to explore the planet and take advantage of visiting as many national parks and geologic sites as I can. I often joke with my students that it doesn’t matter that you graduate and earn a degree, as you are always a student and always have so much more to learn and share with others.