Summer with Ceres
Welcome to Fall Semester 2020! These past few months for our women have been challenging in these difficult times, but we want to share our growth and experiences from this summer, and some new members joining us!
New Members Beta Mu:
Name: Josie Imes
Major: English
Year: Sophomore
Fun Fact: I broke my finger playing softball.
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Name: Melissa Lauck
Major: Psychology
Year: Sophomore
Fun Fact: I can color in the lines of a coloring book.
Name: Mylan Gibson
Major: Animal Science/ Pre-Vet
Year: Sophomore
Fun Fact: I love to crochet
First hand COVID with Brianna:
Hello everyone! My name is Brianna Ringhand and I am currently serving as vice president of chapter affairs of CWF. Brittany asked me to share a little bit about how my summer went and I am more than happy to with all of you. To start off, I’d like to tell you a little about myself. I am from the twin cities and coming to SDSU was an absolute culture shock for me. I knew nothing and I mean nothing about agriculture until I came to SDSU. As I learned from friends about their farm lives I became very interested in agriculture as I never realized how much went into it. With that newfound appreciation I decided to join Ceres to continue to learn more, and boy have I ever. Anyways, I am currently a senior nursing student, I have always known I wanted to be a nurse. I thoroughly enjoy helping people and have no regrets on my major. This past summer I went through numerous rounds of interviews for internships and ended up scoring one at a hospital back home on a med surge unit. Well, then COVID hit causing the state of MN to cancel all nurse internships. I was devastated and so upset that I wasn’t going to be able to get the experience I needed to further my skills and career. Despite that, I decided that I wasn’t going to let COVID hold me back nor was I just going to sit around a watch people and healthcare struggle to get ahold of this pandemic, so I decided to become a CNA on a Covid recovery unit. On this unit I cared for individuals who got the worst of the worst. Many patients would come to me after being in comas and in the hospital for months on end. Many of which couldn’t walk, talk, or even eat. I, along with my team helped these patients relearn all of that and get back to or close to their baseline health. These patients still had active COVID therefore I was on the frontlines and had to gear up. I wore an N95, universal mask, face shield, rubber infused gown, and a hair covering all in the heat of the summer with individuals who loved their rooms excruciatingly hot. This made my job very challenging and I loved it. Although my job was challenging it was extremely rewarding. I laughed with my patients, cried with them, and cheered for them when they were finally able to go home. My patients hard work was so inspiring and made me even more excited to become a nurse in the very near future. This disease is so surreal, I’ve seen what it can do to people. With that being said, I’d like to end this with a little note, please continue to take precautions to protect others and yourself. Wear a mask, wash your hands, and socially distance yourselves. Stay safe everyone!
Summer Internship with Kristy:
Hi, my name is Kristy Cullinan and I am majoring in natural resource law enforcement here at SDSU. This summer I got the amazing opportunity to be an intern for Montana fish, wildlife, and parks. I worked at a fish hatchery in Miles City Montana for three months this summer. An average day consisted of cleaning and feeding all of our fish inside and out. At the hatchery we had catfish, large mouth bass, walleye, tiger muskie, yellow perch, bluegill, and pallid sturgeon. When I first started, we were just getting into our Walleye season. We put nearly 5 million walleye fry into our many different ponds at the hatchery. After about four weeks they were ready to be drained and for the fish to be planted. Although draining ponds was the least favorite part of my job it was really cool to see how many of the fry we put out survived to fingerlings and then get to see them distributed to lakes in the state. After Walleye season was over, we promptly moved into Bass season. For our bass we let our adult fish spawn naturally in our larger ponds. We then go out with nets and catch the Bass fry and move them into their own pond to increase survival chance. Bass season was by far my favorite part of the summer! We got to travel all across the state planting these small bass into rural ponds for Montana residents to go out and fish in the coming years. We also spent a large portion of our time conducting a research study on Pallid Sturgeon. We were looking at a disease called fin curl that has been happening in hatchery raised Pallid. Pallid are currently an endangered species and the hatcheries are working diligently to help the species recover. Figuring out what causes fin curl could push hatchery efforts even farther forward! Overall, I had an amazing summer working with great people and learning a lot!
Fall Retreat 2020:
Our sisters went to the Nature park in Brookings,SD to do a fun photo shoot!, We also got to hear from Angel Kasper as she spoke about the different aspects of agriculture and her experiences as a teacher in the agriculture industry.
Kristy's Ag Minute: This month is the South Dakota State Fair in Huron South Dakota. The dates are September 3rd-7th and there are lots of family fun activities planned through the week! At the South Dakota state fair their is building dedicated just for horticulture! Some of the events taking place in this building are seed quality and testing principles, learning about Monarch butterflies, soils in your garden, and native plants. Take some time out of you busy Labor Day weekend to go and learn a little bit more about agriculture at one of these easy and interactive events! There is also an FFA Ag Adventure Center, and an undeniably dairy scavenger hunt! Keep the tradition of Ag strong by attending events and passing that onto your children this weekend! For more information go to sdstatefair.com.
Alumni Spotlight:
Kayla Rounds from the Beta Epsilon class just started Graduate School at South Dakota State in Counseling and Human Development with a specialization in Clinical Mental Health.
Shania Biers from the Beta Epsilon class got her first adult job working as a Marketing Assistant for Floyd's Truck center.
Samantha Gonzalez from the Beta Epsilon class got engaged on August 21st, 2020 with a wedding date still to be determined.
Kelly Schmitz from the Beta Eta class got engaged May 26th, 2020 and the wedding date is set for next year!
Karley Litterick got engaged on June 12th, 2020 and the big day is on October 30th 2021.
Kylie Lessman from the Beta Alpha class bought a house in Redwood Falls, Minnesota and is also starting her third year of teaching at a new district at Cedar Mountain in Morgan, MN.
Bethany DeBoer: She bought a house with Taylor at the beginning of August and she is getting married this week!
Star Schipper: She bought a house with Dennisen back in May and they also got a new puppy recently. Lastly, she will be starting a new ag program at the Granada-Huntley-East chain.
Victoria Pagel is from the Beta Eta class and she started a new full time job at Glacial Plains Cooperative in the Benson Agronomy Department,
Meet the Blogger:
My name is Brittany Whitam. I am a junior Psychology major with a Dance minor. I joined Ceres in the fall of 2018 during primary recruitment and I've never looked back! I am so glad I joined Greek life because I've made so many friends and found women who were proud of their academic accomplishments.
