Eastfield College student honored by National Science Foundation

by John P. Meyer

Eastfield sophomore Mariano Coleman will be spending nine weeks of his summer break at Northwestern University's Materials Research Science & Engineering Center, as a participant in the Research Experience for Undergraduates program sponsored by the National Science Foundation.

That's a slew of big organizational names to be hurling around, so let's bottom-line it: Coleman, a student research technician with an interest in the physical sciences and engineering, has been assisting the Eastfield folks in setting up the operation of a scanning electron microscope. Partially as a result of this work, his application to the prestigious summer work program was approved by whoever up the chain does the approving, and he'll soon be researching to his heart's content out in Evanston, IL while his housing is comped and he decides which Chicago eateries to favor with portions of the $4,000 stipend that comes with the package.

Eastfield's Dr. Jill DeVito is excited about Coleman's off-campus research opportunity because, as she states, there's not a lot of facilities on campus for him to utilize.