What do science, community service, and cemeteries have in common?

If Southern Arkansas University’s Dr. Claude Baker is involved, they somehow come together to make perfect sense. Armed with iPads, smart phones and cameras in an old city cemetery, Baker’s SAU ecology class seeks data that will provide important answers to science-related questions. But, the documentation effort also benefits the community.

Anyone who knows Baker would not likely be surprised to see him lead his students to such an unexpected laboratory in the name of science and service. They know his penchant for finding answers where others fail to see them. They also would know that there is a personal tradition of service at the heart of his motivation. Baker learned by the example of his parents, who devoted their lives in volunteer service to their south Arkansas community, how important it is to give something back. Also a keen observer of history, Baker understands what past patterns tell us about where we are heading as a society.

Ecology is the science concerned with relationships between organisms (including humans) and their physical and social environments. It is also the science that examines the detrimental effects of modern civilization on the environment.

In the heat of the September sun, Baker and his class of about 20 students scour through the weathered cemetery capturing photographic evidence that will help them unravel the stories waiting to be read in the Magnolia Memorial Cemetery.

Using their modern technology, sidewalk chalk and good old-fashioned sweat equity, the group moves among the weathered headstones, chalking the surfaces to highlight the engraved history to better capture the images.

Asked what he expected to find in this unusual process, Baker speaks animatedly about the evidence the cemetery project would reveal, such as life tables and survivorship curves.

The information will get uploaded, dates will be recorded and statistics will result that reflect trends.

“There are tons of stuff here that tell us something,” said Baker. “By doing this, you get a glimpse of the community. You figure out when people showed up here. You learn a little bit about socioeconomic status. You see when different nationalities arrived in the area by the surnames. There is a whole world of information that a place like this holds.”

He divides his class into groups and assigns each group a range of years to look for. Baker shares tips with his students that will help make their individual searches easier.

For the group searching for headstones pre-dating 1900, he points to the higher terrain and the large, old, hardwood trees. Those are natural markers to where the earlier grave markers are normally found. Those students assigned to the post-1950 group, head toward a section dotted with shiny, polished granite tombstones toward the back of the sprawling cemetery.

Baker explains that in older parts of the cemetery you’ll likely see a trend of early deaths – steep infant mortality, people dying at earlier ages, etc.

“In some periods it will be very steep. We can go back in history and we can often track that to periods of epidemics or natural disasters,” he explains. “For the biology, we know that people showed up here in 1850. We can take the data and produce what we call life tables. We can graph it out and show how modern medicine has influenced life here.”

“As we move to newer areas of the cemetery, we will see longer lifespans, which can reflect the discovery of vaccines or medicines and better healthcare,” Baker said.

Records show that there was a time when women died off faster than men.

“Women often died in childbirth, but we have seen with progress, better healthcare and modern conveniences that women now live longer than men,” said Baker.

The cemetery research will provide data that will also help the class to construct what Baker calls an age pyramid. For instance, in Mexico, researchers find that the population is numbered with more young people than elderly, which gives a broader foundation for health statistics and economy.

In the United States, lifespans have increased so the population of elderly residents can be higher than the population of youth. That kind of imbalance comes with its own inherent impact on the environment and economy.

Baker’s students are instructed to pay attention to the trees, structures, and terrain of the cemetery, as well. The types of trees that flourish in the region tell something about the environment. Trees are also great historians, especially when it comes to determining past weather patterns. ­

Rosalee Meeks, a junior biology major from El Dorado, works intently in an older section of the cemetery. Meeks is pursuing her education at SAU with plans to work in environmental restoration with a focus on plants.

Meeks said her experience in south Louisiana viewing the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina is part of what sparked her desire to pursue biology to that end.

“Part of the devastation of Katrina was caused by people moving into and building in areas not intended for human habitation,” she said. “It was clear to see that some problems we bring on ourselves when we attempt to domesticate the earth.”

Her focus is steady and Baker only serves to flame her fascination in his classes.

“You never get bored in Dr. Baker’s class,” she said. “He finds interesting ways to relate things to what is going on in the world and his projections are usually right on.”

As Meeks knows, ecology teaches us that our environment is deeply linked to our survival. Human domestication of the earth and industrialization, mixed with increased longevity and the benefits and detriments of progress have left their mark on the environment. The future of humans and other earthly inhabitants are intertwined with the world around us. Finding ways to learn from our history, to correct bad patterns and to restore the environment is a necessity, according to Meeks.

“But while we are learning, we are also being of service to the community. It’s a win-win,” she said. “The more you learn, the more it gets you curious about things you never knew – especially if you never had the chance to be exposed. Somewhere along the way, you find you have a passion for something.”

Baker’s passion and energy are contagious.

John Wofford, a senior biology major from Delight, leaves Baker’s class every time with something of interest.

“His classes are great. He is so energetic and enthused with what he teaches, you just can’t help but to follow,” said Wofford. “Dr. Baker makes it easy and fun to learn.”

As Baker shares his secrets and his passion for knowledge and service, the students discover there is a lifetime of information that can be derived from what they document this day.

After the research information is gleaned and sorted, the students will upload the photographs of the headstones to a genealogy-related website called FindAGrave.com, which links people around the world to official records that can help them in their genealogy work. According to Baker, there are 800,000 people working on the project that is intended to enumerate and document every grave to create a virtual, online record for every cemetery in the United States.

The Magnolia cemetery has around 4,000 graves, including one that holds a Civil War general. Thanks to the invention of the Internet and volunteers like Dr. Baker and his students, family research has never been easier and the enormous national project will be 4,000 grave sites closer to success.

 

 

For Deana Hughes, Southern Arkansas University has been a part of her family as long as she can remember. Her father attended SAU, and her sister, Traci Hughes, teaches at the University. She remembers coming with her family as a young girl to watch football games and seeing the Mulerider mascot dash across the field.

“I remember telling my parents that I wanted to come to SAU and bring my horse and be the Mulerider,” Hughes said. “I thought that is the greatest thing ever – a school where you can bring your horse. Who wouldn’t want to go there?”

The Southern Arkansas University junior still pursues a passion for all things environmental and animal sciences. Hughes has worked as a biological tech for the National Park Service in Hot Springs since she graduated from the Arkansas School for Mathematics, Sciences and the Arts.

Her passion for environmental science and animals motivates her and is what drew the attention of the park’s Natural Resource Program Manager Dr. Steve Rudd. Rudd visited ASMSA and was intrigued and impressed by Hughes’ entry titled “Magnetic Cows” in the school’s annual science fair. (The Prescott native had done some of her research for the project at SAU.)

Rudd offered Hughes an opportunity to work for the Hot Springs National Park– an extremely rare offer to someone just out of high school.

One of her work assignments required Hughes to do extensive research on the Ozark chinquapin (Castanea ozarkensis), a strain of American chestnut trees that once grew rampantly through the Ozark Mountain region. The native chestnut trees were a mainstay in the region’s forests from Mississippi and Arkansas up through Missouri. They produced sweet nuts inside spikey shells that were harvested for food and sold at market until the 1950s and 1960s when blight spread through the area and diminished all forms of chestnut trees – including the Ozark chinquapin – from the regional landscape.

We were asked to do a population count because the species was being reviewed to determine if it belonged on the endangered species list,” said Hughes. “I came across a paper that was written about the tree growing in an area of the park, but we were concerned because a prescribed (controlled) burn to kill underbrush had just been done in the area the trees were supposed to be.”

Hughes scoured thousands of acres in the vast Hot Springs National Park looking for any signs of the plant form thought to be endangered.

After a steep climb off the public trail in the national park, Hughes found a strand of the Ozark chinquapin thriving in a remote area of the park.  She also participated in creating a survey map of the conditions within which the chinquapins thrived. That information is used by research labs to create blight-resistant versions of the tree so they can again replenish the forests of the region.

She loves what she does and wants to continue with the National Park Service as long as she can, but with positions in the federal programs being limited, openings are rare and landing a job with the NPS with widespread budget cuts is almost as difficult as winning the lottery.

As soon as Hughes saw the mass email from the National Collegiate Honors Council and honors program director of North Arizona University, she recognized it as the opportunity of a lifetime. A chance to spend a semester in the Grand Canyon working with environmental experts from NAU and the National Park Service (NPS) in her chosen field of study would open doors for her and get her a foot in the door to her dream job.

Hughes was determined to not allow this flash of opportunity to pass, but the short window of time to complete the application process, meant that Hughes had a week to get her application ready, which included filling out scads of forms, writing two essays, providing scholarship information, transcripts and at least two teacher recommendation letters from Honors College Director Dr. Ed Kardas and Biology Professor Dr. Viktoriya Street.

“I had to overnight it to get it there in time,” Hughes said.  “I want to stay working with the National Park Service, but experience to work in a western park is hard to get unless you know someone who can help you get your foot in the door. Environmental science is a personal interest of mine, so I look at this opportunity as a more of a career move.”

Hughes’ rushed efforts paid off. She was selected for the honor and will spend the entire fall semester studying the Grand Canyon environment participating in field trips floating the Colorado River, staying in Native American canyon dwellings called Hogans, studying in classrooms, art galleries and learning in the great outdoors.

“I’ve never been outside of Arkansas, except for a few conferences,” said Hughes. “It’s a great stepping stone to where I want to be, but I’m sure it will be a big awakening for me.”

For Hughes, coming to SAU was one more step in fulfilling a dream. The ambitious biology major earned a place in SAU’s Honors College and also received the Blue and Gold Scholarship, the Encore Spirit Award, as well as the Arkansas Challenge Scholarship. Hughes was also named Arkansas Phi Beta Lambda Member of the Year, among other awards issued by the academic organization hosted by the SAU College of Business.