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Boston Mineral Scholarship 2015 winner

By Danielle Lynch

Boston Mineral Club selected environmental science major Mara Scallon as the winner for their 2015 scholarship. This award will help to further her studies in the earth and geologic sciences. She has earned several distinctions during her time at Northeastern, including the Muckenhoupt Scholarship and the Clara & Joseph Ford Award, both in 2014. She will be graduating at the end of this year and is very excited for the next adventure ahead.

Mara is active in two student groups, the Terra Society and the Husky Environmental Action Team (HEAT). Her work in HEAT as well as Slow Food NU a few years ago provided valuable experience working to effect policy changes at Northeastern and in the community. In 2013, she participated in the Iceland Dialogue, her first field research experience, which deepened her interest in geology. Mara is truly an explorer at heart, making a point to push her boundaries and take part in a broad range of opportunities. She completed a Dialogue to the Balkans, sailed on a tall ship for a semester, and recently returned from a research trip to the Netherlands. “My bit of advice to younger students,” she said, “would be to not worry too much about trying to define a career path so early on in college, and to try anything that is appealing to you.”

Her work assignments have given her a variety of perspectives on the environmental field. Mara’s first co-op was at Clean Air Carolina, where she “worked with area businesses, municipalities, and universities to develop and implement policies” to help prevent air contamination in Charlotte, NC. Her second co-op, where she currently works, remediates contaminated sites (i.e. closed landfills) and installs solar panels at these cleaned sites. “I quickly learned that the best education is a holistic one, and I focused as much on my academics as I did on my involvement in student organizations. I don’t regret anything I have (or haven’t) done during my time at NU thus far, and hope that all students are able to graduate with the same feeling.”

Marine and Environmental Sciences