Beetles and Benevolence

Carrion beetles are like homicide detectives. They make their living off dead bodies. Dr. Rosemary Smith makes her living studying them, among other subjects. Specifically, she looks at things like how different habitats affect their breeding behaviors, how multiple species coexist in the same habitat, and how they’re adjusting to changing climate conditions. As she puts it, “do they move around when what they need moves out from under them?”

Dr. Smith also studies how carrion insects’ taste for dead creatures boosts soil nutrients, which in turn promotes plant growth. Because carrion beetles are so important to the return of nutrients to the soil, could they be useful in restoring a disturbed soil site? To find out, she and the students she mentors are setting up an experiment.

Remember SAIL, the atmospheric research campaign that brought in huge atmospheric measuring instruments in giant shipping containers? These containers have moved on, and Dr. Smith’s team will be observing the role carrion beetles play in returning nutrients to the soil that lay beneath the heavy containers.

Clearly, Dr. Smith’s science is contributing vital knowledge to our understanding of the changing environment at RMBL and beyond. But it’s her contributions to the education program at RMBL that we are proud to highlight. She has been involved in the education program since the early 1990s when she taught field biology courses. She also has mentored undergraduate college students for decades, impacting the lives of more than 100.

Then, in 2018, she took early retirement from Idaho State University, where she was a professor of biology, and became the manager of RMBL’s undergraduate program. She selects the undergraduates and recent graduates for each summer’s cohort, pairs them with a scientist mentor, and designs the 10-week experience in which students live onsite, learn how to conduct research, and do independent research projects. They essentially live the life of scientists.

Ten of the students participate through the NSF Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program, which covers the program cost and provides a stipend. The other 30 students are either self-funded, supported by their home universities, or eligible for full or partial scholarships from RMBL.

RMBL scholarships allow Dr. Smith to choose students based on talent and potential rather than their ability to pay. Scholarships — funded by RMBL donors — are the lifeblood of RMBL’s diverse student participation. With scholarships backed by the support of the RMBL community the program can enroll the best students available.

Dr. Smith’s own family is among these invaluable donors. To recognize her decades of work on behalf of undergraduates, her brother and his wife surprised her by making a substantial donation to establish a scholarship fund in her honor. Then her other siblings, her mother, and her mother-in-law contributed to the fund. Now it’s grown to a size capable of fully funding a student scholarship in the near future. Dr. Smith’s family members have supported RMBL for decades, but it’s exceptionally meaningful for her that they have created a fund able to provide student scholarships in perpetuity.

She also feels fortunate to have RMBL scientists who volunteer their time to mentor the students. That they are willing to mentor one or two students on their research team is priceless, she says. In her view, the program works because of them.

RMBL’s education program would not exist without the contributions of scientists, donors, and scholarship endowments honoring scientists like Dr. Smith. Because it does exist, it has sparked the engine of many scientific careers. The program’s greatest impact may be in how it changes the participants’ image of themselves. When they begin, they identify as students. When they leave, they identify as scientists.

Whether these students go on to become scientists or become professionals who puts scientific thinking to work in their field, they are changed. By extension, they change their world.

Rosemary Smith first came to RMBL as a college student in 1983. She took a class in ornithology and worked as a research assistant. For her, the experience cemented science as a career path. You can see what she’s built.

Rosemary Smith, PhD, is Professor Emeritus of Ecology and Science Education at Idaho State University. Dr. Smith has always combined research and education, teaching field courses at RMBL while conducting her field research and mentoring over 100 undergraduate and graduate students. Her research interests are behavioral ecology and science education. Currently, her biological research focuses on the behavior, ecology, and evolution of beetles, particularly population dynamics and reproductive strategies.