YEC student picked for internship to study fish passage

Staff report

youngstown

Deshawn Javey is a Youngstown Early College student who was chosen to participate with Youngstown State University professor Hans Tritico’s team in a summer internship called “Fish Passage through Culverts.”

Deshawn had to qualify for the paid internship by achieving a high school junior or senior standing by the end of the spring 2010 semester, passing algebra, geometry, biology and physics/physical science and having strong computer skills.

Deshawn was allowed to work 30 hours per week from May through August 2010.

During the internship, she worked closely with Tritico’s team, which designed sustainable hydraulic infrastructure.

The project was specifically looking to increase the ability of fish to swim through highway culverts. Some of her daily tasks included assembling and testing of the new in-situ particle image velocimetry device.

This device is composed of a laser, lenses and high-speed camera. She worked to optimize this system for light intensity and image clarity.

Once the device was optimized, she used it inside culverts set up in the lab and in local creeks.

As an incentive for all the work, the internship funded through the Center for Transportation and Materials Engineering at YSU, paid $1,000 per month for 31/2 months.