Note: Something, something, I'm going through another existential crisis. 

Eight years ago, in an attempt to make undergraduate STEM students feel like they’re contributing new information to science rather than simply running the same old, tired experiments over and over again, the American Society of Mammalogists came together to create Squirrel-Net: a huge database to store data on wildlife behavior collected by undergraduate students, such as myself. 

All of last month, my Biology Lab instructor tasked us with observing and documenting Fox Squirrels on campus, so we could contribute to Squirrel-Net and officially become “published scientists”. Long story short, I’m apparently an official, published scientist. 

To be honest, I really don’t know what to make of it. 

I mean… Squirrel-Net was easy, and it was designed to be that way. But, my TA explained that most of science- including “new” science- is often just as easy as observing something and checking off a box on a chart, much like what I did while watching the squirrels on campus. Hell… half the time, we didn’t even have to bring an observation chart with us to observe squirrels. We did several things called Photo Voices throughout the unit, which required me to take pictures of anything and everything I found interesting, and write about what it was and why I thought it was worthy of a picture. 

Turns out, the pictures I took during my lab courses have also been put into a database for actual professionals to review and perhaps even do something meaningful with. And, I took a lot of pictures during labs over the past month or so, most of which did end up being turned in. 

Because I took my expensive camera with me to these labs and turned in some of the pictures of squirrels and infrastructure I took, the TA pulled me aside and told me outright, “You’re an excellent scientist, already!”

Again, I didn’t know what to say or do, so I just awkwardly grinned and said, “Thank you.”, as I shuffled away like a guilty dog. 

I mean… even though I’m technically a “published scientist” now, I couldn’t feel like a scientist any less than I do. Why that is? Well… I don’t know for certain, but I have my theories, which are pretty damn solid according to my therapist.