This fall, Boothbay Region High School graduate Mikayla McFetridge, who for the academic year 2014-2015 is recipient of the Boothbay Region Garden Club Scholarship, will be a sophomore at the University of Maine-Orono. McFetridge is studying marine science and environmental studies.

As a young girl, Mikayla fondly recalls visiting her grandmother who lived on the remote, but idyllic, Isle au Haut, south of Stonington, in Penobscot Bay. Her grandmother’s home sat close to the shore where Mikayla as a child, like a young Rachel Carson, regularly explored the varied marine life, lifting the seaweed cover from the rocks to expose baby crabs and periwinkles which migrated there with the tides. She became not only amazed, but also deeply enthralled by the sheer diversity of marine life.

Growing up in her teens in the Boothbay region, she continued to be fascinated by the sea and was especially inspired by the work of our Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences. Although Mikayla was not chosen for Bigelow’s week-long Keller/BLOOM Ocean Studies program, she was selected for a similar semester-long program, Coastal Studies for Girls, for sophomore girls only, held in Freeport. According to McFetridge, Tam Erickson founded the program to encourage young women to choose ocean sciences as a career since so few historically enter the field.

Mikayla enjoys her college life at UMaine-Orono, particularly her “Choice Living” residence where students pledge not to use drugs or drink alcohol. Likewise, she is delighted with her marine sciences courses, such as fisheries regulations and beach and dune management. Although she finds her chemistry courses “challenging,” she knows that the study of the world’s oceans is where she wishes to be and she envisions herself one day an ocean scientist. So much of the oceans remain unexplored, observes Mikayla, and she dreams of discovering sea creatures, species never before seen.

Established in 2005, the Boothbay Region Garden Club Scholarship, one of the BRSAF’s 60 “Named Scholarships,” supports Boothbay Region High School graduates interested in career fields such as ecology, horticulture, marine biology, conservation, earth sciences and botany. Clearly Mikayla McFetridge, with her interest in marine science, meets the criteria, and the BRSAF applauds her in her quest to become a renowned marine scientist.

The Boothbay Region Student Aid Fund recently completed its 2014 annual fund drive. However, it always welcomes financial support. Contributions to the BRSAF can be sent to P.O. Box 293, Boothbay Harbor, ME 04538. For more information on the BRSAF, go to www.boothbayharborstudentaidfund.org.