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Volunteer Spotlight Archive

Doris Cohrs, Sapelo Island

You may know her as Doris Cohrs or as the "Phyto Goddess." She earned the title from her dedicated monitoring of Sapelo Island's Post Office Creek. Located along the southern Georgia coast, Sapelo Island is Georgia's fourth largest barrier island and home to the University of Georgia's Marine Institute. Doris is a member of the Friends of Sapelo (FOS), a non-profit volunteer organization that was created to support the research, education, and outreach mission of the Sapelo Island National Estuarine Research Reserve (SINERR).

For the past three years, Doris has collected a weekly sample from Post Office Creek off a floating dock. But getting to the dock is no ordinary task. Every Wednesday, Doris takes the 8:30 am ferry over to Sapelo Island, a 20 minute trip (10 minutes shorter now thanks to the new ferry)! Once on the island, Doris hitches a ride to the science center where she performs her tow, but the ferry doesn't depart for the mainland until noon. So for the next two and a half hours Doris works to escape the wrath of the no-see-ums by "bugging" Brooke and the rest of the SINEER staff. Once back on the mainland, Doris heads deep into the woods to "Midge Manor" (her and Don's passive solar home) to have lunch with the neighborhood raccoons. Then it's upstairs to the "lab" to analyze and count the sample.

It's interesting to go along with Doris to collect a sample since everyone at the dock knows Doris and is expecting to see her each Wednesday. DNR Mate of the Katie Underwood, Mark, put it best when asked to describe Doris. "Perfect, Beautiful, Sweet, Kind..." was his response. Whether it's sunny or cloudy, hot or cold, calm or rough waters, buggy or bug-free, Doris makes the trip to Sapelo Island each week with a smile and a witty comment when she returns to submit her data (even after counting hundreds, sometimes thousands of Amphiprora)! And now the "Phyto Goddess" has earned a new nickname, from a prison pen pal she's been writing and teaching plankton to for the past three years. He calls her "Looks at Water."

Doris, thanks from NOAA and PMN for looking at the water of Sapelo Island.
This article has been edited, for the complete article, see this issue of the Plankton News.

Allene Barans, Porter-Gaud School

Allene Barans was a 9th grade biology teacher at Porter-Gaud School in Charleston, SC. Allene and her students volunteered for SEPMN on a regular basis since September 2001. Since then, Allene has guided hundreds of students through the world of phytoplankton. She has recently announced her retirement and SEPMN awarded her with an enlarged, framed scanning-electron image of a phytoplankter for her 5-year dedication to monitoring.

Allene has been teaching high school and college students since the mid-1960s. She was a teaching assistant and instructor at Ohio State University, The College of William and Mary in Virginia, and Trident Technical College in Charleston, SC. She began teaching high school in the late 1980s at Bishop England High School in Charleston, SC and moved to Porter-Gaud School in 1999. She is an active member of various professional organizations such as the National Science Teachers Association, National Association of Biology Teachers, National Marine Educators Association, SC Assoc. of Biology Teachers, and the South Carolina Science Council.

When asked what her passions are, she stated that they are work-related and include: "to make the study of biology appealing to students (by introducing unusual, hand-on experiences) and to foster in young people a love of and respect for the natural world." Finally, there is life after retirement. Allene has big plans for the future; she does not plan on leaving education entirely. She expects to maintain contact with science education and young people through volunteer work and substitute teaching. She is planning on going back to school herself to take all those classes that she didn't have time for in the past: ornithology, invertebrates, and lower plants. She also has plans to travel in the U.S. and Europe, spend time on her property in N.Y. with husband Charles and the rest of her family. We wish her all the very best! Thanks Allene for your dedication and hard work.