Any marine biologists or students here who can talk about their experiences? I’m working on a book about a marine biologist student in the summer before her final year and could use some insight for research.
Need advice from a marine biology student going into their final year, or anyone with knowledge on this (for a book I’m working on). What kind of things do you do in the summer before final year? Is this when you start on a thesis etc?
(Marine biology) I’m not sure if this is the place to ask, if not maybe some advise on where to get advice from a marine biologist student? Basically I’m writing a manga and the focus is marine life. The main character is a marine biologist student and she’s spent the majority of summer working on university projects and things for her final year approaching, and she’s spending the final week on holiday at a coastal town to relax a bit bit mostly work on her thesis in peace and quiet. A bunch of stuff happens but what I really need help with is the “university projects and things for her final year approaching” part… It’s not a big part of the plot but I’d hate to be unrealistic but I’m not a marine biologist so I don’t have a clue what the typical student experience is like. I know the majority of students don’t get a job in say, deep sea exploration after graduation but my character is extremely ambitious and desperate to get the top grade possible with as much experience as possible to get a job in that area, because she thinks she’d be a failure if not (by the end she decides she doesn’t want to go into that anymore anyway).
So basically… what’s a good high level thesis question related to the deep sea? What kind of things would this character have done before the events of the story (aka the rest of summer prior to this holiday setting)? She’d probably have done a LOT considering her ambition. What exactly happens at university for marine biology in a typical day? When do students start writing their thesis? Would they start writing it during final year, or in the summer before, or even earlier? And finally the setting of this story is a coastal town with an overfishing problem, this is where she decides to specialise by the end of the book but most importantly I’m thinking my character does some shadowing of an NGO in the area just for a day for the experience. Despite this just being a holiday she doesn’t want to turn down any potential contacts, would it make sense for her to do a personal side project on overfishing while she’s on holiday or is that a dumb direction? Maybe she’s putting together her prior summer research on deep sea stuff but while she’s on holiday she still wants to study as much as possible in other areas? I really just need a simple excuse for her to be interested in the overfishing issues.
Thank you!