Greetings! My name is Nadirah Amirah Cogbill. I am currently a sophomore at Elizabeth City State University (ECSU) majoring in Mathematics with a minor in Secondary Education.

Entering my Undergraduate studies at ECSU, I was awarded the Center of Excellence for the Remote Sensing Education and Research (CERSER) Scholarship under the advisement of Dr. Linda B. Hayden.  Being a member in the CERSER program, I have had the opportunity to apply to internships and attend numerous informative conferences.  I have also had the great privilege of being in the presence of great renowned scientist who has graciously passed their knowledge onto the program. CERSER will assist me in the development of technical skills and proper communication skills needed to pursue future internships as well as a successful career.  

During the year of 2009-2010, I was enrolled as a member of the Multimedia Team. The title of our research project was, "Research and Implementation of Data Submission Technologies in Support of CReSIS Polar and Cyberinfrastructure Research Projects at Elizabeth City State University ". The team researched ways to collect information through forms such as registrations or surveys via online submission and printable methods. Recognizing that most forms request private information, the team investigated procedures to develop a secure server for the collection of such data. The team investigated three approaches for the construction of general data submission forms and implemented them on web servers utilized by CERSER.  Web-based forms were created using Adobe Dreamweaver CS4, phpMyAdmin, Google Docs and PHP. Printable forms were developed by Adobe LiveCycle Designer.

In the summer of 2010, I had the pleasure to attend an internship at Indiana University of Bloomington where I worked under the mentorship of Dr. Marlon Pierce on Cloud Computing. CReSIS acquires large amounts of information over long periods of time; thus it was the duty of the team to research different ways of allowing CReSIS to have a backup storage place for the data. This process was necessary if the computers at Indiana University were to crash, CReSIS would then want to insure that such data does not become permanently lost and in fact can be recovered. The team primarily focused on Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a potential security barometer for storing such data. It was observed that although AWS guaranteed that it was 99.99% effective at securing the data, it was only measuring a short time period and not long term, thus eventually having the potential of losing all CReSIS data if in fact a shutdown of the system was to occur.  

During the 2010-2011 school year, I was a member of the Mathematics Team under the leadership of Dr. Darnell Johnson.  The title of our research was “Race to the Top: Five-Year View of Math Sprint Competition at Camelot Elementary School 2005-2010. The team compared the testing scores of Camelot Elementary School students in the third, fourth, and fifth grades. The group compared the SOL end of the year scores using the Math Sprint Competition versus not using the math sprint. The scores showed the students performed better with the Math Sprint Competition unlike the previous years without the Math Sprint.

After graduating with my Bachelors' Degree in Secondary Math Education from ECSU, I wish to pursue a Master's Degree along with obtaining a Ph.D in Mathematics. My long-term goal is to be an educator at a high school with the hopes of inspiring a student as my instructors inspired me. There is a great African Proverb that I have lived by since it was introduced to me, "It takes a Village to Raise a Child".  With the completion of the CERSER Program I can ensure that my village will be secured enough that I can pass on such knowledge that was once blessed upon me.