2024 Field School Week 6

By: Natalia Donia and Faith Jacob

This week, students have been working on finishing their units to prepare for the end of field school. This included finishing up layers, collecting the last few artifacts, and dredging through subsoil and saprolite for our clarifying layers. Do not be dismayed, however – there were still a plethora of artifacts found, including gorgeous sherds of transferprint ceramics, a large sherd of a bowl, and a plethora of glass and cut nails. Although the field school’s excavation time is coming to a close, there are still many exciting features and units to be excavated. Some of note include two sherds displaying a maker’s mark at the top of a layer, and several builder’s trenches along the walls of the 1857 Slave Dwelling.

We took a break from the heat and digging on Wednesday afternoon for a discussion with the full-time archaeology staff about the next steps after field school: job hunting, graduate school, and how to build strong careers in the field of archaeology. We were also introduced to several resources to aid us in the search for archaeological opportunities. This lecture showed how the field school was not only about learning valuable skills in archaeology, but also giving us the tools necessary to pursue it in the future as a career.

In addition to wrapping up excavations, we spent some time this week in the lab working on our final research projects. Each student chose a topic of interest to them that relates to the work they’ve done this summer, and Karen McIlvoy, our Archaeology Laboratory Supervisor, assisted us in finding supplementary materials to aid in completing our projects. This was a great opportunity for each of us to do a bit of a deeper dive in the topics we’re most interested in! Each student presented their findings on Friday and helped all of us learn a bit more about the work we’ve been doing for the last six weeks and what it all means. It was great to hear about each student’s interests and passions!

At the end of the day on Friday, students said a bittersweet goodbye to each other and to Poplar Forest. We’re sad to be leaving but grateful for the wonderful experience, knowledge gained, and friendships formed.