Learning to Fly

A dedicated mentor's fast-growing research project gives students the chance to take wing as scientists.

From the fall 2025 issue of Sacred Heart University Magazine

Key Highlights

• SHU biology professor Emily Levy leads a multiyear field research project studying how environmental factors—including food availability—affect Eastern bluebirds and house sparrows
• Undergraduate researchers conduct hands-on work: measuring nestlings, banding birds, collecting blood samples and recording data across six Fairfield/Trumbull field sites
• Began in March 2025 with the installation of about 85 nesting boxes across SHU campuses and local conservation areas, supported by the Fairfield Conservation Department and Nichols Improvement Association
• The project continues through breeding seasons and into laboratory analysis, with students returning annually to gather comparative data

Three researchers settle into a shady spot below a green canopy rich with sound. The chirps, cheeps, warbles, whistles and caws are evidence of the many bird species that call these open fields and woodlands home. But on this hot mid-July morning, the trio is focused on just one—the Eastern bluebird.

Emily Levy, an assistant biology professor at Sacred Heart, observes Cassandra Vallon ’26 and Liliana Sosnowski ’26 as they take measurements of several nestlings, all of 12 days old, to assess growth including weight and wing length, collect blood for further testing and record other observations, such as the presence of parasites, including ticks or mites.

“Do you see anything crawling on them?” Levy asks.

The answer is no.

The students carefully apply bands to the birds and safely return them to the nearby nesting box where they were collected about 15 minutes earlier.

Today is just one of many field data collections in a larger experiment examining how environmental factors affect the bluebirds and house sparrows that live and breed at this collection site. This one is Hoyden’s Hill in Fairfield, a municipal conservation area about two miles from Sacred Heart University. The five other sites include Sacred Heart’s West Campus and Park Avenue Campus, Lake Mohegan and Grace Richardson (additional Fairfield conservation areas) and the Nichols Improvement Association site in Trumbull. Under Levy’s direction, SHU undergraduates are gathering the data and driving the research forward.

^{Home Visit: Assistant biology professor Emily Levy and Liliana Sosnowski '26 check a Bluebird nesting box near student dorms as part of Sacred Heart's ongoing field study in Fairfield County}

Vallon, who is majoring in neuroscience and minoring in biology, chemistry and psychology, says the experience is unique. “I’ve never worked with birds before,” she relates. “This was my first time banding, measuring and even handling one. It’s been a completely new and rewarding experience for me.”

From Nesting Boxes to New Frontiers

The project began in March 2025, when Levy and undergraduate SHU science researchers installed dozens upon dozens of nesting boxes at the SHU sites and added to those already installed by the Fairfield Conservation Department at some open space areas. Additional boxes were installed at the Nichols Improvement Association site as part of an Eagle Scout project. “We are hugely grateful to the Fairfield Conservation Department and the Nichols Improvement Association for letting us put up boxes and monitor the birds in them,” Levy says. “They’ve been incredible to work with.”

The project continued through the May to August breeding season and has moved into lab work and analysis. It’s a multiyear effort, which means students will be back in the field in spring 2026 to repeat the experiment.

Sosnowski, who until this point was most at home in the lab, is grateful to be trying her hand at “really challenging” fieldwork. Early on, she would watch Levy carefully cradle a chick in her hand as she collected the data. Soon, this honors biology major and chemistry and writing minor was mirroring the movements. “Dr. Levy never rushed us, always took our questions and allowed us to learn how to do it ourselves,” Sosnowski says.

This project is all about food, specifically how more or less of it impacts chick behavior, growth, physiology and survival. Certain nests among the 85 boxes scattered across all six sites received cups of mealworms as the chicks developed, while chicks in control nests only got what their parents brought them.

“The goal is to identify any differences between the nests with supplemental food versus those without food, and to see if bluebirds and house sparrows respond differently to the supplemental food,” Levy says.

There are many questions to answer, including the overarching one that guides the experimental design: How are wild birds impacted by their environment? “Where an animal lives, who it is living with, who its neighbors are—all that—can get under its skin, so to speak, and affect its behavior, physiology, survival and reproduction,” Levy says. “For baby birds, what they are getting fed, what their outside environment is like and what their parents are doing could affect all aspects of their biology, such as behavior, growth and immune function.”

The Rewards of Research

That dynamic is not unique to the avian world. It can just as easily be said that the experiences and environment provided to budding scientists can have a profound impact on how they grow in their learning, their confidence, their abilities to succeed and their vocation.

Studies have shown that engaging in research projects as an undergraduate has significant perks. Whether in the lab or field, students learn as they observe—picking up skills and knowledge that can help them land jobs right after graduation or prepare them for graduate programs. Other studies have found that fieldwork can improve academic performance, as well as boost skills such as critical thinking and writing.

Long intrigued by genetics, Sosnowski intends to obtain a master's degree in chemistry and focus on personalized medicine. She’s checked off many boxes that she needs to proceed with her career. “It’s good to expand your knowledge,” Sosnowski says. “If you just become an expert in one portion of science, it’s hard to see how everything is connected.”

A commuter from Norwalk to Sacred Heart, Sosnowski will spend the offseason in the lab, along with fellow student Brianna Nieves ’26, examining the chicks’ white blood cells (gathered from the blood samples) to see if the extra food boosted their immune systems. The students will also assess what happened to the birds on a cellular level, specifically measuring whether the extra food acts as an “on” switch for genes that produce antioxidants and protect telomeres, “good” guys in the fight to keep our cells healthy. The students will be asking additional questions: Did the extra food help an invasive species (house sparrows) gain a leg up on the native species (bluebirds)? How are different species affected when they no longer worry about securing food?

“We might be able to explain different rates of growth,” Sosnowski says. “But it’s a learning curve right now. This is just the first year.”

Broadening Their Horizons

Across multiple academic departments at Sacred Heart, undergraduate–faculty partnerships and mentorships provide students with lab and field experiences that help them grow and broaden their horizons. Students can earn research credit, and in some cases receive a stipend, as they explore options and career paths well before leaving the nest, so to speak.

Vallon, who is from New York City, plans to continue with postgraduate veterinarian studies. She is now considering all paths before her, including conservation medicine, which integrates veterinary medicine, ecology and conservation. “I want to be in the field every day and work with animals in their environment,” she says.

Vallon and classmate Lena Seerosh ’26, an honors neuroscience major, are investigating the behavior of parents in relation to their chicks, thanks to cameras they installed in the nests and many hours watching parents visit them. “Being in the field and working with the birds hands-on has been incredible, as has having the opportunity to design, plan and lead the parental behavior study,” Vallon says. “Dr. Levy gave us a lot of freedom on this project.”

Kate Vincent ’27, who is majoring in biochemistry and sociology, is also a part of the research team. Two newly minted alums, Vita Pivtorak ’25 and Alexandria Lovasi ’25, got the ball rolling prior to their graduation in May.

Pivtorak helped to build and install nesting boxes and then learned how to monitor the boxes, handle the birds, collect data and prepare it for analysis. A neuroscience major on a premed track, Pivtorak was also new to fieldwork. She’s grateful for the critical thinking, problem-solving and observational skills she developed and the ability to deal with unexpected challenges— an occupational hazard in natural environments.

“The experience definitely taught me to think on my feet and be a team player, which was a big aspect of ensuring fieldwork would go smoothly,” she says. “Unexpected things could happen, like changes in the weather, difficulty in locating the boxes or needed adjustments to how we collected data. I had to learn how to respond quickly and stay calm under pressure. I became more confident in making decisions in the moment.”

Lovasi, an honors biology major from Pompton Lakes, NJ, who minored in chemistry and theology & religious studies, is preparing to apply to graduate school for physician associate studies. She says the hands-on aspect broadened her view of biology.

“It strengthened my observational skills, attention to detail and patience—all essential qualities for a health care professional,” Lovasi says. “The research helped solidify my interest in pursuing a career in medicine by showing me the importance of asking meaningful questions and contributing to advancing knowledge that can improve patient care, whether that’s baby birds or people.”

Passing on a Passion for Learning

If proof is still needed that hands-on learning is a key factor in success, one need not look further than Levy, a behavioral ecologist and physiologist in her second year at Sacred Heart. Levy did postdoctoral work studying songbirds in the field at Indiana University and doctoral research at Duke University, where she studied a population of wild baboons in Kenya, observed by the Amboseli Baboon Research Project.

^{Passing It On: Through mentorship and fieldwork, Levy empowers her students to take the lead in original research projects that take flight beyond the classroom.}

Her first foray into fieldwork came in the summer after her junior year at college. “We’d kayak from one island to another to collect data,” she says, speaking of the field studies she conducted in Lake Superior with two of her professors. These included studying tadpoles, plants and pollinators. The idyllic experience not only caused her disbelief that one could get paid to do this, but also encouraged her to continue her path and, ultimately, create similar opportunities for others.

“I really love working with students,” Levy says. “They are given a big responsibility, and it’s really rewarding to watch them as they observe, take it all in and learn to do it on their own.”

All fieldwork and data gathering mentioned in the article and photo captions were done with the proper permits, including one from the USGS Bird Banding Laboratory.