now

I am a PhD candidate in Dr. Joanna Lambert’s lab in the Environmental Studies program at University of Colorado Boulder. I am currently working on a doctoral prospectus and am looking forward to jumping into field work in the landscapes and communities I have come to love in the American West.

Broadly, I am interested in wildlife behavior and physiology, and how we as researchers can accomplish more by doing less invasive work. Specifically, I hope to use my doctoral work to investigate how anthropogenic development may be leading to physiological changes in coyotes (Canis latrans) that could perpetuate behavioral differences between populations of coyotes. This information could be useful for assuaging a tenuous relationship between humans and one of our most prevalent (seriously, they’re everywhere!) furry predators.

I am also very focused on human-wildlife interactions, and getting stakeholders involved with my work wherever possible. I believe that thoughtful science includes a ‘what’s next’ stage that integrates community level communication and a commitment to stakeholder engagement.

Lastly, I am committed to making field ecology a more inclusive place for early career scientists, especially those that are currently under-represented in this space. I feel very grateful to have gotten to work with and benefit from non-traditional students, and know that there is always more that I can do to help this cause. There is more than enough room for all of us.

then

I have known I wanted to explore biology since I was four and learned I could not in fact be a dog when I grew up.

As a teen in the suburbs of Atlanta, GA, this meant I devoured National Geographic magazines and worked on an ability to be flexible— in different field settings and amongst many different people. I was privileged to study abroad in high school, and spent my summers teaching environmental education to a wide range of kids in the Blue Ridge mountains at a sleep-away summer camp.

I went to undergrad at the College of Charleston’s Honors College, where I was a William Aiken Fellow and member of Charleston 40 Tour Guide Association (though I still struggle with lefts and rights and never really mastered walking backward…). Once again, I was privileged to study abroad in East Africa with School for Field Studies, which granted me the opportunity to work with free-ranging African elephants (Loxodonta africana). I used this work to generate a Bachelor’s Essay on elephant body condition across a gradient of habitats and I graduated Summa Cum Laude in 2015.

In Colorado, I worked for a time in conservation ranching, listening to generational ranchers, understanding the landscape through a new lens, and getting to know the rangelands from horseback. I came to Dr. Lambert’s lab in 2018 and completed my MS on urban coyote behavior in 2020.