Oceans4Generations
Education
Looking out the porthole window of my cabin on board a ship as a Marine Mammal Observer in the Gulf of Mexico.
Nobody becomes a marine biologist for the money. You’re either driven by wanting to make a difference or by wanting to work with really cool organisms. In my case, I wanted both!
Raised in California, I grew up with a fascination and respect for the ocean and the animals in it. As a kid, I used to wish I had gills or could hold my breath for a really long time so I could explore underwater longer. I could sit for hours at the Monterey Bay Aquarium, faced pressed up against the glass of a tropical reef or shark tank, but I was particularly fascinated by marine mammals. I attended marine science camps over the summers and landed my first animal-related job at a local theme park when I was 18. It was glorious! Well, ok picking up poop after petting zoo animals isn't as spectacular as the Animal Planet channel might make it out to be. It was more like what you’d see on Dirty-Jobs, but I enjoyed it and it was my first foot in the door for a long list of animal-related volunteer and internship opportunities to come!
Best place on the ship!
Bachelor's degree: I was determined since high school to become a marine biologist and study marine mammals. So, a marine science program at the University of Hawaii, Hilo was a natural choice. And let's be honest, given the choice between going to a college only two hours from home (UC Santa Cruz) and Hawaii, who wouldn't go to Hawaii?! My program gave me a background in marine biology, oceanography, coral reef ecology and I got a certification in scientific diving. I discovered along the way that I was also very interested in animal behavior and cognition, so I decided to double major in Psychology.
Master's degree: Through my academic experiences, ensuing summer internships and various jobs around the U.S., I discovered an interest in many subjects and ended up in an Experimental Psychology program at the University of Southern Mississippi for my masters degree. Surprisingly, I discovered a new excitment for behavioral neuroscience and exploring individual variation in animal behavior through the use of zebrafish... yes, that's right, zebrafish. The zebrafish is the new rat for research in behavioral neuroscience, molecular genetics, developmental biology and behavioral ecology. And unlike marine mammals, they're small, cheap, you can build an experimental tank to house them in and actually have control over the experiments you conduct! I gained a wealth of invaluable experience during my masters but as much as I enjoyed the new research concepts I was exploring, the ocean was calling. The Deep Water Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico occurred during the last year of my masters and confirmed my resolve to return to marine mammal conservation research.
PhD degree: I found an opportunity to help on a bottlenose dolphin research project in the Florida Panhandle following the Deep Water Horizon oil spill which soon led to a PhD position in Conservation Biology at the University of Central Florida. Happy to be back in my element, I am now working on my dissertation research to explore the population dynamics, survival and population structure of bottlenose dolphin populations in Pensacola, Florida.
For more info on past and present research, check out the "Research" tab above!
