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UVM Impact
Graduate Education and Research News September 2022
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| Welcome
Welcome to the September issue of IMPACT, an e-newsletter highlighting research, scholarship, and graduate education at the University of Vermont (UVM). The Graduate College and the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR) have had a busy start to the semester. Dean Cindy Forehand and Graduate College staff welcomed new and returning graduate students back to campus, and Vice President Kirk Dombrowski and his team celebrated a third consecutive year of research growth, with faculty and staff attracting over $250 million dollars in research funding for the fiscal year that ended in June. The momentum continues in both offices as the semester hits a busy stride.
Please read on and discover what else has been happening.
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Featured Graduate Student
Gund Graduate Fellow Aura M. Alonso-Rodríguez and her advisor, Taylor Ricketts, Ph.D., Professor in the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources (RSENR) and Director of UVM's Gund Institute for the Environment, have been awarded a 2022 Gilliam Fellowship for Advanced Study by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). The prestigious fellowship recognizes exceptional doctoral students who are on track to be leaders in their fields and who are supported by a faculty mentor possessing a shared commitment to advancing diversity and inclusion in the sciences.
In the Ricketts’ Lab, Alonso-Rodríguez’s research focuses on assessing how socio-ecological systems respond and adapt to disturbances in Puerto Rico. Specifically, she is measuring the ecological resilience of tropical forest moth communities after a large-scale hurricane, as well as the agricultural resilience of diversified farming systems that have prevailed regardless of climatic, socioeconomic, and pandemic pressures. See more>>
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Graduate Student Senate The Graduate Student Senate (GSS) Executive Council began the Fall 2022 semester by hosting two of the year’s largest events: the GSS BBQ and the Graduate Student Resource Fair. Nearly 200 students joined the annual GSS BBQ this year to enjoy burgers, hot dogs, and music, and 30 organizations participated in the Graduate Student Resource Fair, providing useful information, swag, and prizes to the students who attended. These two major events launched the academic year for GSS and set the GSS Executive Board on a course toward achieving their collective goals for this year.
On September 24, the GSS Executive Board held their annual retreat where the board heard from UVM senior leadership, including President Garimella; Provost Patricia Prelock; Dr. Cindy Forehand, Dean of the Graduate College; and Dr. Elliot Ruggles, Sexual Violence Prevention and Education Coordinator. The retreat was a time for the GSS Executive Council to flesh out the year's initiatives, outline events, and set a budget. The team also formed Senate Committees to address some of their major priorities such as housing; sexual assault prevention; and diversity, equity, and inclusion.
(Erica Lamkin, GSS Communications Director)
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University Scholar Lecture: Donna Rizzo, Ph.D.
Professor, Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering
Professor Rizzo notes that the challenges associated with the Big Data revolution have less to do with the amount of data being generated, and more to do with how these data are being used. For me, the ability to see patterns and find order in the chaotic systems that make up our daily lives is fundamental to: i) our existence as intelligent human beings, and ii) our connection to this beautiful, blue planet. Artificial intelligence (AI) is a tool that can help humans visualize and integrate information, identify patterns, and more importantly – rethink how we use the resulting insights to improve decision making. This talk focuses on the application of AI in the context of environmental decision-making, including humanity’s impact on groundwater and the reconciliation of competing interests (e.g., among polluters, landowners, and regulators), the outbreak of Cyanobacteria blooms, disease transmission, and the science of healthcare communication.
Sit back, relax, and enjoy Professor Rizzo's inaugural University Scholar lecture: One Good Pattern Reveals Another: Unraveling the Complexity of Natural Systems using AI.
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Postdoctoral AssociationOver the summer, the UVM Postdoctoral Association (PDA) welcomed a new executive committee. For the 2022-23 academic year, the PDA will be led by Dr. Brandon Bensel (Chair), Dr. Mikaela Fudolig (Webmaster and Public Relations), Dr. Rebakah Honce (Secretary), Dr. Anil Lalwani (Postdoc-at-large) and Dr. Mojtaba Zeraatpisheh (Postdoc-at-large). We will be holding a special election for our Treasurer position soon and hope to announce that individual in the coming months. If you are, or know someone who might be, interested in this position, please reach out to postdocs@uvm.edu!
In addition to welcoming new executive committee members to the board, the PDA recently hosted a Welcome Barbeque. Postdocs from many colleges and departments gathered together at nearby Oakledge Park for burgers, hot dogs, sides, and yes, a little outdoor time away from the lab or computer! Many postdocs in attendance are fairly new to UVM, and we hope to continue to establish and grow a sense of community for not only these new members of the UVM community, but established members as well. We plan to do this through continuing our professional development and social programming.
Finally, the week of September 19th was National Postdoc Appreciation week. In addition to serving the university as researchers and bringing in funding in the form of training grants, many postdocs also take on mini-mentorship roles in their research groups and form a key part of the support network for our talented graduate and undergraduate students. While a week in September is a designated time to recognize the contributions of postdocs, please remember to take a moment to acknowledge the postdocs in your circle anytime throughout the year. (By Brandon Bensel, UVM PDA Chair)
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Postdoc Spotlight: Anil LalwaniAnil Lalwani, Ph.D., is the Post Doc Fellow for Assessment at UVM’s Office of Institutional Research and Assessment (OIRA). He has a wide range of research interests and is involved on campus in a variety of ways. In his OIRA role, Anil works collaboratively with the Executive Director of OIRA and the Vice Provost for Academic Affairs and Student Success to provide planning and support for student learning assessment activities across various academic programs on campus. Two of Anil’s ongoing OIRA work projects are Annual Assessment Reports (AAR) and Catamount Core Assessment. Outside his direct post doc work, Anil is involved with the UVM Postdoc Association, serving as Postdoc-at-large. He is also involved with the Prism Center and collaborates with the Queer and Trans People in Education-QTPiE team, conducting research and building community at UVM. Much of Anil's involvement and research stems from his personal interests and lived experiences. Recently, part of his dissertation, which looked at the challenges international students faced accessing campus support during COVID-19 campus was published. See more >>
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| Graduate Program Spotlight
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Program SpotlightThis fall, the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources launched a new Ph.D. program in Transdisciplinary Leadership, Creativity and Sustainability (TLCS). This new program is a collaborative response to the growing call for Ph.D. programs, innovative scholarship, and useful leadership practices that can meet the complex interrelated and intersecting challenges of these times (e.g., climate change, systemic inequity, racialized violence, accelerating loss of biodiversity, and more). These challenges require unprecedented capacity to collaborate across differences and navigate uncertainty, contradiction, ambiguity, and incommensurability. The TLCS Program is designed for leaders, organizers, and practitioners who are committed to applied scholarship that is rooted in transdisciplinarity, creativity and applied leadership in service to a sustainable and equitable future. The program is rooted in a tradition of engaged scholarship. See more >>
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Research Spotlight
The University of Vermont (UVM) attracted $250.1 million for research for the last fiscal year ending in June. This represents a 8.3% increase from the previous fiscal year, making it the third consecutive year of solid research growth. This steady growth certainly helped position UVM among the top 100 public research universities in the country this year, according to the most recent National Science Foundation (NSF) Higher Education Research and Development (HERD) survey.
As noted in the linked article, the increasing number of competitive awards that UVM faculty proposed and won figured prominently into the growth. Faculty garnered more than 40 awards of $1 million or more compared to 27 in the previous year. This momentum continues. In fact, just this September, several research awards went to UVM faculty, including (but not limited to) Jon Durda (LCOM) who was awarded $736,008 for the project: "Reasons for Geographic and Racial Difference in Stroke (REGARDS)," Abby van den Berg (CALS) who was awarded $499,589 for the project: "Increasing crop value and income of U.S. maple producers through education and research on practices to increase the production of maple syrup with Grade A flavor," and Beverly Wemple (CAS) who was awarded $739,000 for the Cooperative Institute for Research to Operations in Hydrology (CIROH) project: "Improved Representation of Floodplains and Natural Features for Channel Routing in the National Water Model." Please see the Office of the Vice President for Research (OVPR) website for a more complete research awards timeline, and see the linked article for more details about the steady increase in research funding. See more >>
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Alumni NewsEric Hagen, M.S., is a 2020 UVM graduate of the Plant Biology Department's Field Naturalist Master's Program. He is thoughtful about being a transient resident of this Earth and a responsible steward of the land. Eric is particularly interested in understanding how people experience the importance of nature and how this sense of nature’s value can be strengthened. The recent book that Eric co-edited with Curt Lindberg, Our Better Nature: Hopeful Excursions in Saving Biodiversity is an outgrowth of this interest and intertwines information and essays about the "who, whys, and hows" of biodiversity conservation in Vermont and beyond. IMPACT had the opportunity to ask Eric some questions about his book as well as his background, interests, thoughts on environmental valuation, and more. Please enjoy reading our Q & A with Eric... See more >>
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