SEEDS: Newsletter > Volume 4, Issue 4 - May 2006

SEEDS Highlights: Lewis Reed, SEEDS Undergraduate

My name is Lewis Reed. I am currently an undergraduate senior in Environmental Studies at San Jose State University in California. My interests within this broad subject have ranged from sustainable agriculture systems to conservation biology, but I have become increasingly focused on grassland ecology. My fascination with ecology began very early as my parents toted me around on their shoulders during family excursions to wild places before I could walk. It was in a high school field biology class that I began to realize that studying the myriad forms of organisms and how they interact with their environment would be a potential career for me. I recognized the way my teacher, Rolland Carlson, inspired so many students and I thought what a neat job that would be to have. Shortly after graduating high school, I began working as a ranger aide with a local park called Sycamore Grove (that I essentially grew up in) and taking biology courses at a local community college. By the time I transferred to San Jose State University I had become a seasonal park ranger.

My work as a ranger has been very complimentary to my academic study. I have been exposed to a variety of real-world resource management challenges and spent a tremendous amount of time observing ecological interactions and processes in the park’s grasslands, oak savannas, and riparian woodlands. One of the most gratifying aspects of this work has been teaching the public about the intricacies of these ecosystems and how their function relates to our own lives. In addition to the ecological work I have done with the parks, I also spent a year teaching elementary school students about solid waste reduction for the Alameda County Waste Management Authority and nearly two years administering water conservation programs for the Santa Clara Valley Water District. Each of these jobs has taught me a great deal about our relationship as humans with the environment and, more importantly, they have provided me with an opportunity to share that understanding with others.

I am now looking forward to furthering my education in graduate school. Next fall I will begin work on my Masters degree under a Research Assistantship in the Department of Plant Biology at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale. My research there will focus on the ecology and restoration of tall grass prairie ecosystems. The SEEDS program has played an important role in my decision to go to graduate school and in my opportunity to attend this program that is so well suited to my personal academic interests.

I found out about SEEDS from my Sustainable Agriculture instructor, Dr. Rachel O’Malley, who encouraged me to apply for the SEEDS travel grant to attend the 2005 ESA Annual Meeting in Montreal, Canada. I was excited to receive the travel grant, but got so much more than I expected from the experience! Meeting so many researchers and students from different backgrounds who all shared my enthusiasm for learning about ecology was a tremendous inspiration. I was so impressed to see many of these students actively contributing to the field of ecology so early in there careers! In that single week with my SEEDS mentors, fellow students, and the numerous people I met during the conference, my prospect for attending graduate school to study ecology changed from being a distant possibility full of questions to a solid goal with several clear pathways. As it turns out, the assistantship under which I will be attending graduate school was introduced to me by my mentor at that conference.

The SEEDS program has provided me with other opportunities that have greatly influenced my academic development. SEEDS also allowed me to attend the International Conference in Merida in January 2005 where I met researchers from other parts of the world who share my interest in grassland ecology and I learned about some different potential careers for grassland ecologists. This summer I will be attending the SEEDS field trip to the Konza Prairie Long Term Ecological Research Station in Kansas. This will be my first hand introduction to the tall grass prairie ecosystems that I will study throughout my Masters degree program! The SEEDS program has been a major positive influence on my academic development and I am grateful that I have had the opportunity to be part of it.