Staff

Alison joined Lake Champlain Sea Grant and UVM Extension in March 2020. As the Watershed Forestry Coordinator, she manages the Watershed Forestry Partnership, coordinating riparian forest buffer restoration efforts across the Lake Champlain Basin. Alison has a Master’s degree in Natural Resources from UVM, which focused on mapping forest change in New England. She is currently completing her PhD exploring how environmental change affects people’s connections with nature. Prior to graduate school, Alison worked in Washington, DC in environmental advocacy and community outreach. Outside of work, she can usually be found hiking, rock climbing, or foraging for mushrooms.

Dr. Bowden is the Robert and Genevieve Patrick Professor in Watershed Science and Planning in the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Vermont. He teaches undergraduate courses in the Environmental Sciences curriculum and graduate courses in the Aquatic of Ecology and Watershed sciences curriculum at the University of Vermont. He is the Director of the Vermont Water Resources in Lake Studies Center and leads the Vermont component of the Northeastern States Research Cooperative.Dr. Bowden's research interests focus on the interactions among land use, land cover, and water resources. He has conducted research on wetland, terrestrial, and aquatic ecosystems in temperate, tropical, and arctic biomes and has been involved with strategic planning in universities and in government agencies.His current research projects focus on the effects of exurban development on stormwater runoff in Vermont and on climate change impacts in the arctic. Dr. Bowden is active in national and international programs to that seek to integrate science in resource management decision making, including the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) program, Hydrology for Environment Life and Policy (HELP), the National Environmental Observatory Network (NEOaN), and the Study of Environmental Arctic Change (SEARCH).

Gary is an Extension Assistant Professor in the Saint Albans, VT Extension office. Gary has worked in higher education most of his career, and contributes skills and experiences in operations, business process, and financial management, with additional experience in field and specialty crop production, communications, and research management to the Lake Champlain Sea Grant team. Specifically, Gary has been brought on board to contribute to LCSG's efforts on workforce development within the Champlain basin. As an avid hiker and kayaker, Gary is passionate about Lake Champlain and every square inch (especially the higher-altitude square inches) of its 8,234 square mile watershed.

Ashley joined Lake Champlain Sea Grant and UVM Extension team in November 2015. As the Watershed and Lake Education Coordinator she oversees the Watershed Alliance program K-12 education program which has a UVM and a SUNY Plattsburgh location, coordinates watershed science professional development opportunities for K-12 teachers, and oversees an undergraduate Watershed Education internship program. She has a BS in Education and Environmental Science and a MS in Natural Resources from the University of Vermont and will be starting her doctorate this summer (2021) at the University of Wisconsin Stevens Point. 

Ashley’s educational and professional pursuits have been dedicated to helping create a sustainable future for Vermont, the greater Lake Champlain basin and beyond. Ashley works at the state and federal level to support watershed science and environmental literacy. She is the co-chair of the Vermont Education and Environment Network which is the state level North American Association of Environmental Education affiliate, which aims to foster a network of individuals and organizations working together to promote high quality outdoor, environmental, and educational experiences. Ashley is also the secretary of the Sea Grant Educators Network and an active member of the Champlain Basin Education Initiative. She is immensely grateful for all the time she has spent connecting and learning from natural systems; today she is most likely found  mountain biking, skiing, or SUPing with her floppy eared pup Callie.

Shari provides communications assistance for Lake Champlain Sea Grant. She maintains websites, coordinates enewletters and social media, writes news stories, and creates print materials. She also manages communications for the Vermont Water Resources and Lake Studies Center, the Northeastern States Research Cooperative, and the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources at the University of Vermont.

Aude Lochet is the water resources extension specialist based at SUNY Plattsburgh. She conducts outreach, educational activities, and applied research in relation to water resources and human use of Lake Champlain and its shoreline.

Aude started her career in France as a fish ecologist. She studied the otoliths (“ear stones” in Greek) of fish to understand the migration of many species, including sea lamprey in Lake Champlain. She also participated in fish restoration programs. She discovered herself as an educator when she started working with undergraduate students, as an instructor and research mentor. For several years, she managed undergraduate research programs for the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies and taught biology and environmental science courses at Vassar College and at some SUNY institutions. In her spare time, you might find her swimming in a pool, reading a thriller, or cooking with her family.

Caroline has called Vermont home on and off for the past 10 years but grew up in the Finger Lakes Region of New York. She recently graduated with a Master of Science in Natural Resources from the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point; however, she completed her undergraduate degree at UVM in 2013. Since 2009, she has called many states home (Vermont, California, and Wisconsin), but she is excited to circle back to UVM where her environmental education career officially began. She will enjoy being closer to the mountains and Lake Champlain.

Timothy (Tim) Mihuc oversees LCSG's SUNY Plattsburgh operations and serves as the coordinator of the Lake Champlain Research Institute at SUNY Plattsburgh. Tim began his career with an undergraduate independent research project on nutrient limitation of algae in a small eutrophic lake in Oklahoma. He continued his education as an aquatic ecologist through studies on invertebrate life-history ecology in a Colorado alpine wetland (M.S.) and post-fire food web dynamics in Yellowstone National Park streams (Ph.D.). He spent several years at Louisiana State University as a post-doctoral researcher (1994-1996) conducting invasive species research in the Atchafalaya River Basin, the largest contiguous hardwood swamp ecosystem in the U.S.  From 1996-1999 Tim served as director of the Great Rivers Field Station (Illinois Natural History Survey) where he led a multidisciplinary research team working on the Upper Mississippi River. He has published over 35 research articles including journals such as Ecology, Freshwater Biology, Aquatic Sciences, Hydrobiologia, Journal of Great Lakes Research and American Midland Naturalist and has co-edited the book volume titled “Lake Champlain: Partnership and research in the new millennium,” published by Kluwer Academic publishers. Tim’s professional areas of interest include aquatic food webs, fish population dynamics, ecological integrity and aquatic biodiversity. He enjoys outdoor activities, particularly fly-fishing, skiing, hiking and mountain climbing (preferably combined).

Mark was born and raised in Pennsylvania, earned a bachelor's degree in forestry from Virginia Tech in 2002 (including 2001 at the Victorian School of Forestry in Australia) and a master's degree in Limnology at the University of Jyvaskyla in Finland in 2008. He began working with the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Lakes Program as a seasonal environmental technician from 2009 to 2012, then worked as a seasonal fisheries technician with the US Forest Service in California in 2013 and 2014, and spent a winter as a State of Alaska certified crab observer on fishing vessels in the Bering Sea. He returned to Vermont from 2015 to 2020 to work with the DEC Lakes Program again as an environmental scientist involved in volunteer monitoring, assessment, and permitting. After a year working as a water quality scientist with Horizons Regional Council on the North Island of New Zealand, Mark has returned to Vermont once more.

Linda is responsible for coordinating education programs that target real estate professionals, watershed groups and municipal employees. She collaborates with topic experts to develop accredited courses for real estate professionals in Vermont and New York on topics related to land use and water quality protection. Linda works with watershed groups to create and present public education workshops focused on shoreland erosion control. She enlists local businesses, non-profits and municipal agencies in adopting recommended lawn care practices for healthy soils and stormwater runoff mitigation.

Linda’s life-long devotion to the health and welfare of Lake Champlain inspired her transition from a social work career to working for the Lake.  She is co-founder of Ahead of the Storm, a Lewis Creek Association program addressing stormwater runoff in the LaPlatte River watershed through education, mitigation designs, and installations. Her involvement with local watershed initiatives includes her role as a member of the Sacred Waters Committee of the Clean Water Network, and of the Aquatic Plant Committee for the Long Point. Linda’s family has owned a summer home on Lake Champlain at Long Point since the 1930’s.  She is an avid open-water swimmer, hiker, and cross-country skier, and enjoys sharing time on the Lake with her extended family.

As the Green Infrastructure Collaborative (GIC) Coordinator, Jill works with the Clean Water Initiative Program (CWIP) at the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation. She coordinates the statewide GI Roundtable and supports development of clean water project verification and operation and maintenance programs for projects funded under the Clean Water Service Delivery Act of 2019. Through this role, she provides outreach and coordinates educational programming to encourage the use of low impact development, green stormwater infrastructure (GSI), and nature-based solutions for managing stormwater runoff. 

For her master’s research, Jill evaluated the nutrient removal performance of bioretention cells and a denitrifying woodchip bioreactor treating agricultural runoff from dairy farm production areas and silage storage bunkers. After completing her MS degree, Jill was a lecturer in the UVM Plant and Soil Science Department, where she instructed environmental science and plant and soil science labs. She has also conducted stormwater management property site assessments to make suggestions to landowners. In her free time, Jill enjoys getting outside and exploring the mountains throughout all of Vermont's seasons, especially while skiing, biking, climbing, and hiking.

Paliza is a postdoctoral researcher in the UVM Department of Plant and Soil Sciences and joined Lake Champlain Sea Grant in March 2021. Paliza is working with Kris Stepenuck as a professional development coordinator for the newly developed Sea Grant Scholars Program. Paliza helps with planning and implementation of a week-long professional development immersion program, as well as peer-mentorship opportunities and internship support for scholars.

For her postdoc, Paliza is working on green stormwater infrastructure (specifically bioretention) projects based on water quality and will soon start a new research project to explore novel questions intersecting agroecology, stormwater management, and water quality in urban watersheds in Vermont. Paliza completed her doctoral studies from the UVM Plant and Soil Sciences Department. She continues to be passionate about using research as a tool to tackle ecological and sustainability problems from soil and water chemistry perspectives.

Kris develops, implements, and oversees Lake Champlain Sea Grant Extension and outreach activities. Her current outreach efforts include using social marketing techniques to promote healthy soils through lawn care, community resilience to flooding, and clean boating and best winter maintenance practices. Her research endeavors include understanding outcomes and building credibility of volunteer water monitoring and citizen science programs, assessing impacts of land use on water quality, and understanding behavior changes that result from watershed outreach programming.

She helps to support a national network of volunteer water monitoring programs, maintaining volunteermonitoring.org, that includes a national jobs board for water outreach and volunteer water monitoring positions, and an associated listserv for Extension water professionals (ExtVolMonNetwork). She is appointed as the U.S. co-chair of the Public Advisory Group of the Lake Champlain-Richelieu River Flood Study and serves as a member of the Lake Champlain Basin Program Education and Outreach Committee, and the Watersheds United Vermont board of directors.

Chief Don Stevens of the Nulhegan Abenaki Tribe is well-known throughout the Lake Champlain basin and receives frequent invitations to participate at events where he shares his inspiring Abenaki stories and knowledge with school children and other groups. For many years, he has demonstrated Abenaki traditions and told campfire stories at festivals and family programs at Shelburne Farms. 

Through a partnership with Lake Champlain Sea Grant and Shelburne Farms, Chief Stevens and other educators will convey their Indigenous knowledge and cultural history of the basin with learning activities and events at Shelburne Farms and at area K-12 schools, colleges, nonprofit organizations, and other public venues. Chief Stevens will collaborate with other Indigenous educators to provide learning opportunities including the development of videos, books, and teaching materials and lessons to share Abenaki cultural history.

Nate grew up in the Ausable River Watershed in upstate New York where he fell in love with the region. An avid backcountry skier, hiker, mountain biker, paddler, and lover of adventure, Nate spends his time outside whenever possible. He is passionate about inspiring young people to interact with and study their local environment in hopes of emboldening the next generation of environmental stewards. In 2017, Nate earned a Bachelor of Arts in Environmental Studies from Fort Lewis College. In 2019, he completed his Master’s in Education with a focus in environmental education from Western Washington University and North Cascades Institute. Before joining Lake Champlain Sea Grant he worked with a variety of experiential environmental education programs.

Kate is currently a PhD student at the University of Vermont, but grew up in the Finger Lakes region of New York. She started researching lakes as an undergraduate student at SUNY Geneseo, particularly how physical lake mixing and internal phosphorus loading leads to the proliferation of cyanobacteria blooms. At the University of Vermont, her research is focusing on the drivers of cyanobacteria blooms and their production of harmful toxins. She has recently started as the watershed science education program assistant with Lake Champlain Sea Grant's Watershed Alliance in order to work with communities and help educate K-12 students on watershed dynamics and what is threatening our water quality in the Lake Champlain basin.

For questions about Watershed Alliance, email us at watershd [at] uvm.edu.

Julianna is the Research Program Coordinator for the Lake Champlain Sea Grant, the Vermont Water Resources and Lake Studies Center, and the Northeastern States Research Cooperative. In this capacity, Julianna is responsible for administration and budget management of the three research programs, competing and awarding research projects, and reporting. She also contributes to outreach and communications efforts.

Previously, Julianna was based at UVM’s Gund Institute for Environment, supporting and communicating research on low emissions agriculture in developing countries, a focus of the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). Prior to joining UVM, Julianna managed projects and wrote and edited proposals, reports, and outreach materials for the USAID West Africa Trade Hub, CARE International, and the US Peace Corps in Niger and Ghana, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Niger, and taught middle and high school in Baton Rouge, Louisiana and Washington, DC. 

In 2006, Theo moved to Maine to work on ecology and restoration issues related to anadromous fish and their interactions with native and naturalized species in the freshwater and nearshore marine environments. His work focused primarily on alewife (Alosa pseudoharengus) but also extended to eels, Atlantic salmon, and Atlantic cod. He was awarded an adjunct faculty position at the University of Southern Maine in 2008 where he taught classes, such as Land-based Aquaculture, Limnology, and environmental lab courses, and pursued research on anadromous fish ecology.

Theo joined the Sustainable Ecological Aquaculture Network (SEANET), an NSF-funded “Established Program to Stimulate Competitive Research” (EPSCOR) project based out of the University of Maine in 2013. Through SEANET, he was introduced to a wide array of topics in mariculture and aquaculture, settling on Recirculating Aquaculture Systems (RAS), Aquaponics, and clam and seaweed farming as areas of investigation. He worked with the Passamaquoddy Environmental Department to explore aquaculture related business ventures associated with their reservation near Eastport, ME. In 2017 he took one of the SEANET projects commercial, starting a kelp farm off Stonington, ME. 

Theo generally enjoys being outdoors, on boats or in the woods of northern New England.