Hi! My name is Lillian Taylor, and I’m a rising junior at the University of Pittsburgh. I’m majoring in environmental science, and I also intend to pursue a minor in history and a certificate in GIS. I am deeply interested in the interactions between humans and the natural world, specifically the impacts of land use change, urbanization, and agriculture on biogeochemical cycles. Outside of class, I enjoy reading, trying new recipes, and exploring Pittsburgh’s city parks. 

Next week, I will be traveling to Laramie, Wyoming, to participate in Pitt’s Wyoming Spring Creek Field Studies Program. Over the course of the six week program, we will be learning about and using field techniques in ecology, geology, and paleontology to understand the ways in which geological, biological, and historical processes have influenced the landscape around Pitt’s Spring Creek Preserve and other Wyoming landmarks like the Medicine Bow mountains. This experience will culminate in each of us applying what we’ve learned in an independent research project.

I was initially drawn to this program because it satisfied a graduation requirement for my major and because my geology lab professor spoke so highly of all the prairie critters he saw while teaching this program. As I started looking more closely into the program though, it jumped out to me as a tremendous opportunity to grow as a person, student, and worker. I’m so thrilled to be participating in this program with my peers and being able to build a community together in Wyoming as we take this next step in our academic and professional lives. This program will expose us to the kinds of work we could be doing in graduate school and/or careers in environmental science. For me, this is such an exciting chance to gain more insight into what I want to do after I graduate from Pitt. Although the program focuses on Wyoming, the skills, knowledge, and community that we will build over the next six weeks will follow us back to Pitt’s campus in the fall and on all our future endeavors.

I look forward to writing to this blog again in the coming weeks!