Mid Coast Today

Ella recently took the Water and Soil Resource Management course at Unity College with Professor Dr. Erik Larson.

Before starting my program at Unity College I was a 7-12th grade science teacher in South Texas. I had been working as a teacher for about 5 years.

My husband and I relocated last year to the southern tier of New York state for his job, and I decided this was the perfect time to go back to school and make a career change. I chose Unity college because it had the flexible time requirements that I needed from an online program and allowed me to still complete my home duties as well as work as a substitute teacher for the time being.

My most recent class was water and soil resource management. This is a topic that I did not have a great background in, so I knew it may be fairly difficult. The instructor, Dr. Erik Larson, was active and engaging during the course, always available to lend a hand or answer questions. He has been one of my favorite professors thus far at Unity. One thing that I enjoyed about this class is how the instructor had us go out into the environments around our home to evaluate the soils and water, which allowed for a greater connection and understanding of the material. The course project was in-depth and helped me to refine my writing and research skills.

Once I graduate, I would like to work either in consulting or research within the green energy sector. I am especially interested in the Hoary bat, and mitigation of mortality events associated with bats at wind energy facilities. I aim to utilize the skills I have learned during my degree programs to help produce a more stable and environmentally conscious energy grid while decreasing bat fatalities. 

Original source can be found here