acquired a passion for birds and conservation in college, earning bachelor's degrees at the University of Washington and Evergreen State College plus MS and PhD degrees from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with an emphasis in physiology and neuroscience. Her master's degree program involved developing a conservation strategy for nongame birds for the state of Nebraska, and she worked for several years as a US Forest Service biologist, studying bird populations in the Tongass National Forest in southeast Alaska. She is currently president of the Bighorn Audubon Society chapter in Sheridan, Wyoming, working on establishing regional Important Bird Areas (IBAs).