The end of the summer season offers an opportunity to welcome our community back into the rhythm of a new academic year. While a yearlong endeavor, summer at SEFS provides a time for many of our student, faculty, and staff teams to get out into the field and spend devoted time on their research. This summer saw research teams heading out to various points in eastern and western Washington and the Olympic Peninsula, to as far away as the South Pacific and Alaska. This field work is critical to place-based understanding of ecosystem processes and human interactions with them. In addition, many students spent the summer gaining experience through internships, independent projects, conferences, study abroad opportunities, and community service. These engaged learning opportunities both extend our impact to resource management in practice and provide key connections students need as they build their professional networks.

This offering of our newsletter highlights some of the specific ways in which our research is advancing knowledge and having impact. Take a look at the articles on how our work helps to better understand coyote populations in cities and the importance of nature contact for human well-being. You’ll also see articles about how our faculty, staff, students, and alumni are addressing plastic pollution with sustainable paper, harmful toxins in seafood through monitoring, and stormwater management with beavers. This impactful work makes me proud of the vibrant, engaged and collaborative community in SEFS.

Our work is more important now than ever, but also faces a particularly challenging funding environment. I am consistently impressed by and grateful for the generosity of our alumni, friends, and supporters who step up to support our work. This is why we started our donor spotlights in these newsletters, to both acknowledge that we cannot do this work without this support and also tell the great stories associated with your giving. This month’s spotlight highlights the Richard D. Taber award, set up by Kenneth Raedeke in honor of a beloved faculty member to support our wildlife science students.

I look forward to welcoming you and the entire SEFS community back to campus. This year, we carry on the tradition of coming together for the annual Salmon BBQ that takes place right here in the Anderson Hall Courtyard. Please join us on October 8th from 4 – 7p.m. to enjoy fresh, local salmon provided by our Yakama Nation friends. The Salmon BBQ is an opportunity to mingle, meet new people and usher in fall.

Dan Brown

School of Environmental and Forest Sciences
Corkery Family Director’s Chair
Professor and Director