This following is part of the “Where Are They Now?”series featuring guest posts from former interns, volunteers, staff, and friends of BRIT. This month’s post is from former BRIT intern, Delany Baum. Delany interned with the Texas Plant Conservation Program in Summer and Fall 2019. In 2016, staff and students within the ecology department at the University of North Texas in Denton stared at a four-acre plot surrounding the engineering campus at Discovery Park and saw nothing but Bermuda grass. With an extensive background in urban conservation and restoration ecology, Dr. Jaime Baxter-Slye wanted to transform this empty field into a pollinator sanctuary of native North Central Texas plants. In May of that year, Baxter-Slye received funding from the We Mean Green Fund , a sustainability ini...

Education: Junior in Microbiology at the University of Alabama at Tuscaloosa Most Recent Project: Vanessa is currently collaborating with Dr. Harold W. Keller at BRIT on a paper about corticolous myxomycetes, a type of slime mold found on Texas American elm trees. Vanessa started this project during her 2017 summer internship and has continued the project in the year since. Favorite Memory of Summer 2017 BRIT internship: “Helping with the NLU collection acquisition in the herbarium, which led to lots of fun and laughter. The most memorable part of the whole experience for me was each intern getting a dinosaur-based nickname. Mine is Vanessasaurus Rex.” Education: Senior in Ecology at the University of Texas at Dallas Most Recent Project: Over the summer of 2018, Natch helped with BRIT summ...

This is the first in a new “Where Are They Now?”series featuring guest posts from former interns, volunteers, staff, and friends of BRIT. This month’s post is from former BRIT intern and herbarium staff, Miranda Madrid. Hello! I wanted to share my experience in the Mile High City with all of you back home in the great state of Texas. I am currently participating in a year-long service program in Denver, Colorado, while I discern my path as an up-and-coming environmental scientist. My first couple days in Colorado were spent in the mountains. Amazing views! My service group, Colorado Vincentian Volunteers, is a nonprofit organization based in Denver dedicated to inviting young people into a process of transformation through companionship with those who are poor and marginalized. So what exa...