My research asks students, the academy, the public, and policy makers to consider our current natural resources and environmental issues holistically. Our solutions must improve balances, symmetries, and harmonies. They must solve more than one problem and should not enrich one person or community by the distress or impoverishment of another. Our choices have the potential to uplift communities which have been left behind or historically excluded, protect the environment, and inspire the next generation of stewards for the places we love. My goal is to provide these groups with the tools, philosophy, and context necessary to achieve these goals as we face an uncertain future.
keywords
Acequias, Water Resource Management, Environmental Justice, Leadership
Teaching
courses taught
ENVM 5014 - Foundations of Environmental Policy and Management
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2024 / Fall 2025
Examines concepts related to policy and regulatory processes, institutions, and management of the environment and natural resources. Surveys environmental issues and laws at the international, national, state and local levels. Focuses on policy tools including property rights, regulation, voluntary compliance, and market-based mechanisms. Students analyze a contemporary environmental or natural resources issue and prepare policy advocacy documents and presentations.
ENVM 5019 - Advanced Environmental and Natural Resources Policy Field Seminar
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2024
Provides students with the opportunity to examine and research all environmental and natural resources policy issues within a geographic area. These areas can include the Colorado Plateau, the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the San Luis Valley, the Puget Sound, or others. Emphasis will be placed on contextualizing contemporary natural resources issues within the greater political, policy, and human history of the examined area. Students will analyze these issues through the lenses of environmental justice, politics, and economics. Each student will choose a principal topic to deepen their knowledge in through research, teaching co-facilitation during the seminar, and writing a publication-quality policy paper. Course time will be spent on-location in the chosen geographic area to meet with policy makers, tribal leaders and members, business representatives, and other subject matter experts to deepen students� understanding of the issues.
ENVM 5066 - Environmental Stewardship: Practice and Law
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2023 / Spring 2024
Addresses the context in which environmental laws have been created, as well as the customs and laws related to resilience, sustainability, stewardship, and honorable practice. It will concentrate on law as a means of market regulation, cultural expression, health, equity, and justice. Water and land law, property rights, wildlife and public land management, and other topics of historical and ongoing relevance will be discussed.
ENVM 5084 - The Water-Energy-Food Nexus
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2025
This course examines the concept, principles, and application of the Water-Energy-Food Nexus and their implications for sustainable development. The course explores contemporary and historical issues related to each of the water, energy, and food sectors, their interconnections, and opportunities for positively reinforcing policy decisions based on a nexus approach. Students will learn how the nexus concept developed in conjunction with ideas around international development; explore emerging technological solutions to nexus issues; and analyze specific problems and case studies of the nexus drawn from local, national, and international levels.
ENVM 5088 - Environmental Justice in Law and Practice
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2026
This course will provide students with the skills and knowledge necessary to locate contemporary and historical environmental justice (EJ) issues within the greater framework of American law and policy. Students will examine the history of environmentalism and EJ justice as both have developed, intersected, and been at odds with one another during the last 200 years. They will then learn the contemporary landscape of EJ issues, legal requirements, and societal aspirations through a combination of academic commentary and case studies. Using this knowledge, students will produce advocacy documents that apply conceptual EJ lenses to recommend real-world solutions.
ENVM 6100 - Special Topics for Master of the Environment Program
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2023 / Spring 2025
A variety of topics not currently offered in curriculum; offered depending on instructor availability and student demand. May be repeated up to 18 total credit hours.
ENVS 3525 - Intermediate Environmental Problem Analysis: Topical Cornerstones
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2023
Engages students in in-depth study of a topic such as climate change, energy, natural resources or sustainability. Through lectures, discussions, readings and activities, students will become conversant with how science, policy and values are integrated in environmental problem solving, and develop their own sense of how to critically engage with proposed solutions. Fulfills cornerstone requirement for Environmental Studies Major. Recommended prerequisite: ENVS 1000. May be repeated up to 6 total credit hours, provided the topics vary.
ENVS 4850 - ENVS Honors Thesis Research
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2024
To be taken in final academic year prior to graduation. Consists of honors research and thesis preparation under the guidance of a faculty mentor. Department enforced restriction: Requires a minimum 3.3 GPA and a declared ENVS major and approval by departmental honors committee. If a student wishes to use ENVS 4850 to complete the ENVS Capstone degree requirement, at least 3 credit hours of ENVS 4850 are required (by graduation). Recommended prerequisites: ENVS students should have already taken a cornerstone class (ENVS 3520, ENVS 3525, ENVS 3555, or ENVS 3621).
ENVS 5701 - Policy, Politics and Management: Foundations
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2022
Examines concepts related to policy and regulatory processes, institutions and management of the environment and natural resources. Explores environmental laws at the international, national, state and local levels as well as how the processes and institutions at various levels of government help shape laws and their implementation. Focuses on policy tools including property rights, regulation, voluntary compliance and market-based mechanisms.
LAWS 8112 - Seminar: Advanced Natural Resources Law
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2023 / Spring 2024
Provides in-depth study and analysis of current problems in natural resources law, using historical, literary, and scientific materials. Includes field-trip, and requires additional field trip expenses. Recommended prerequisite: LAWS 6112. Department enforced prerequisites or corequisites: any two of the following: LAWS 6002 or LAWS 6112 or LAWS 6302 or LAWS 7725. May be repeated up to 6 total credit hours.
LAWS 8312 - Seminar: The Law of the Colorado River
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2022 / Spring 2024
Addresses the many areas of law and policy that affect management of the Colorado River and the communities that depend on it. The seminar will also include material and presentations from experts in other disciplines, including conservation biology, climate science, anthropology, geology, and hydrology. The centerpiece of the class will be a two-week raft trip through the Grand Canyon.
OREC 5004 - Environmental Justice and Stewardship
Primary Instructor
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Spring 2023 / Fall 2023 / Spring 2025
Explore an interdisciplinary approach to environmental justice and stewardship. Learn how law, policy, and outdoor recreation practices are connected to class, gender, racial, and religious disparities. Learn how law and outdoor recreation practices can contribute to both environmental integrity and social equity. Issues of water justice, public lands, sacred sites, biodiversity, wildlife management, public health, and access to nature through broader outdoor recreation are also addressed.
OREC 5017 - Environmental Movements, Alliances, and Legal Change
Primary Instructor
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Fall 2022 / Fall 2023 / Fall 2024
Examine the nuances of past and ongoing environmental movements and trends with a focus on public land management, outdoor recreation, water allocation, tribal self-determination, access to nature, and environmental justice. Study how law and policies have changed over the years and explore legal strategies to ensure a more sustainable, inclusive, and principled relationship with nature and fellow citizens. Learn to anticipate where environmental disputes are likely to arise in relation to outdoor recreation, and explore potential opportunities for collaboration and resolution.
