I am a graduate of Western Washington University in Biology (emphasis in botany). To further my interest in plant ecology, I received a Master's of Science from Oregon State University in Forest Science. This experience sparked my enthusiasm for biogeochemistry, which I pursed as a doctoral student in the Forestry Department at Michigan State University (MSU). After completely my Ph.D., I began postdoctoral work in the Teacher Education Department at MSU, where I studied how middle and high school students reason about carbon-transforming processes as well as an interdisciplinary investigation into how undergraduate students leverage ideas from their biology, chemistry, and physics courses to reason about complex phenomena.