Student Travel Grants

The purpose of the student travel grants is to promote and support student interest in biometrics and the Biometrics Working Group by attending The Wildlife Society annual conference. The number of grants and amount vary may vary by year.

Applicants must be current students (undergraduate or graduate) or recent graduates (individuals that graduated within two years of the scheduled conference) and members of The Wildlife Society presenting (oral or poster) at the annual conference.  Applicants do not have to be current members of the Biometrics Working Group (but see BWG Homepage for how to join the BWG). Preference will be given to applicants who demonstrate strong statistical or mathematical skills and dedication to wildlife management . To be considered for a student travel grant, please submit the following material:

• 1. a cover letter describing your interests in quantitative wildlife ecology (maximum 1 page);

  2. a letter of support from a mentor, advisor or supervisor; and

  3. an abstract of the paper or poster being presented at the meeting.

The deadline for submitting student travel grant applications is July 11, 2025. Please submit your application via TWS BWG Student Travel Grant Application Form. You will receive an email confirming receipt of your application.  All applicants will be notified of their travel grant status within a month of the application deadline. 

Email the Student Travel Grants Committee Chair (see Executive Board) with "BWG Student Travel Grant" in the subject line if you have any other questions regarding the grant and application process or to volunteer to serve on the selection committee.

2024

• Darcy Doran-Myers, University of Florida, Temporal and interspecific comparisons reveal range shifts in the distributions of two Florida skunk species.

• Kenneth Noonan , Oregon State University, Shifting strategies: Changes in community composition and space use After an elk reduction.

• Hannah Clipp, West Virginia University, Management actions and local habitat characteristics influence occurrence of three regionally important game bird species in wildlife openings.

• Kaili Gregory, University of Georgia, Navigating uncertainty: Defining foreseeable future in Endangered Species Act classification decisions.

• Heather Siart, University of Massachusetts, Assessing future habitat suitability for an alpine pollinator in a changing climate.

• Yunyi Shen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Causal inference on effects of colonization and lethal removal of wolves on deer harvest in the Great Lakes region, USA.

2023

• Kayla Davis, Michigan State University, Integrated community models: a framework combining multi-species data sources to estimate the status, trends, and dynamics of biodiversity.

• Lindsey Gapinski, Iowa State University, Breeding bird use of wetlands reserve program properties in Iowa: assessing restorations across 16 years.

• Steven Gurney, Michigan State University, Assessing the effect of a deer harvest regulation change on relative abundance: an experimental approach.

• Kevin Shaw, University of Alabama, Disentangling species availability from observer memory when estimating occupancy.

• Annabelle Stanley, University of Georgia, Making informed decisions for private lands conservation under uncertainty and spatial complexity: a case study on the Northern Bobwhite.

2022

• Cara Appel, Oregon State University, Estimating occupancy and pair status of Northern Spotted Owls using passive acoustic monitoring.

• Gilia Patterson, University of Oregon, Spatial close-kin mark-recapture for estimating a map of population density.

• Wendy Leuenberger, Michigan State University, Estimating long-term species and community trends of butterflies in the midwestern United States.

• Camille Rieber, Kansas State University, Bayesian machine learning for movement modeling of Lesser Prairie-Chickens.

• Cailey Isaacson, University of North Dakota, A bird’s-eye view: developing aerial survey protocols for Prairie Grouse where mixed species leks are observed.

2021

• Amanda Buskirk, University of Georgia, Incorporating structured decision-making and alternative sources of data into management of white-tailed deer in Georgia.

• Catherine Carter, University of Georgia, Implications of a new bear hound hunt on black bears in north Georgia.

2020

• Francesca Erikson, Auburn University, Monitoring Strategies for Repatriated Eastern Indigo Snakes in Southern Alabama.

• Marie Tosa, Oregon State University, Can we estimate the abundance of small mammals with camera traps?

2019  

• John Clare, University of Wisconsin - Madison, When occupancy isn't the (only) end-goal: generalized confirmation models for dealing with false positives in detection-nondetection data.

• John Drake, University of Massachusetts - Amherst, A patch is not a population: spatio-temporal perspectives on connectivity dependent processes.

• Heather Gaya, University of Georgia, Assessing stability of gopher tortoise populations on working lands through line-transect distance sampling.

• Michaela Kratofil, Michigan State University, Persistent organic pollutants in Hawaiian false killer whales: variation in relation to life history and social group.

• Simona Picardi, University of Florida, Mechanisms for shifts of migratory patterns: a case-study with a partially migratory subtropical wading bird.

• Lydia Stiffler, University of Georgia, Combining camera and telemetry data for monitoring of white-tailed deer in South Florida.

2018

• Courtney Davis, Penn State University, Ecological correlates of the spatial co-occurrence of sympatric mammalian carnivores worldwide.

• Matt Farr, Michigan State University, Multi-species hierarchical modeling reveals variable responses of African carnivores to management alternative.

• Fabiola Iannarilli, University of Minnesota, A new tool for measuring autocorrelation in binary data: using lorelograms to assess dependence in camera trap data.

• Abby Lawson, Clemson University, Synthesizing multiple data streams to estimate abundance and detection probability in a highly wary, long-lived apex predator: an integrated modeling approach.

• Anna Tucker, Auburn University, Bias in survival estimates due to individual misidentification in long-term mark-resight studies.

• Erin Zylstra, Michigan State University, Drought governs extinction of an arid-land amphibian.

2017

• Ben Augustine, Virginia Tech, Generalized spatial partial identity: a generalization and extension of current spatial capture recapture models with latent individual identities.

• Sarah Bassing, University of Montana, Variable effects of harvest within and across wolf packs in the Rocky Mountains.

• Anna Moeller, University of Montana, Novel methods to estimate abundance of unmarked animals using camera trap data.

• Benjamin Padilla, University of Massachusetts, A general decision framework for quantifying urbanization gradients.

2016

• Franny Buderman, Colorado State University, Mountain Lion movement dynamics in the wildland-urban interface.

• Kristin N. Engebretse, University of Georgia, Using spatial capture-recapture methods to estimate fawn recruitment and survival from camera data.

• Alexander Wright, Michigan State University, Long-term population ecology and large-scale movement patterns of Gopher Tortoises in southwestern Georgia: a spatial capture-recapture approach.

•  Sydney E. Manning, Michigan State University, Evaluating fall harvests with practicable wild turkey management models: incorporating observation uncertainty and regulation cycle.

2015

• Hannah M. Specht, Ph.D student in the Department of Fisheries, Wildlife and Conservation Biology at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities presented a paper entitled “Estimating Occupancy While Accounting for Detection and Availability.” 

• Kelsey Vitense, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fisheries, Wildlife and Conservation Biology at University of Minnesota, Twin Cities presented a paper entitled “Uncovering State-Dependent Relationships in Shallow Lakes Using Bayesian Latent Variable Regression.” 

• Brian Brost, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “Animal Movement Constraints Improve Resource Selection Inference in the Presence of Telemetry Error.” 

2014

• Benjamin Augustine, Ph.D student in the Department of Fish and Wildllfe Conservation at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University presented a paper entitled “Accounting for Behavioral Response to Capture when Estimating Population Size from Hair Snare Studies with Missing Data.  

• Brian Gerber, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “Predicting Juvenile Sandhill Crane Production from Ecologically-Driven Hypotheses Using Statistical Regularization.” 

• Brittany Mosher, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “Confounding of Pathogen Detection and Host Presence Induces Bias in Occupancy Estimation."

• Perry Williams, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “Population Dynamics and Adaptive Management of Cackling Geese.” 

2013

• Alex Cohen, M.S. student in the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources at Purdue University presented a poster entitled “Modeling the Effects of Human Disturbance on Piping Plovers.” 

• Casey Day, Ph.D. student in the Department of Forestry and Natural Resources at Purdue University presented a poster entitled “Using the individual-based modeling tool SEARCH to simulate an American marten reintroduction in Wisconsin.”

• Dana Morin, Ph.D. student in the Department of Fish and Wildlife Conservation at Virginia Tech presented a paper entitled “Incorporating territoriality and foraging behavior in coyote space use models in the forests of western Virginia using relocation data and fecal DNA.” 

• Beth Ross, Post-doc in the Kansas Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at Kansas State University presented a poster entitled “The importance of climate, predation, and density dependence in waterfowl population regulation.” 

2012

• Sharon Baruch-Mordo, Post-doc in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “A practical guide for use of home range estimators.” 

• Adam W. Green, Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Fish, Wildlife, and Conservation Biology at Colorado State University presented a paper entitled “Optimal management of vernal pools to maintain wood frog metapopulations."

• Bryan Stevens, Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Fisheries and Wildlife at Michigan State University presented a paper entitled “Wildlife mortality from infrastructure collisions: statistical modeling of count data from carcass surveys.”

• Andrew Tri, Ph.D. candidate in the Forest Resources Management Program at West Virginia University presented a poster entitled “Is harvest still a viable tool for managing urban bears?” 

2011

• Luke J. Eberhardt-Phillips, M. S. candidate in the Wildlife Department at Humboldt State University, Arcata, CA, presented a poster entitled “Population viability of snowy plovers in coastal northern California."

• Tabitha Graves, Ph.D. candidate in the School of Forestry at Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ, to present a poster entitled “Can we use opportunistically collected data to identify variables collected data to identify variables."

2010

• Ben Augustine, Ph.D. student in the Biology Department at the University of Kentucky, presented a poster entitled “GPS collars and the acquisition of location data: A mechanistic model.” 

• Orien Richmond, Ph.D. student in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management at the University of California-Berkeley, presented a paper entitled “Two-species occupancy models: A new parameterization applied to cooccurrence of secretive rails.”

• Elise Zipkin, Ph.D. student in the Biology Department at the University of Maryland, presented a paper entitled “Multi-species occupancy models for community analyses.” 

2009

• Christopher Bobryk worked as an associate scientist for an environmental consulting firm, where he observed first-hand the importance of statistics in decision-making processes that affected clients and other stakeholders. As a result, Christopher returned to school with an interest in biometrics and is currently pursuing a M.S. in Biological Sciences at Eastern Illinois University under the direction of Dr. Karen Gaines and Dr. James Novak. Christopher presented a paper titled “A spatially explicit model to predict white-tailed deer radiocesium body burdens on the Department of Energy’s Savannah River Site.” Karen Gaines and Susan Dyer were coauthors.

• Jacob Ivan has a M.S. in Wildlife Biology from University of Montana. After working as a professional wildlife biologist for The Nature Conservancy and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Jake returned to school and is pursuing a Ph.D. in Wildlife Biology at Colorado State University under the direction of Dr. Gary White. Jake has placed considerable emphasis on mathematical statistics and presented a paper titled “Comparison of methods for estimating density from capture-recapture data.” Coauthors were Gary White and Tanya Shenk.

2008

• Jacob Ivan has a M.S. in Wildlife Biology. After working as a professional wildlife biologist for The Nature Conservancy and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Jacob has returned to school and is pursuing a Ph.D. in Wildlife Biology and Colorado State University under the direction of Dr. Gary White. Jacob presented a paper titled “Survival and population growth of snowshoe hares in central Colorado.” Gary White and Tanya Shenk were coauthors.

• Thomas Borhman has a M.S. in mathematics. He is pursuing a Ph.D. in Interdisciplinary Ecology at the University of Florida under the direction of Dr. Mary Christman. Thomas presented a poster titled “Modeling populations in natural protected areas: an extension of matrix metapopulation models.” Mary Christman was a coauthor.

2007

• Jacob Ivan has a M.S. in Wildlife Biology.  After working as a professional wildlife biologist for the Nature Conservancy and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, Jacob has returned to school and is pursuing a Ph.D. in Wildlife Biology and Colorado State University under the direction of Gary White. Jacob presented a paper titled “Using telemetry to correct for bias: a new approach to estimating density from trapping grids”. Gary White and Tanya Shenk were coauthors. 

• Chadwick Rittenhouse has a M.S. from the University of Missouri-Columbia, and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. there under the direction of Joshua Millspaugh and Frank Thompson. Chad’s work involves box turtles, and he has published three papers directly related to his work. Chad presented a paper titled “Resource selection by translocated three-toed box turtles in Missouri”. Joshua Millspaugh, Michael Hubbard, Steven Sheriff, and William Dijak were coauthors. 

• Jamie Sanderlin is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Wildlife Ecology and Management, and a M.S. in Statistics from the University of Georgia, under the direction of Mike Conroy. Jamie’s dissertation focuses on the central Georgia black bear population, and she presented a paper titled “Optimal genetic misidentification error estimation for mark-recapture abundance models”. Michael Conroy was a coauthor.

• David Miller has a M.S. in Wildlife Biology from Auburn University, and is currently working towards a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Iowa State University. David presented results from his work on mourning dove recruitment in a presentation titled “Towards range-wide estimates of mourning dove recruitment: initial results from a national harvest wing collection pilot program”. David Otis was a coauthor.

• Krishna Pacifici recently completed his M.S. thesis at North Carolina State University.  Krishna plans to continue with his education this fall as a Ph.D. student under the direction of Mike Conroy at the University of Georgia. Krishna presented a paper titled “Effects of vegetation and background noise on the detection process in auditory avian point count surveys”. Theodore Simons and Ken Pollock were coauthors.

2006

• None awarded 

2005

• Dale Tessin, Ph.D. candidate at Iowa State University, for his paper, “Spatial and temporal variation in waterfowl nest initiation and predation" (coauthors: William Clark, Philip Dixon and David Howerter).

2004 (est.)

• Paul Conn, Ph.D. candidate at Colorado State University, for his paper, “A general model for the analysis of mark-resight, mark-recapture, and band recovery data under tag loss” (coauthors: William Kendall and Michael Samuel).

• Debra Montgomery, M.S. candidate at University of Idaho, for her paper, “Estimating age of Rocky Mountain elk calves from morphometric measurements” (coauthors: Oz Garton, Peter Zager, and John Cook).

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