Kathryn L. Sobocinski

Biography

Hailing from Red Sox Nation, I spent a good deal of my childhood exploring the shorelines of New England, especially the tidepools along the Maine coast at Reid and Wolf's Neck State Parks. I swam, sailed, fished, and explored Casco Bay, often ruining the good shoes my parents provided for me. Despite my love of the ocean, I headed off to Connecticut College as an intended government major. A semester abroad in Mexico with The School for Field Studies studying coastal wetlands led me to see the light, and I changed majors, graduating with a BA in Environmental Studies and Anthropology.

My research career began in earnest the summer after I graduated from college, when I was hired as a research assistant on a long-term study of salt marsh plant ecology and relative sea level along the southern New England coast. It was fun and interesting and I was often covered in mud.

After a move to the west coast and a few years of work in the public sector, I pursued my Master's degree at the University of Washington, School of Aquatic and Fishery Sciences in Seattle. I was part of the Wetland Ecosystem Team, working on questions related to juvenile salmon, their nearshore habitats, and anthropogenic disturbance. Following this, I took a position as a research scientist with Battelle/Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Marine Sciences Laboratory in Sequim, WA. I worked on a variety of projects relating to coastal wetlands, eelgrass, and juvenile salmon, and I was on the research dive team. During one dive project, fish/eelgrass interactions started to interest me, and I returned to the east coast to work on my PhD.

I completed my PhD at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science (The College of William & Mary) and have since migrated back across the US, where I was first a Post-Doctoral Research Associate at Oregon State University in the College of Earth, Ocean, and Atmospheric Sciences with the Fisheries Oceanography Lab and then a Post-Doctoral Research Scientist at NOAA-Fisheries, Northwest Fisheries Science Center working on developing ecosystem indicators for the Salish Sea Marine Survival Project. I had a short appointment as a federal research scientist at the Alaska Fisheries Science Center (NOAA-Fisheries) before finding my way to Western Washington University.

I am currently an Assistant Professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences (ESCI) at Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA. I am a faculty member in the Marine and Coastal Science (MACS) program and teach and advise within ESCI and MACS.

Outside of work, I enjoy any and all outdoor activities with my husband and dogs and friends. I like to hike, ski, run, ride bikes of all kinds, and watch amazing sunsets and/or sunrises. I also enjoy cooking and eating on a daily basis, gardening and caring for our hens, and traveling whenever I can. I am trying to become proficient with my camera and I take any chance I can get to put myself in or on the salty sea.