The scholarship committee of the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of the Association of Environmental Professionals was very impressed by the strong applications submitted to its scholarship program for the 2015-2016 academic year. SFAEP has awarded four $500 scholarships to students pursuing careers as environmental professionals at Bay Area colleges. This year‘s winners included two students who will be attending Santa Rosa Junior College in the fall (including one outstanding recent high school graduate), one UC Berkeley undergraduate student, and a graduate student at University of San Francisco.
The AEP Board of Directors would like to congratulate the following scholarship recipients:
Betty Kwan - University of San Francisco
Betty is currently pursuing a Master‘s degree in Environmental Science and Management at the University of San Francisco. She has a combined nine years of experience in research, administration and communitybased programs. Betty continues to develop her young career as an Administrator at Bay Planning Coalition, a nonprofit that works to balance economic and environmental concerns in the San Francisco Bay Area, and as an Analyst at Panorama Environmental, a thriving small womenowned business in the field of environmental consulting.
Betty received her Bachelor of Science from the University of California at Davis, where she studied Wildlife, Fish, and Conservation Biology. Having strong interests in both research and environmental education, she participated in several research internships and served as an environmental ambassador for the UC Davis Arboretum and Putah Creek Council. Betty also worked extensively as a lab and field assistant for the Neal Williams‘ Lab studying interactions between native wildflowers and bees.
With a concentration in ecology, Betty aims to forge a career in leading largescale restorations. She is particularly interested in developing restoration projects that consider resiliency as California continues to be affected by climate change impacts. Having said that, Betty values the experience she is receiving at Bay Planning Coalition and Panorama Environmental a great deal. Such experience provides her with a knowledge in environmental policy, a great and necessary complement to her experience in research.
Joan Campos - University of California Berkeley
Joan was born and raised in a small province in the Philippines, where she was influenced by her firsthand experiences with the effects of poor waste disposal. After moving to the United States in middle school, Joan began to be aware of the disconnect between people‘s desire for proper waste management and sustainable living and our wasteful disposal of materials.
She is described by her mentor at the World Rainforest Fund, where she volunteers, as a motivated person who is dedicated to environmental issues. She is pursuing a Bachelor's Degree in Sustainable Environmental Design at University of California Berkeley, integrating architecture with environmentally sustainable practices, and works part time on top of a full academic load and multiple volunteer obligations. Joan‘s longterm goal is to work in city planning or urban design and earn a Master's Degree in City Planning with a concentration in Sustainable Processes and Economic Development. She hopes to use the skills and experiences she has had in American to bring sustainable practices to economically distressed countries.
Kerrianne McCarthy - Casa Grande High School
Kerrianne recently graduated from Casa Grande High School in Petaluma, CA. While attending CGHS, Kerrianne was actively involved in the schools United Anglers (UA) organization, which is an oncampus fish hatchery and community outreach program focused on restoring the city‘s watershed and reestablishing the endangered steelhead trout and chinook salmon in a partnership with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.
Her advisor in the program praised Kerrianne for her tireless work as the student president of UA, giving numerous tours of the facilities, speaking at multiple Sonoma County community organizations about the program, and helping to raise the tens of thousands of dollars needed to support their work. She has taken on, as a high school student, internships and training opportunities with state and federal agencies normally reserved for college students and graduates. Her field work with UA, the electro fish program in the upper reaches of Adobe Creek, and at the Warm Springs Fish Hatchery have inspired her to pursue a college degree in environmental studies focusing on fisheries biology or wildlife management. Her hope is to earn the education and experience she needs to enter into a career which will allow her to continue to help have an impact on the environment.
Thao Tran - Santa Rosa Junior College
Thao was born and grew up in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. At the age of nineteen, she moved to the U.S. to further her education. She is thankful for the opportunity to experience new teaching styles and learn from her great college instructors at Santa Rosa Junior College.
Thao has a passion for biology and environmental issues affecting the natural world. Her childhood love of nature inspired her to pursue the Environmental Science major in college. She feels that a career as an environmental analyst will allow her to be a voice for the nature amid increasing global social and economic pressures. She hopes to use her knowledge and experiences to return to Vietnam to teach and raise public awareness about environmental issues to influence policy makers and average people to make intelligent decisions that will reduce their negative impact on the environment.
