Nicole is a graduate student and research assistant in the Geography Department at Oklahoma State University. She earned her bachelor’s degree in Biology from the University of Nebraska at Kearney in 2017. Her love for nature began at a young age traveling around the country and visiting various state and national parks with her family. This love and desire to protect Earth’s natural resources has continued to grow, especially through the completion of her last research project examining land-use changes along the Central Platte River Valley. Her academic and research interests center around landscape ecology and the applications of geographic information systems and remote sensing in natural resource and wildlife management.