Rock Solid: USU Geology Alumni Join Forces to Support Current Aggies

A report released this summer by the U.S. Department of Education indicates that the nation’s graduate students rely heavily on loans and grants to pay for their education. At the same time, universities, including Utah State University, are dealing with state and federal budget constraints and scrambling to offer aid to compete with peer institutions and attract top candidates.

Recognizing these challenges, the USU Geology Department’s Advisory Board, a group of alumni and friends that meets annually to visit the department and offer advice and support, stepped into action. The board established the department’s Benchmark Society, a new group of supporters, and its accompanying Benchmark Fund, a new channel of funding to bolster recruitment and retention of hard-working scholars.

“In order to thrive in these challenging times, it’s imperative that the Geology Department be able to continue to aggressively recruit top quality graduate students by offering competitive stipends, tuition waivers and health insurance,” says Andy Taylor MS’03, board chair and a manager with Anadarko Petroleum Corporation in Denver. “The advisory board saw these challenges as a call to action and asked fellow alums to join us in making an annual commitment to support the Geology graduate program via the Benchmark Society.”

Beginning in 2009, the 11-member board, consisting of representatives from the petroleum industry, mining, secondary education, higher education, science, engineering geology and the public sector, pounded the pavement to garner broader alumni and corporate participation in program funding. Through personal phone calls, letters and email messages, the society grew to 30 members and raised more than $60,000 to establish the department’s Benchmark Fund. This year, the fund supports seven graduate students in diverse research projects.

“We received really strong support from folks who not only reached into their own pockets, but leveraged corporate support through generous matching donations from their employers,” says Jim Evans, geology professor. “The efforts of these alumni and friends, seeing a need and taking action to help, make a huge difference in our ability to compete with other schools and recruit and retain well-qualified, deserving students.”

Current Benchmark Scholars include:

• Eric Beard, an army veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, is working with faculty mentor Tony Lowry to model variable elevations of ancient Lake Bonneville resulting from glaciations;

• Dawn Hayes is studying Neoproterozoic earth systems with faculty mentor Carol Dehler and challenging long-held views of the so-called Snowball Earth Theory;

• Price, Utah, native Ryan Jensen is exploring sedimentation and stratigraphy of the Cambrian Bloomington Formation with faculty mentor Dave Liddell;

• With faculty mentor Tom Lachmar, Hannah McDonough is working with the U.S. Forest Service to perform groundwater analysis at an abandoned mine site in Idaho;

• Heidi Pierce is studying the sequence stratigraphy of Cambrian rocks in the Bear River Range with faculty mentor Dave Liddell;

• With faculty mentor Tammy Rittenour, Emilee Skyles is determining the ages of alluvial terraces in Corsica and their relationship to glaciation;

• Steven Thornock is examining the geometry of complex fault networks on southern California’s San Jacinto Fault with faculty mentor Susanne Janecke.

Related links:

USU Department of Geology

USU College of Science

Contact: James “Jim” Evans, 435-797-1267, james.evans@usu.edu

Writer: Mary-Ann Muffoletto, 435-797-3517, maryann.muffoletto@usu.edu