Through a sabbatical from the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science (UMCES), Cat is in residence as a visiting scholar at the OSU Center for Research on Lifelong STEM Learning. As a UMCES tenured research faculty member, she has 15 years of experience designing, researching and evaluating science/environmental education in schools and informal education settings with funding from the NSF, NOAA, and other organizations. She is particularly interested in lifelong and life-wide learning, public engagement in science, and collaborative learning around environmental topics and issues. Her work has focused on citizen science development, scientist-teacher/student partnerships, educator professional development, and integration of science-based technologies in K-12/public settings. Her current research projects include initiation and evolution of an

Her current research projects include initiation and evolution of an informal educator community-of-practice on climate change education, development of a classroom observation tool that captures the quality of technology use in science classes, and exploration of embedded assessments to measure skill gains in citizen science efforts. Cat holds an M.S. in biology and a Ph.D. in ecology with expertise in plant community ecology and ecophysiology. She also has experience in broadcast television production.