Madelon Case

About Madelon

updated 6/2013: Madelon Case grew up exploring the mountains, forests, and deserts of the Pacific Northwest. Through a botany research summer camp in Idaho at the age of 15 she found a passion for plant ecology and conservation biology that has guided her academic interests ever since. She went on to pursue a degree in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology with a certificate in Environmental Studies at Princeton University. In her time as an undergraduate, her interest in ecology took her to forests in New England and the Pacific Northwest, coral reefs off the coast of Panama, and the mountain meadows in Oregon where she studied the effects of gopher mounds on plant communities for her senior thesis (the basis of a forthcoming paper in the journal Botany). As a student at Princeton, she tutored fellow students in the Writing Center and trained new leaders for freshman outdoor orientation trips. Since graduating in June 2012, Maddy has lived and worked in Hanoi, Vietnam as a 2012-2013 Luce Scholar, drawing on her experience in science and education to develop environmental education programs with the Center for Education and Development, a Vietnamese NGO. She is an avid hiker and rock climber as well, and has loved the chance to explore the landscapes and limestone karsts of Southeast Asia during her year in Vietnam. After another year of working and traveling, she plans to pursue a Ph.D. in Ecology and a career in research and teaching, seeking out opportunities to address fundamental questions in ecology as well as applications to conservation and management.