Born and raised in Hilo, I grew up hiking in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park, fishing in Ka‘u, and stargazing on Maunakea. I knew then that the Big Island is one of the most beautiful places on Earth but had never considered earth science to be a pathway, or that I would find myself back here at the University of Hawaii at Hilo teaching it. While I could not have possibly imagined it at the time, I’m grateful for the journey I’ve been on, and am excited to continue it here.

After graduating from Waiakea High School, I went east for my undergraduate degree at Harvard, in Cambridge, Mass. During the first semester there, I took a seminar in which we watched natural disaster movies and examined the accuracy of how they portrayed the science. Enamored by the intersection of physics, math, and

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