2024 Environmental Studies Seniors
Eleanor Burks
Hometown: Little Rock, Arkansas
About: Eleanor is currently interning at Wildland Gardens, where she can be found weeding and planting new seeds, harvesting vegetables, and collaborating on artistic projects like origami seed pouches and customized planting calendars. She loves spending her time in the park under a welcoming tree or enjoying the company of her friends and family. Eleanor's thesis topic is on the importance of community gardens in relation to the threat of green gentrification, focusing specifically on how these spaces are utilized for social support and activism. After graduation, Eleanor plans to move to Arizona and find work related to environmental conservation.
Mera Feltenstein
Hometown: St. Louis, Missouri
About: Mera is interested in environmental policy areas involving resource degradation and management, emissions regulation, and renewable energy development. After Hendrix, she hopes to work in the public sector before returning to graduate school, intending to pursue a career in environmental policy and/or law. She participated in valuable professional development projects during her time at Hendrix where she utilized her interdisciplinary education. At Wildland Gardens, she practiced small-scale sustainable agriculture and ethical land cultivation. At Scenic Hill Solar, she learned how to navigate policy changes from a business perspective and researched the ecological and economic benefits of renewable energy. She is currently developing a new ethic for agricultural biotechnology informed by Aldo Leopold’s land ethic, arguing the necessity to ethically develop agricultural biotechnologies without imposing ecological damage and disrupting human-nature connectedness. In her free time, she spends time outside, draws, writes, bakes, and spends time with friends and family. She dedicates her work to her 13-year-old tabby cat, Amelia.
Nathan Hahn
Hometown: Yukon, Oklahoma
About: Nathan is interested in environmental studies because of his interactions with the environment. After graduation, Nathan plans to teach at a high school and coach football. His senior thesis topic revolves around his hobbies, which include hunting and fishing. Nathan will be researching the cost for conservation of public land based on non-consumptive and consumptive-use. Nathan spent his four years at Hendrix College as a member of the football team.
Alex Price
Hometown: Austin, Texas
Second Major: Biology
About: Alex's interest in environmental studies is rooted in his passion for ecological and evolutionary research with potential to inform conservation decisions. After graduation, he plans on attending graduate school and eventually a career in research. Alex interned at the Children's Eternal Rainforest, the largest private nature reserve in Costa Rica, where he conducted field work to assess amphibian populations in response to an invasive fungus and to describe the natural history of two tree frog species. Alex is particularly interested in devising strategies to foster coexistence between humans and wildlife, and his thesis focuses on this topic in the context of national parks. In addition to contributing to a number of research projects, Alex has enjoyed honing his communication skills and reinforcing his knowledge as a teaching assistant.
Maeve Smith
Hometown: Rogers, Arkansas
About: Maeve’s interest and passion in environmental studies stems from her involvement and love for nature, community work in outdoor spaces and gardens, and love for bringing people and nature together. Her love for travel has encouraged her to explore new environments and experiences in the world. Her involvement throughout Hendrix by being an active on-campus student worker, engagement with campus activities, and advocacy for Hendrix participating in local community events also contributed towards her imagination of future career goals. She completed two internship credits at Hendrix. The first was during her sophomore and junior year in the spring, at Wildland Gardens in Morrilton, Arkansas, where she learned how to grow plants from seed to premature plants and the process of small sustainable farming. The second during the fall of her senior year at Harvest Farms Arkansas in Conway, Arkansas, where she worked with a large agriculture business and cultivated sustainable agricultural skills working with management, and received lessons of agricultural cost and management when operating local food sales. Her career goals include continuing work in food systems and pursuing sustainable farming techniques through policy initiatives and local community advocacy. Her internships helped her conceptualize and explore the applicability of her thesis topic. Her thesis topic is addressing how local food system initiatives, food justice advocacy, and community supported agriculture can improve food insecurity in low income and minority communities in the US and in Arkansas.
Marcia Williams
Hometown: Pine Bluff, Arkansas
About: Marcia declared as an Environmental Studies major after spending a semester volunteering at Bell Urban Farm in Conway where she still works. Marcia has a passion for sustainable agriculture and environmental education that she found through her work at Bell Urban. Marcia also spent two semesters with the Arkansas Advanced Energy Association as an intern and spent much of her time doing social media and communications work for the association. Marcia spends her time as the Vice Chair of the Campus Sustainability Fund as well as the Vice Chair of the Environmental Concerns Committee. Marcia’s thesis topic is urban green space access and the correlation between green space access and mental health. This topic was born out of a study abroad trip in Costa Rica where she studied the benefits of nature to overall wellbeing. Marcia wants to pursue a higher education in environmental education to become an educator in the future. She also wants to further her LLC that she developed to help environmental organizations with communications and policy work.
Photosynthesizing EVST Seniors