USU Natural Resources Alum Receives Top Conservation Award
The Department of Wildland Resources was proud to recognize the outstanding achievements of two of our alumni, Drs. Bruce Roundy and Kris Havstad, during the USU reception at the 2009 annual conference of the Society for Range Management, held in Albuquerque, NM, in February. The citation for Dr. Roundy's award was read by Dr. Mark Brunson and Dr. John Malechek read the citation for Dr. Havstad, which was particularly appropriate since Kris had been John's PhD student.
DR. BRUCE A. ROUNDY
Dr. Bruce A. Roundy has offered distinguished service to the range management profession through his teaching and research over the past 30 years, greatly influencing our understanding of how disturbances affect range plant communities and watersheds, and how rangelands in the Intermountain West can be restored after disturbance.
Dr. Roundy is currently a professor of range science in the Plant and Wildlife Sciences Department at Brigham Young University, where he has worked since 1994 and served as department chair from 1996 until 2001. He previously taught and conducted range research at University of Arizona for over 10 years and conducted range research for the USDA Agricultural Research Service in Reno, Nevada, for 7 years. He earned his doctorate in Range Management at Utah State in 1984, after completing a Bachelor of Arts degree in Social Sciences and a Master of Science degree in Range Management, both from the University of Nevada, Reno.
Dr. Roundy is known for his outstanding contributions as both a researcher and teacher. His research on seedbed ecology is widely acknowledged for its importance and creativity. He has published dozens of articles in his career, from his early work on germination of Great Basin plant species with Drs. Jim Young and Ray Evans to more recent studies of plant water relations, cheatgrass growth and control, and post-fire rehabilitation.
As a teacher of courses that include range improvements, watershed management, principles of range management and restoration ecology, Dr. Roundy receives accolades from colleagues and students alike. At the 2000 SRM meeting in Boise he was honored as Outstanding Undergraduate Teacher by the Range Science Education Council. At the University of Arizona he received several awards including Outstanding Thesis Advisor and Outstanding Mentor of Non-traditional Students. Perhaps the best accolades come from his students, including this entry on the website RateMyProfessors.com: “Amazing teacher!! Take the class and you will be blessed for life!!”
Dr. Roundy’s citizenship in the range profession and his community is also well-known. In 2002 he received the Outstanding Citizenship Award from BYU’s College of Biology and Agriculture. In November 2008 he was honored by the Utah Section of SRM as Range Manager of the Year for his contributions not only to the academic and scientific community but to the practical application of rangeland ecology principles to land management in the Great Basin.
We are honored this evening to be able to recognize Dr. Bruce A. Roundy as an outstanding alumnus of the College of Natural Resources at Utah State University.
DR. KRIS HAVSTAD
Dr. Kris M. Havstad has offered distinguished service to the range management profession through his research, leadership and educational activities, influencing how scientists, managers, and citizens understand rangelands in the western U.S. and in Asia.
Dr. Havstad earned his Ph.D. in Range Science from Utah State University in 1981, after having completed a Bachelor’s degree from Oregon State University in 1975 and a Master’s from New Mexico State University in 1977. He went on to a faculty position at Montana State University, then moved in 1988 to Las Cruces, New Mexico, where he became the Supervisory Range Scientist for the USDA Agricultural Research Service’s Jornada Experimental Range.
As a researcher Dr. Havstad has focused on diet selection by rangeland animals, including basic research on how herbivores respond to chemical cues from plants and applied studies of livestock grazing as a mechanism for controlling noxious weeds.
On arriving in Las Cruces, Dr. Havstad immediately began leading a highly productive long-term collaboration between the USDA-ARS, whose work at the Jornada had focused almost exclusively on grazing, and the National Science Foundation’s Long-term Ecological Research (LTER) program. Under Dr. Havstad’s scientific and administrative leadership, the Jornada science team has become the acknowledged leaders in the field of rangeland monitoring and assessment, and combines cutting-edge studies of desert ecology with applied research on the effects of management activities in arid and semi-arid systems. In the spirit of long-term study Dr. Havstad also has led efforts to restore and preserve early data from the Jornada Range, now nearing its 100th birthday.
Dr. Havstad has served his profession as well through effective leadership, serving on the board of the Society for Range Management and as Applied Ecology Section chair for the Ecological Society of America.
His service extends to numerous public education and outreach efforts, including public presentations, articles designed for lay audiences, and most notably his work developing the Chihuahuan Desert Nature Park, an educational facility located just inside the Jornada Experimental Range boundary. As one colleague recently put it, “Kris has expanded the audience for rangelands and demonstrated that range management is something everyone can be involved in.”
Not surprisingly, Dr. Havstad has been honored frequently for his accomplishments, winning annual awards from both the Montana and New Mexico sections of SRM, from Montana State University, and the Montana Association of Conservation Districts.
In 2006 he received his agency’s national Equal Employment and Civil Rights Award in recognition of his efforts to reach out to minority and youth audiences.
We are honored this evening to be able to recognize Dr. Kris M. Havstad as an outstanding alumnus of the College of Natural Resources at Utah State University.