Honors Research

ES Students Honors Research
Environmental Studies majors with a minimum cumulative grade point average of 3.50 at the end of the January term of the junior year or with special program approval are eligible to apply for the Environmental Studies Honors Research Program.

Successful completion of the Honors Program will include an oral presentation at the Colby Undergraduate Research Symposium, a successful oral thesis defense, and an approved thesis as well as the completion of the required course work for the major. The student fulfilling these requirements will graduate "With Honors in Environmental Studies." The decision whether or not the student will be approved to convert their fall semester seminar or independent study project to an honors project in the spring semester and continue in the ES Honors Program by enrolling in ES 484 will be made at the end of the first semester. In cases where requirements for Honors have not been fulfilled at the end of the spring semester, ES 484 (Honors Research) will revert to a graded ES 492 (Independent Study). See the ES  Honors Requirement page for further information.

For more information on undergraduate research at Colby.

 

Undergraduate Research Symposium

The Honors Program students present their research during the annual undergraduate Research Symposium.

Proceedings of the 2012 Undergraduate Research Symposium

Past Honors and Senior Scholar Projects

The ES Program is proud of the research undertaken by our honors students.  The faculty are committed to helping the students achieve the best research possible, from research design to final production. 

Daniel Homeier ('12)
Cameras, Satellites, and Surveys: A Multi-Platform Approach to Monitoring Lake Conservation Behavior

Anna Leavitt ('12)
From Pond to Pump: Microalgae as a Feedstock for Biodiesel

Yiyuan "Jasmine" Qin ('12)
Reintroduction of the South China Tiger: Lessons, Assessments, and Implications

Blair Braverman ('11)
The one that carries you away.  Environmental essays

Kimberly Bittler ('11)
Zooplankton of the Belgrade Lakes: The Influence of Top-Down and Bottom-Up forces in Family Abundance

Sophie Sarkar ('11)
Buffernomics: Assessing willingness to pay for lake conservation on North Pond and East Pond

Rachel Baron ('11)
Biomass Energy at Colby College

Michelle Russell ('11)
State Leadership in Safer Chemicals Policy: Lessons from California, Maine, Minnesota, and Washington

Ian McCullough (‘10)
The Impacts of Land Use and Development Patterns on Water Quality of the Belgrade Lakes

John Abbett (‘10)
Achieving Carbon Neutrality at Colby College through Carbon Offsets

Lindsay Driess (‘09).
Protecting Maine's Mammals: A Model of Human Footprint and Biodiversity in the North Woods

Caitlin Dufraine ('09).
An Identification and Assessment of Human-Carnivore Conflict Hotspots and Large Carnivore Policy Implications in the United States

Patrick Roche ('09).
Learning the Lay of Their Land: Data Recording by Maine Land Trusts   

Megan Saunders (‘09). 
Factors Influencing Conservation Success or Failure in Tiger Range States

Charles Carroll ('08). 
An Analysis of Carbon Sequestration Potential in Maine     Alaina Clark ('08).
Designing a Green Graduation at Colby College  

Courtney Larson ('08).
Separating People and Wildlife: Zoning as a Conservation Strategy for Large Carnivores      

Jamie O'Connell ('08). 
Carbon Neutrality at Colby College Kerry Whittaker ('08). 
Using Variable Stomatal Sensitivity to CO2 in Conifers to Reconstruct Ancient Atmospheres and Predict Future Implications of Climate Change  

Katie Himmelmann ('07) 
Developing a Tool to Assess Human Health Impacts of Purchasing.

Emilia Tjernström ('06) 
"Be the Change You Wish to See: National Attitudes and Climate Change Policy". A co-authored paper (with her mentor Tom Tietenberg) based on this project with the new title "Do differences in attitudes explain differences in national climate change polices?" has been accepted for publication in Ecological Economics in 2007.  

Alexandra Jospe ('06) 
Modeling Spatially Explicit Human-wildlife Conflict: GIS and Moose-vehicle Collisions in Maine.

Sarah Kelly ('06)
Energy Use Patterns and Potential Areas for Energy Conservation in Dorm Rooms at Colby College.  

Hilary Langer ('06) 
The Cost of Conservation: Payments for Environmental Services on the Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica.

Jenna Morrison ('06)
Environmental Awareness of Waterville Junior High Students.

Jessica Beetz ('05) 
The Role of Private Ownership in the Conservation of Exotic Species.  

Brendan Carroll ('05) 
The Transboundary Implications of Wolf Reintroduction and Recovery in Maine
     
Allison Stewart ('05) 
The Forest Service's Quest for Power and Money and its Implications for the American Public

Kellie Phelan ('04)
Estimating the Impact of State Policy Incentives on Wind Power Development.
   
Catherine S. Benson ('02) 
Local Participation as a Determinant of Success in World Bank   Environmental Projects in Africa: What is the Evidence?
 
Jacob A. Mentlik ('02) 
The Private Forest Periphery: Industrial Colonization of the Maine Woods
 
Sharon K. Lee ('02) 
The Impact of Socio-Economic Status on Hazardous Waste Cleanup in Maine
 
Katie Wasik ('01)
Corporate Interests and International Environmental Negotiations:   The Kyoto Protocol to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
 
Johanna Reardon ('00)
Is Radical Environmental Activism Effective: A Look At Forestry Protests in the United States.
 
Abby Campbell ('00)
Marketable Permit Systems: Is there a Recipe for Success?
 
Amanda Carucci ('00) 
Analysis of Environmental Effects of Economic Sanctions though the   Cuban Experience

You can find many of these works in the Colby Digital Commons.