Preparing the Next Generation of Environmental Science Leaders
Graduate students in the College of Science at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi are learning that impactful science begins long before research is conducted. Through the Stakeholder-Guided Environmental Science (STAGES) program, they’re learning to engage the people most affected by environmental challenges and ensure their work is informed by community needs from the very beginning.
STAGES is a $2 million National Science Foundation (NSF)-funded Research Traineeship built to prepare graduate researchers for environmental challenges across disciplines, agencies, and communities. Students take a shared set of courses, receive group and individual mentorship from faculty outside their own committees, and work in project teams to co-develop research with outside partners. The funding also supports student tuition and stipends.
“Scientific curiosity is essential, but it cannot be the only reason we do this work,” said Dr. Dorina Murgulet, STAGES Program Director and Professor of Hydrogeology. “Our research should ultimately contribute to solutions that benefit society.”
Doctoral candidate Quincy Walker ’20, ’23, ’28, felt that pull first-hand. A meteorology and atmospheric science researcher working toward a Ph.D. in Coastal and Marine System Science, Walker joined STAGES to break out of a field he describes as highly collaborative, but often specialized.
“What drew me to STAGES was its multidisciplinary aspect,” Walker said. “It pushed me to explain my research to people outside my own field, which made me a better presenter and helped me understand my own work better too.”
Murgulet built the program alongside an interdisciplinary team of co-principal investigators: Dr. Philippe Tissot, Chair for Coastal Artificial Intelligence; Dr. Jennifer Pollack, Professor of Marine Biology; Dr. Jennifer Epley Sanders, Professor of Political Science; and Dr. Chuntao Liu, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences, with Dr. Audrey Douglas ’20, overseeing day-to-day operations as Program Manager. That wide range of specialties gives students access to mentors and methods well outside their own, something that Murgulet believes pushes students and faculty alike past their comfort zones and toward better-informed results.
Scientific curiosity is essential, but it cannot be the only reason we do this work. Our research should ultimately contribute to solutions that benefit society.”
Dr. Dorina Murgulet, Associate Vice President for Research and STAGES Program Director
“Science becomes stronger when we move beyond the boundaries of our own disciplines,” Murgulet said. “By connecting students with mentors across fields and perspectives, we help them develop research that is better informed and more responsive to the challenges we’re trying to solve.”
The program defines its partners broadly. Over three cohorts, STAGES students have worked with the National Weather Service (NWS), the Coastal Bend Bays and Estuaries Program, the Coastal Watch Association, NOAA Fisheries’ Southeast Fisheries Office, and the Texas General Land Office (GLO). Each partnership centers on a real question the organization needs answered, and student teams spend at least six months working directly with that partner to answer it.
The projects lean heavily on large, often public datasets, and the artificial intelligence and machine learning models needed to make sense of them. Walker’s cohort partnered with the Texas GLO to identify what drives Enterococcus, a fecal bacteria, in Texas coastal waters near Matagorda and the Galveston area. The team modeled environmental factors, potentially explaining the presence of fecal matter in nearshore waters. Another team worked with NWS to build a model to forecast when thunderstorms forming in Mexico’s Sierra Madre will track into the Coastal Bend, a pattern tied to some of the region’s worst overnight flooding events. Work on that project has resulted in the NWS working to operationalize their model which will help decide when the NWS staffs overnight meteorologists to potentially issue flood warnings.
Scientific discoveries only create change when they can be understood beyond the walls of academia. Through a dedicated science communication course, STAGES helps students learn how to translate complex research into meaningful conversations with the communities it is designed to serve. The training provides the foundation, while stakeholder partnerships give students the opportunity to put those skills into practice.
“Something that a lot of our students don’t get is interaction with stakeholders and interaction with funding agencies or future employers,” Douglas said. “Why should our local community care about the research we’re doing? How does it impact their lives? Developing that level of communication helps them share their science to that broader audience.”
STAGES has graduated three cohorts under the original NSF grant. Current STAGES trainees are working with the Smithsonian Institution, GLO, Flour Bluff ISD, and Texas SeaGrant to help map out the new STAGES: Society-Targeted Approach in Graduate Environmental Science certificate program, a path that would allow for the continued training of students in advanced data analysis and stakeholder engaged research after the NSF funding ends in 2027. The majority of STAGES alumni have been hired by their stakeholder partners or have been admitted to doctoral programs within six months of graduation.
That kind of outcome feeds directly into TAMU-CC’s Texas University Fund goals, which reward growth in doctoral degree production and external research funding. STAGES contributes on both fronts, its $2 million NSF grant adds to the university’s sponsored research portfolio, and its graduates add to the pipeline of Coastal and Marine Science doctoral graduates who successfully transition into the workforce produced by the university.