The Becky Colvin Memorial Award provides juniors enrolled in the Minor in Environmental Studies or majoring in ecology and evolutionary biology (EEB) with support for travel, research supplies and other expenses associated with field research for their senior thesis. Awardees are selected by the executive director of HMEI and the chair of the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology in consultation with the Colvin family.
The award was established in memory of Becky Colvin ’95, an EEB major who was strongly committed to ecology and environmental studies. More than 30 Princeton undergraduates have received the award since 1999.
Applying for the Award
The Becky Colvin Memorial Award application for 2024 opens Monday, Jan. 9, 2024. Applications are due by 11:59 p.m. Friday, March 22 (tentative).
As you prepare materials for your application in the future, please keep in mind you will need to organize the following items:
- A project title and a description addressing the environmental relevance of your proposed topic (word doc);
- An itemized budget detailing the costs associated with your research and travel (excel preferred);
- A list of all other funding sources you have received and any you have applied for;
- A copy of your transcript (unofficial copy will be accepted); and
- A letter of recommendation from your faculty thesis adviser.
Please feel free to reach out to Amber Lee, Undergraduate / Graduate Program Manager if you have any questions.
2023 Becky Colvin Memorial Award Recipients
Max Gotts ’24, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Thesis Title: Allopatric and sympatric acoustic divergence in Oophaga pumilio throughout the Bocas del Toro Archipelago
Advised by Stephen Pacala, Frederick D. Petrie professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, Gotts is studying the calls of strawberry poison-dart frogs in the Bocas del Toro Archipelago, Panamá to understand how speciation occurs in frogs. While the archipelago is known for its striking visual diversity of strawberry poison-dart frogs, which take on all colours of the rainbow throughout the region, Gotts is using the methods of bioacoustics — biological eavesdropping — to understand how “species barriers” form. Frogs only mate with frogs that have the same calls as them, so determining the factors that cause them to evolve new calls is critical for understanding how species form. By investigating a range of habitats, locations, and islands, Gotts aims to understand the mechanisms that promote call divergence. Preliminary results seem to suggest that human disturbance may play a significant role in mediating the divergence and evolution of these frogs’ calls, interfering with the speciation process.
Mae Kennedy ’24, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Thesis Title: How Fynbos Plants Adapt Belowground Strategies in the Presence of Invasive Pine Trees
Advised by Lars Hedin, George M. Moffett associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, and the High Meadows Institute, Kennedy is researching how commercially-planted Pinus radiata are affecting the belowground competitive strategies of endemic plants in the South African Fynbos shrubland. She will evaluate how various Fynbos shrubs have adapted and will continue to adapt to the novel conditions created by invasive pines.
Colby McArthur ’24, Ecology and Evolutionary Biology
Thesis Title: Does DNA methylation serve as a mechanism for the plastic response of yellow-bellied marmots?
Advised by Bridgett vonHoldt, associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology, MacArthur will collect and perform DNA methylation sequencing on blood samples from yellow-bellied marmots at Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratories, investigating how DNA methylation may serve as a mechanism that explains the link between warmer springtime temperatures and earlier emergence times from hibernation (a trend that has been observed as global climate change affects local climate patterns in the Rocky Mountains).
Past Recipients
| Year | Recipient (click name for stories) |
Major | Adviser(s) | Senior Thesis Title |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2022 | Darcy Chang | EEB | Mary Caswell Stoddard | Hummingbird Pollination Behavior in the Rocky Mountains |
| 2022 | Joanna Shoubaki | EEB | Sarah Kocher | Chemical Signaling in Lasioglossum baleicum |
| 2021 | Willow Dalehite | EEB | Christina Riehl | Pair-bond and Parental Care Behavior in the Socially Monogamous Carolina Wren (Thryothorus ludovicianus) |
| 2021 | Katherine Irelan | EEB | Lars Hedin | Impact of Water Stress on Nutrient Acquisition and Below-Ground Traits of Model Plant Leptecophylla tameiameiae |
| 2020 | Joe Kawalec | EEB | Mary Caswell Stoddard | Warning and Cryptic Coloration in Woodpecker Camouflage |
| 2019 | Maria Stahl | EEB | Robert Pringle | Understanding the Role of Fire in Maintaining Herbivore Diversity in a Recovering Savanna Ecosystem |
| 2018 | Daniel Petticord | EEB | Robert Pringle | The Ecology of the Leopard Tortoise |
| 2017 | Alana Reynolds | EEB | Robert Pringle | Strategies that Can Prevent Elephant Crop-Raiding in Farming Communities Bordering Gorongosa National Park |
| 2016 | Zoe Sims | EEB | Stephen Pacala | Impacts of Anthropogenically Enriched Groundwater Discharge on Bermuda’s Near-shore Coral Reefs and the Role of Bermuda’s Herbivorous Fish in Maintaining the Reef Ecosystem |
| 2015 | Connor Stonesifer | EEB | Lars Hedin | Phosphorus Utilization in Panamanian Tropical Forests |
| 2015 | Kathryn Grabowski | CEE | Rob Pringle | Consequences of a Vegetation Shift Following the War-Driven Loss of Large Mammals in Gorongosa National Park, Mozambique |
| 2014 | Katherine Smith | EEB | Lars Hedin | Assessing the Efficiency of Nitrogen and Phosphorus Uptake in the Backwaters and Wetlands of the Lower Mississippi Watershed |
| 2013 | Lauren Wyman | EEB | Robert Pringle | Analyzing the Impact of a Dual Lizard Introduction on Orb-weaver Spider Communities in the Bahamas: An Experimental Approach |
| 2013 | Elizabeth McKenna | EEB | Simon Levin | Researching the Effects of Varying Light and Sedimentation Conditions on the Growth Rates of Juvenile Corals at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences (BIOS) |
| 2012 | Abigail Hewitt | EEB | Andrew Dobson | Land-Use Dynamics on Costa Rica’s Osa Peninsula: A Model for Balancing Ecological, Economic and Social Development |
| 2012 | Tara Thean | EEB | James Gould | Signature Whistle Models in Bottlenose Dolphins, Tursiops truncatus |
| 2011 | Madelon Case | EEB | Simon Levin | Gopher Disturbances and Plant Community Dynamics in Montane Meadows |
| 2011 | Sara Nason | GEO | Satish Myneni | The Effects of Elevated Soil CO2 on Plant Uptake of Metals |
| 2010 | Hannah Barkley | EEB | Stephen Pacala | The Effect of Temperature and Feeding on the Early Tissue Growth and Calcification of the Atlantic Coral Porites astreoides |
| 2009 | Sarah Chambliss | EEB | David Wilcove | Land Degradation and Plant Community Change: Examining the Case of Sansevieria volkensii, a Native Plant Spreading in Kenya |
| 2009 | Josephine Walker | EEB | Simon Levin | Acaricide Use and the Control of Theileria parva at the Wildlife-Livestock Disease Interface in Kenya |
| 2008 | Ruth Schwab | EEB | Stuart Altmann, Henry Horn | From Wild Apples to Modern Cultivars: Chemical Profile Changes of Sugars, Acids and the Phenolics Over Selective Time |
| 2007 | Nathan Crumpton | SOC | Elizabeth Armstrong | Dissonant Realities: Behind the Veil of AIDS in Tanzania |
| 2007 | Jonah Wagner | WWS | David Wilcove | Water-Pricing Reform and Water Service Sustainability: Case Studies of Hyderabad and Johannesburg |
| 2006 | Meha Jain | EEB | Daniel Rubenstein | Measuring the Effects of Cattle on Land and Wildlife in Laikipia, Kenya |
| 2006 | Aliya Sanders | EEB | Lars Hedin | Nutrient Limitation on N2 Fixation by Acacia saligna Stands of the Western Cape, South Africa |
| 2004 | Wenfei Tong | EEB | Daniel Rubenstein | On the Genetic Structure of Plains Zebra Populations and Societies: Insights from Non-invasive Microsatellite Genotyping |
| 2004 | Olympia Moy | EEB | David Wilcove | The “Grain-to-Green” Program and Its Implications for the Conservation of Giant Panda Habitat in Woolong National Nature Reserve, China |
| 2003 | John Kim | EEB | Effects of Cultivation and Proximity to Natural Habitat on Ground-nesting Native Bees in California Sunflower Fields | |
| 2002 | Andrew Bryant | HIS | Social, Economic and Environmental Transformations Following the Introduction of Coffee to the Kilmanjaro Region of Tanzania, 1900 | |
| 2000 | Amanda Hawn | EEB | Early Juvenile Mortality in a Cohort of Chromis cyanea: The Grownth Mortality Hypothesis Revisited | |
| 1999 | Mark Cornwall | EEB | Daniel Rubenstein | An Analysis of the Competitive Interaction Between Two Sympatric Species of Zebra: Equus greyvi and Equus burchelli |