{"id":5077,"date":"2016-07-07T17:13:24","date_gmt":"2016-07-08T00:13:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/?p=5077"},"modified":"2022-02-10T18:14:04","modified_gmt":"2022-02-10T18:14:04","slug":"keesing-felicia-2004","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/2016\/07\/keesing-felicia-2004\/","title":{"rendered":"Felicia Keesing (2004)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>From an \u201cEcologist Directory\u201d maintained by the ESA Education Office about 2004-2005. Profile circa 2004.<\/em><br><strong>Degree<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Ph.D. 1997<br><strong>Position<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Associate Professor<br><strong>Department<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Department of Biology<br><strong>Organization<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Bard College<br>I became interested in ecology by accident. For my first few years in graduate school, I was studying evolutionary biology. In my third year, while looking for a new dissertation project, I stumbled across an ecological question that fascinated me immediately \u2013 whether small mammals played any significant role in the ecology of African savannas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignleft\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"138\" height=\"168\" src=\"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/07\/fkeesing.gif\" alt=\"fkeesing\" class=\"wp-image-5058 img-fluid\"><figcaption>Felicia Keesing<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the time, it was generally assumed that the only important consumers were large mammals. I decided to investigate the potential for competition between animals as disparate in body size as elephants and mice. After finding that large and small mammals compete strongly but asymmetrically, I began to study how savanna communities function differently when large mammals aren\u2019t there.<br>I have been teaching at small liberal arts colleges since I got my Ph.D. in 1997. I\u2019m currently an Associate Professor of Biology at Bard College, which is about 1.5 hours north of New York City and has about 1500 students. This position has allowed me a wonderful mix of teaching and research. I maintain two active research programs \u2013 one on the Africa work and one on the ecology of Lyme disease risk in the northeastern U.S. \u2013 while still having the opportunity to teach small groups of fantastic, engaged students. My classes never have more than 25 students, and both teaching and research are highly valued at my institution.<br>I encourage students \u2013 both undergraduate and graduate \u2013 to be fearless in the pursuit of the answers to important research questions. That means being willing to learn new disciplines and new techniques when necessary, to find collaborators from different fields when needed, and to define themselves not by the type of training they\u2019ve had, but by the questions they want to answer.<br><span style=\"border-radius: 2px; text-indent: 20px; width: auto; padding: 0px 4px 0px 0px; text-align: center; font: bold 11px\/20px 'Helvetica Neue',Helvetica,sans-serif; color: #ffffff; background: #bd081c  no-repeat scroll 3px 50% \/ 14px 14px; cursor: pointer;\">Save<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From an \u201cEcologist Directory\u201d maintained by the ESA Education Office about 2004-2005. Profile circa 2004.Degree\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Ph.D. 1997Position\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Associate ProfessorDepartment\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Department of BiologyOrganization\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Bard CollegeI became interested in ecology by accident. For my first few years in graduate school, I was studying evolutionary biology. In my third year, while looking for a new dissertation project, I stumbled across an ecological question&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11106,"featured_media":5058,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[151,155,165,175],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-biographies","category-ecologist-directory","category-personal-accounts","category-women-in-ecology"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11106"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5058"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esa.org\/history\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}