Science Communication
I think that plain spoken science is an important bridge between academic science, policy, and the public. During my PhD I sought out training in science communication via Northwestern University’s SCOPE program, coursework in the UW-Madison Life Science Communication Department, and served on the science consulting team for the art-science collaboration “Life as We Don’t Know It”.
I am a current pen pal to a middle school student as part of the Letters to a Pre-Scientist Program. I love writing with my pal 4x per year about topics ranging from ‘a day in the life of a scientist’ to the college journey, to discussing our favorite hobbies and science facts!
Diversity, Equity, Inclusivity, Justice
I was awarded a 2022 UW-Madison Graduate Student Service Scholarship.
In 2018, I participated as a founding member of the UW-Madison GeoPath Initiative—a group aimed at connecting undergraduate and graduate students to improve diversity and retention in the geosciences by providing peer to peer mentoring. The group hosts study hours, open door offices (where students can come with any questions/issues), paired mentoring, and departmental events on important ‘hidden curriculum’ topics such as job applications, graduate school preparedness, and field camp accessibility. See 2019 AGU Poster here.
In 2020, I founded GeoReadingforEquity, a community library focused on creating a central repository of DEI literature related to gesociences, alongside resources for having difficult conversations. While reading is not ‘enough’, we hope that this resource will encourage our community towards actively anti-racist actions. Update 2021: Please see the URGE initiative for updates going forward. See 2021 AGU poster here.
In 2021, I participated in the Stanford Diversity & Inclusion in the Geosciences (DiG) seminar. Check out their twitter feed to learn more and see the virtual posters my cohort created to showcase our action-oriented final projects.
From 2020-2022 I served as the graduate student representative on the UW-Madison Department of Geoscience Faculty Diversity Hiring Inititative “TOP” recruitment and hiring committee, which works to improve recruitment and retention of diverse faculty.
Throughout my PhD, I worked with peers to construct, disseminate, and synthesize results from the first Graduate Worker Climate Survey ever conducted in the UW-Madison Department of Geoscience in 2019-2020 (survey repeated every 2 years thereafter). Questions focus on mental health, workplace environmenet, safety, and evaluation of departmental initiatives. This in turn led to a community effort to draft of a departmental Code of Conduct in 2021-2022 and voluntary Field Safety Protocols in 2023-2024. I am happy to chat 1:1 about these experiences and share broad lessons learned (eemixon@wisc.edu).
Professional Service
I have performed peer review for GSA Bulletin and Geochemistry, Geophysics, Geosystems (G-Cubed). I am interested in reviewing work with focus on geochronology (40Ar/39Ar, U-Pb), isotope geochemistry for addressing petrologic problems (Nd, Hf, Sr), trace-element geochemistry for igneous questions, and general igneous petrology/volcanology.
From 2020-2022 I served as an elected student representative on the GSA Geochronology Division Management Board. I worked to represent student interests to the division and expand opportunities for student research and mentorship, including through establishing a ‘meeting mentorship’ program within the division to improve networking at the 2022 Denver Fall Meeting.
From 2022-2024, I served as a member of the steering committee for the PetroNet community which “was built by a group of assistant and associate professors interested in building a community space between the scales of individual university departments and our national professional societies”. If you identify as a petrologist or high-temp geochemist, join us on our slack space!