Celebrating 2023 Graduating Seniors

Justin Anderson

Hi! I’m Justin Anderson and I’m a geology major and environmental studies minor! I was raised on documentaries and national parks growing up, so I developed a love of geology early on. It wasn’t until I took “Geology of Minnesota” in high school that I figured out there were career paths in geology. Mac’s geology department drew me in for the large amount of equipment, small student to faculty ratio and its paleontology focus. Declaring a major and acquiring the flannel, agate, and hand lens as a freshman right before Covid hit seemed only natural. 

Every summer before classes, I’ve gone to a dinosaur dig camp called Hell Creek Fossils, on the North Dakota size of the Hell Creek Formation. I found myself intrigued with the wide array of scrappy dinosaur bones lying around in cow pastures and wondered why they came in so many colors. Ray suggested I look into bone diagenesis, the change from bone to fossil. I had also always wanted to see Kristi’s bone lab too, so my capstone involved making thin sections of dinosaur bones from various depositional settings and looking at their cements and secondary minerals. I also do amateur paleontology with a friend in southwest Minnesota, where I have found a cretaceous shark vertebra. We are hoping to start our own dig program called Minnesota Shark Quest. 

After all this paleontology, I would love to keep studying the natural world, but plan to take multiple gap years before deciding on my next steps.

Roheyatou Ceesay

Hello, my name is Roheyatou Ceesay (she/hers), but everyone calls me Roro! I didn’t come to Mac knowing I would major in Geology, but it only took a month or two for me to pledge my allegiance to rocks. Coming from NYC, I wasn’t really exposed to geology until my FYC Dynamic Earth and Global Change with Alan Chapman. The geo department hosts a genuine community of mutual support and eclectic personalities, and I am so proud to be a part of this fun bunch!

My thesis project aims to reconstruct a fire history in eastern Glacier National park through lake core charcoal proxies. I plan to spend the summer sleeping, collecting rocks, and FINALLY getting my license. In the Fall, I will start my PhD program at Stony Brook University. There, I will be doing field work in the northern lakes of Kenya to use luminescence dating techniques on sedimentary rocks near early human habitats.

Rennie DiCarlo

Hiiii! I’m Rennie, a geology major from New Orleans. I’ve been told by friends and family that my choice of academic department makes sense because I picked up rocks all the time as a child, but I have no memory of this. I came to Macalester interested in environmental studies and studio art, but fell into the geological sciences by a miraculous accident (and the nightmarish way high school seniors register for their first semester of classes). Right now, I’m finishing up an honors thesis on deformation and uplift in the Klamath Mountains, and I look forward to working with my research partners to get our findings published. 

I’m so grateful to the Macalester Geology department for the experiences I’ve had over the years. I’m not sure exactly what I want to do with this yet, but I love learning about the history of our world on such a large scale, and I hope to share that knowledge and passion with others.

Zia McGarry

Hi all, I’m Zia (she/hers) from Boston, Massachusetts.  Before coming to Macalester, I had never taken a single geology or earth science class, but after taking Kelly MacGregor’s Environmental Geology class as my first year course, I was hooked.  I am graduating as part of the class of 2023 with a Geology major and a Biology minor.  Working with Kelly, Ray, Jeff, and all of the other geology professors over the past four years has rocked (pun extremely intended), and I’m super excited to head out into the world armed with a very sharp hammer and the knowledge of which rocks will break my teeth when (not if, when) I bite into them.  Last summer I worked in the fossil lab at the Badlands Dinosaur Museum doing prep work, and I absolutely loved spending my days supergluing dinosaur bones to my fingers and being asked by children why I personally killed all the dinosaurs.  I plan on taking a break before going to grad school, but I hope to be able to continue doing prep work and other hands-on applications to paleontology.  The Macalester Geology department was definitely my favorite part of my college experience, and I would 100% recommend checking it out if you have any interest in eating rocks, being mean to Jeff Thole, or bolting awake in the middle of the night screaming “STRESS LEADS TO STRAIN!”

Lou Miller

Hello! My name is Lou Miller (he/him), and I am from just outside of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. I am a Geology and Applied Math double major with an Environmental Studies minor. I came to Mac not even considering geology, but got hooked after having Kelly’s Environmental Geology as my FYC, then further drawn in after taking Ray’s History and Evolution of the Earth, declaring a geo major at the beginning of my sophomore year. My work over the past two years has been looking at glacial lake cores in Argentina and Montana, determining sedimentation rates from cesium-137 analysis to learn about short-term glacial history and lake dynamics. After graduation, I hope to be working doing something that’s related to groundwater management and remediation. Overall, I’m incredibly thankful for what the geology department has given me over my four years here, as a place of community, knowledge, and better field trips than any other department.

Kari Myhran

Hi all! My name is Kari Myhran and I am so excited (but a bit sad) to be a geology senior! I fell in love with paleontology as a kid and have wanted to be a paleontologist ever since I was four years old. That aspiration never left me and I declared a double major in geology and biology early in my freshman year! The geology department is amazing here at Macalestester and I’ve taken so many great classes with awesome profs, especially Dynamic with Alan and Jeff and Paleobio and Sed/Strat with Ray! Through the department, I got to work at the Science Museum of Minnesota after my junior year in the osteology and paleo labs and do my very own research! I’ve looked up to Kristi Curry Rogers at Mac ever since middle school and it’s been a dream and an honor to work with her and Ray on my research. Ray offered me this project at the start of my junior year and I’ve been working hard ever since. The Bug Creek Anthills are an amazing deposit with incredible fossils and a deep history. I’ve grown to absolutely love this project and am so excited to share it with you! I am planning to take a gap year after graduation and (hopefully) find a position where I can still look at rocks and work outdoors, so I am hopeful for something in the national parks or similar! I eventually want to go back to grad school and continue my education and learn more about paleo!

Brooke Noonan

Hi everyone! My name is Brooke Noonan (she/her/hers) and I am a Geology major from Stanley, Wisconsin. My first time learning about geology was in my first-year course Environmental Geology with Kelly MacGregor. Later on, I also took Paleobiology with Raymond Rogers, which was when I declared my Geology major! All of the professors in the department are friendly, welcoming and down-to-earth. The field trips were amazing and a good way to get to know my peers. 

I’m excited to venture off into the field of geology after I graduate! Macalester Geology has had such an impact on my life, from meeting great people who share my interests, to enjoying the outdoors, and discovering my love for looking at rocks and fossils. I plan on taking a break before continuing on to graduate school. I’m so grateful for the incredible experiences I have been able to have during my time being a part of the Macalester Geology community. I will forever cherish the adventures and the many skills I have learned as I move to the next chapter of my life!

Nicole Sponseller

Hi! I’m Nicole Sponseller (she/her), I’m from Madison, WI, and I’m a Geology major with minors in Spanish and Linguistics. Geology wasn’t even on my radar when I came to Mac, and I more or less fell into it by accident when I signed up for Alan’s Dynamic Earth FYC thinking it was an environmental studies class. I was in for quite the surprise when I realized it was, in fact, a geology class… and even more so when I realized that I loved it! The community I’ve found in the Geology department has been a constant source of support and entertainment throughout my entire time at Macalester – even in the midst of the pandemic – and I am so endlessly grateful for that. As I finish up my senior year and the capstone I’ve been working on with Ray as my advisor, I’m looking forward to taking some time off of school and spending quality time with family, friends, and of course, rocks! I’m currently applying for jobs related to hydrology, and am planning to take at least a couple of years to work before potentially applying for grad school.

Karlee Taylor

Hi!! I’m Karlee Taylor, a Geology and Physics (Astronomy) double major from Seattle, WA. I got into geology by accident in my freshman year, when I took Kelly MacGregor’s Environmental Geology FYC, thinking it was an environmental studies course. After realizing through this class that geology was a subject which combined my interests in the environment and physical earth processes, I was hooked! Since then, the Geology Department has played a huge role in my time at Macalester, and I could not be more grateful to be a part of such a supportive and enthusiastic community of students and professors. After graduation, I’m super excited to stick around for a year as a post-bac with the department, where I’ll get to finish some of the exciting research I’ve been doing with Alan Chapman and help Emily First set up her lab, among other things! I have a few backpacking trips planned for the next year (the Italian Dolomites and Annapurna in Nepal), and after that I’ll be moving abroad to teach English before starting grad school in a few years! I’m currently interested in tectonics and volcanism, as well as paleoclimate – but if there’s one thing I’ve learned in the last few years, it’s that I change my mind about once a week, so we’ll just have to wait and see!!

Karley Thurston

Hello! My name is Karley Thurston and I am from Bloomington, Minnesota. I am a geology major with a minor in computer science. I found my way into the geology department pretty early in my Macalester career, first taking Ray’s History and Evolution of the Earth in Mod 3 and loving it, and I haven’t gone a semester without geology since! I’ve always found earth science interesting to learn about, and geology combines all the fun stuff about science & math into a tangible real-world application. The students and faculty are all welcoming and fun to be around, which makes learning exciting and enjoyable. And we have the best field trips – hands down.

After graduation, I plan to work somewhere in the field of geology – not too sure where but it will give me some time off before potentially going to grad school. The geology community at Mac is one of the best! I will forever be grateful for the time I spent with everyone in the department, and cannot wait to see what the future has in store for me.

Amber Wiedenhoeft

Hello! My name is Amber and I am a geology and environmental studies double major and Spanish minor! Although I’ve always been interested in rocks and collecting cool ones along the way, I did not know that I would devote my college career to learning about them in such depth. But after taking Alan’s first year course and getting to observe such cool geologic features out in the Klamath Mountains, I realized this just might be what I wanted to do. I’ve really enjoyed my time in the geology department here, it’s such a fun group to be around and I’m so glad I decided to be a part of the flannel club! 

For my honors thesis, I am looking at tree cores I took in Patagonia, Chile during my study abroad. Although it is not quite as geology focused, it was still super cool to date the different cores and compare them to different climatic variables. That is one thing I definitely like about the geology department: their flexibility with people’s interests. Geology reaches into so many other categories of study and everyday life, that people can take it in any direction they want! And besides, who doesn’t like to be outside?