Carol's career has taken a few twists and turns since being at the Nicholas School.  She entered the MEM program with a keen interest in endangered species management, specifically, captive breeding and reintroduction.  So she was interested in both zoo and field work. Instead of doing a summer internship, she took a semester off for a 6-month internship at Disney's Animal Kingdom. Upon graduating, she was offered a chance to return to Disney as a research fellow.  The research was focused on animal behavior, and Carol wanted to get back to conservation work.  She entered a doctoral program at Purdue University, and completed a dissertation which examined connectivity for forest rodents in an agricultural landscape. Carol returned to Disney a third time to lead a native wildlife monitoring program, working primarily on conservation easement lands within Walt Disney World. During this time, she also participated in a two-year training program, Emerging Wildlife Conservation Leaders, which provided an incredible opportunity to collaborate on an international conservation issue.

After three and a half years, it was time to move on.  Carol accepted a post-doctoral position with University of South Florida, working to test survey methods for the Florida Sand Skink at Archbold Biological Station.  With the end of the grant in sight, Carol moved into another grant-funded position with Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission. Critical Wildlife Areas (CWA) are established across the state to protect important congregations of wildlife during critical periods in their life cycle. The CWA program had languished for various reasons, and a grant was received to hire a CWA Coordinator to essentially kick-start the program. When a permanent position was open (Assistant Regional Biologist), Carol proposed merging the two positions, to ensure that CWAs have permanent support beyond the lifetime of the grant. The agency accepted the proposal. Carol now spends her time on a variety of CWA and nongame wildlife issues. CWAs can be controversial among stakeholders because they are the only legally enforceable closure to protect wildlife. Someone could be cited for entering the area, even if a take isn't observed (take is incredibly difficult to prove). She responds to concerns about snakes, bats, burrowing owls, eagles...you name it. She also gets into the field to perform habitat management and conduct surveys. While the position isn't the rigorous research a PhD typically looks for, Carol loves the variety of species and challenges she encounters.