McKnight, Aly, PhD

Biography

Aly holds a B.A. in Zoology from Connecticut College, an M.Sc. in Wildlife and Fisheries Conservation from the University of Massachusetts-Amherst, and a Ph.D. in Wildlife, Fisheries, and Conservation Biology from the University of Maine – Orono. Aly is a population biologist by training, having spent more than a decade working for the US Fish and Wildlife Service to monitor seabird and marine mammal recovery following the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill in Prince William Sound, Alaska. Her graduate research explored how environmental and community interactions combine to influence individual seabirds, and how these individual experiences scale up to drive higher level population dynamics. Aly is also deeply interested in pedagogy, particularly with respect to teaching within the STEM fields. Her yearly efforts to train field crews to survive and succeed in the rugged and unforgiving Alaskan wilderness contributed greatly to her core educational philosophy of “learning by doing.” Prior to working at Husson, Aly served for a number of years as an Associate Professor of Wildlife and Fisheries Management at Unity College in Unity, Maine.