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A line of colorful toy ducks sits on top of the file cabinet and another, atop the windowsill in Associate Professor Suzanne Levine’s office in the Rubenstein School’s Aiken Center. The casual visitor might see a mother duck leading her three smaller ducklings, but those who have worked with or learned from Suzanne might see a college professor leading her young students on learning adventures on the waterways of Vermont and on trips farther afield.

“Suzanne turns all learning opportunities into full-on adventures,” wrote Lindsay Schwarting Miller (MS-NR ’11), Suzanne’s former graduate student. “She led our watershed management class through the Everglades; we camped in the deserts of New Mexico during an ASLO [Association for the Sciences of Limnology and Oceanography] conference; she arranged for me to briefly live in Italy while I learned new lab techniques for my thesis; and we canoed the Winooski [River in Vermont] my first week meeting her. Her sense of humor and love of travel infuses every situation. Suzanne always encouraged folks to see the ‘boring data’ in the context of the larger, more important story of natural history. Since graduate school with her, I strive to approach research the same way.”

Suzanne retired from the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources this spring after 24 years of teaching and research in the aquatic sciences. Suzanne joined the faculty at �պ����� in 1992 as an accomplished and well-published young researcher with much experience conducting biogeochemical experiments on lakes, aquifers, and seagrass beds in the U.S., Canada, and South America – expertise she brought to Vermont’s Lake Champlain Basin.

Washington State, Ontario’s Experimental Lakes Area, Colorado, Venezuela, Cornell

A native of Washington State and the oldest of six children, Suzanne excelled in school and attended Western Washington University’s Fairhaven College where she earned her B.A. in biology with minors in chemistry and geology in 1973. With a growing interest in ecology, she spent summers taking ecology courses at the University of Minnesota’s field station on Lake Itasca, the headwaters of the Mississippi River. There her interests turned to limnology, the study of the biology, chemistry, and physical properties of lakes and other freshwater systems.

She did her graduate work with top flight limnologist Dr. David Schindler at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg and conducted research in the Experimental Lakes Area (ELA) of northwestern Ontario. She earned her M.S. in 1976 using radiotracers added to a whole lake to describe and quantify phosphorus cycling. For her Ph.D. research, Suzanne used 10-meter-diameter enclosures in two ELA lakes to study the impact of nitrogen and phosphorus ratios on eutrophication and blooms of cyanobacteria.

She completed her dissertation in 1983, after she was hired as field manager of the Lago de Valencia Limnology Research Station in Venezuela by the University of Colorado, Boulder. In Venezuela, Suzanne conducted research on cyanobacteria and nitrogen fixation in large Lake Valencia and on dissolved organic carbon in the Orinoco River.

Suzanne then spent eight years at Cornell University, first as a research associate at the Ecosystems Research Center where she conducted ecotoxicology research and advised the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on emerging ecological issues related to lakes. Then, as a senior research associate in microbiology, she investigated and identified microbes in deep aquifers with funding from the U.S. Department of Energy.

University of Vermont, Lake Champlain Research, Teaching and Advising

In 1992, Suzanne accepted a professorship at �պ����� in the then School of Natural Resources and began nearly a quarter century of research on Lake Champlain and its feeder streams and rivers, as well as teaching undergraduates and mentoring graduate students in various sub-disciplines of aquatic ecology and water resource management.

Teaming up with many �պ����� faculty, staff, and graduate students, Suzanne continued her studies of nitrogen fixation, phosphorus cycling, food webs, and nutrient limitation in Vermont, using Lake Champlain and its watershed as her laboratory. With former Rubenstein School research technician Angela Shambaugh, she conducted feeding experiments in Lake Champlain to describe and quantify the lower portion of its food web. She collaborated with former Rubenstein School Associate Professor Leslie Morrissey and graduate student Sarah Wheeler to test remote sensing techniques as a means of mapping and assessing the severity of cyanobacterial blooms on Lake Champlain. With Associate Professor Andrea Lini, of the �պ����� Geology Department, she used paleolimnology and sediment cores to study the long-term  eutrophication of Lake Champlain and Shelburne Pond. 

Suzanne taught courses in Limnology, Stream Ecology, and Wetlands Ecology and Management, as well as other water and ecology courses. Her field laboratories were well-touted by her students as extremely memorable. Each fall, she started Stream Ecology with a canoe trip down the Winooski River. Invariably, by the end of the semester, she learned that this first lab had made a huge impression on her students. When, early on, Limnology occurred in the spring semester, her students collected water samples through holes chopped in the ice. She recalls them, “slipping and sliding, falling and holding each other up, as we made our way out onto Shelburne Pond on a warm day with melt water over the ice, but the students remembered it as the best time they had in class.”

“There is nothing Suzanne wouldn’t do for her students,” wrote Heather Shabunia Galarneau (MS-WR ’98), an early graduate student of Suzanne’s who conducted research to track phosphorus in a river feeding Lake Champlain. “Once, while we were collecting samples in the LaPlatte River, I found myself completely covered in leeches. Suzanne was glad to help with the unpleasant and rather time-consuming task of picking them all off!”

For five years, Suzanne chaired the School’s Master’s in Water Resources and helped to transition it to a concentration in Aquatic Ecology and Watershed Science. She advised more than a dozen graduate students, many who have gone on to pursue research and management positions in aquatic science, and she served on the graduate study committees of more than fifty �պ����� students.

“Dr. Suzanne Levine advised my master’s degree in water resources at �պ����� from January 1999 to May 2001,” wrote Lisa Ferber Pekar (MS-WR ’01). “During this time, Suzanne was a positive and supportive mentor to me in many ways. First, Suzanne’s breadth of research experience and guidance allowed me to focus my project soon after arriving at �պ�����. She also encouraged me to present my work at local and international research symposia where I gained confidence and made professional connections. Second, Suzanne’s sense of humor made spending time with her enjoyable, whether we were out sampling lakes in a canoe on a long field day or joking about whether a “regular” or “lice” comb should be used for editing one of my chapter drafts. Third, Suzanne’s view of the purpose of graduate school, that the main goal of graduate students is to publish their research, proved to be beneficial to me upon graduation. With Suzanne’s contagious tenacity and support, our research was published a couple of years after I graduated. My publications have been noted in several interviews and are something I am proud of. Finally, Suzanne was not only an excellent role model for me as a scientist, but she also cared about my personal wellbeing. All in all, Dr. Suzanne Levine’s mentorship and kindness helped to prepare me well for my water quality work and life in Alaska. Thank you, Suzanne!”

Several sabbatical leaves took Suzanne to different parts of the world to enhance her expertise on lakes. In New Zealand, she studied zooplankton and its response to sediment resuspension; in Italy, she conducted paleolimnological work on Italian and Tibetan lakes and analyzed samples from Lake Champlain; and in Finland, she began writing a book on the history of lake and marine eutrophication – a project she plans to continue during retirement.

Suzanne not only saw the importance in learning through travel for herself as a professor, but she also encouraged her students to learn through travel. She led them on Spring Break field courses to the Florida Everglades, Georgia and South Carolina, and northern California.

“I most enjoyed the field trips, labs, travel courses, and time spent outdoors with students on lakes, rivers, streams, and wetlands,” shares Suzanne. “Their enthusiasm is contagious. Many of the students had never traveled much and their excitement energizes you as a teacher.”

She traveled farther afield with her graduate students and took many of them under her wing to mentor them as scientists and practitioners in the field.

“Suzanne was my graduate adviser when I was a Master's student in water resources at �պ����� from 2003-2006,” wrote Sarah Wheeler (MS-NR ’06) who now works in water quality for the state of Colorado. “Suzanne's passion for travel and limnology was contagious and we shared many adventures together when I was her student. We spent hours and hours together on boats collecting water quality data. We hiked through the woods of Vermont and New Hampshire together. We explored the cobblestone streets of Quebec City, and we traveled through small coastal villages in Spain together. All of these trips involved learning from international experts in limnology. Suzanne knew that the best way to learn was to experience limnology first-hand in the field, and so she was determined to get all of her students outside, literally getting their feet wet. This type of learning sticks with you forever, and I'll always be grateful that I had an advisor that was so passionate and excited about hands-on learning.” 

The plastic ducks in Suzanne’s office served a hands-on learning purpose. While students waited during Stream Ecology labs to take turns using water sampling and measuring equipment, they would pass the time by running races with the ducks in the stream. The ducks also served to determine the main flow of the stream. Suzanne took hands-on learning and made it fun.

“We thank Associate Professor Suzanne Levine for more than two decades of service to the Rubenstein School,” states Dean Nancy Mathews. “Her devotion to hands-on, memorable learning in the aquatic sciences has enhanced the education of hundreds of students. Suzanne’s research on nutrient processes in aquatic ecosystems has transformed our understanding of the effects of land use changes on the Lake Champlain ecosystem. She has earned a reputation as a stellar mentor to her graduate students, many of whom have gone on to establish distinguished careers in academia and government. Her dedication to the School has helped propel it to a nationally recognized school of the environment.” 

In retirement, Suzanne will visit her son, Nathan, a researcher at Harvard University, and she will continue to pursue her passion for travel, learning, and exploring the world.