Heath Nero

Wyss Scholar
MS 2009, focus on Environmental Policy and Planning

Heath Nero is a graduate of the United States Military Academy at West Point. After graduating from the Academy, he was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in the United States Army Corps of Engineers and stationed at Fort Carson, Colorado. Heath was deployed to Iraq in April 2003 and earned a Bronz Star for meritorious service. Heath spent his final year in the Army helping to develop Fort Carson's Sustainability and Environmental Management System (SEMS).

After his military obligation was over, Heath worked for The Wilderness Society's BLM Action Center in Denver, Colorado serving as the organization's Outreach Coordinator.í‚  During his time at TWS,
Heath and his coworkers helped secure administrative protection of over 600,000 acres of Wilderness quality lands managed by the BLM.

Heath's concentration at SNRE is environmental policy and his master's thesis focuses on the role of protected landscapes in multiple use managed lands.í‚  Specifically, his thesis focus on implementation of the Bureau of Land Management's National Landscape Conservation Sytem.

Heath used his summer stipend to fund an internship with the National Wildlife Federation's Office of Federal and International Affairs in Washington, DC where he gained valuable legislative process
experience.  Heath and his wife are looking forward to graduation and moving back to the mountains, mesas, and valleys of the American West.

Elizabeth Nysson
Wyss Scholar
MS 2009, focus on Environmental Policy and Planning

Elizabeth Nysson is a Master's of Science candidate in the School of Natural Resources and Environment at The University of Michigan with an expected completion date of April 2009. She is on the Environmental Policy and Planning academic track with a keen interest in land use issues in areas of the Intermountain West experiencing increased energy development, housing expansion and sprawl. Her research and Master's project focus on the ancient pronghorn antelope migration route experiencing fragmentation due to "natural gas" development and rural expansion in Western Wyoming. One of the core components of the project is based on developing collaborative tools for stakeholder involvement for the preservation of the pronghorn's path.

Liz's interest in land conservation issues emerged during her undergraduate experience at the University of Wyoming where she received a Bachelors of Arts degree in May 2006. After graduation, Liz served a year for AmeriCorps through the Campus Corps Program at The University of Montana. While on the Montana campus, Liz volunteered at the Wilderness Institute working on its Legislative History Project and learning about the wilderness designation process.

Liz used her summer stipend to work at the Green River Valley Land Trust in Pinedale, Wyoming. This internship helped her develop knowledge of market-based land conservation methods, provided an enhanced perspective on the region where her master's work is focused, and further strengthened her understanding of conservation issues in Wyoming and other parts of the Intermountain West. Liz plans to live in a community in the Rocky Mountains after graduation and work for a nonprofit land trust or alternative land conservation organization. She hopes to one day start a nonprofit focused on community-based collaborative land planning to conserve open spaces and lands in communities of the Intermountain West.