Craig L. Smith Memorial Scholarship

This scholarship is awarded annually to an academically distinguished graduate student to honor the memory of its namesake, former Professor of Environmental Science Dr. Craig Smith.

This year the Smith Scholarship is awarded to Althea Moore for her outstanding contributions to research.

Althea Moore came to VIMS with a distinguished academic record, graduating with a B.S. in Biology from Earlham College, and with strong practical experience in a range of biological disciplines. Since entering our graduate program less than a year ago, she has enriched our scholarly community with a contagious enthusiasm for learning, a strong creative spark, and a refreshingly individual perspective on a wide range of topics. She has also proved herself a model of focused dedication to her studies and development of her research plans.

Althea’s interests focus on how interactions among organisms structure the way in which ecosystems function and provide services to human society. In the midst of the tumultuous first year of core marine science courses, she dove into a project synthesizing data on community interactions from previous studies. Her developing work has already documented intriguing patterns in the functional diversity of animals near the base of estuarine food chains. This research has implications not only for understanding food-web dynamics in Chesapeake Bay seagrass beds, but also for understanding broader general principles by which ecological communities are organized and function.

Althea Moore is clearly setting out on a productive and innovative career in marine ecology, and is an asset to the VIMS community. She is a worthy recipient of the Craig Smith Fellowship.

Congratulations, Althea!