Beyond my passion for teaching and research, I’ve fallen in the love with the Mountain West. Having grown up in Massachusetts, not too far from White Mountain National Forest, I took to the outdoors early-on in life. So it was easy to transition first to the tiny mountain town of Durango, Colorado and then to Salt Lake City, especially since the region offers views like the one above in the La Plata Mountain range, and the one below, atop Wilson Peak, one of Colorado’s 58 14ers.

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