Vermont Atlas of Life Postdoctoral Fellowship

Organizational Profile
The Vermont Center for Ecostudies (VCE) advances wildlife conservation in the northeastern US and across the Americas through scientific research and community engagement. Our work involves researching and monitoring biodiversity in a variety of ecosystems and delivering results to inform management and policy decisions. We engage thousands of volunteers on a wide range of projects through data collection and monitoring. At VCE, we believe that kindness and collaboration are integral to effective conservation science. Our staff is committed to creating a workplace culture that respects and celebrates diversity and values the well-being of all employees. We accomplish this by fostering inclusivity and offering flexibility within the workday to encourage a healthy work-life balance.

Position Description
VCE invites early career researchers to apply for a new postdoctoral fellowship focused on using open-source biodiversity data to inform state-level conservation planning. The successful candidate will work with the state of Vermont’s Vermont Conservation Design (VCD) and VCE’s Vermont Atlas of Life (VAL) to create species distribution models to: 1) better understand the current and expected distribution of species in the state, 2) identify species of greatest conservation need (SGCN) whose needs are not met by VCD and require a fine-filter conservation approach, and 3) make recommendations for how to improve VCD for long-term biodiversity protection. This work will inform the upcoming 2025 State Wildlife Action Plan and 1) lead to an improved ability to assess and prioritize species in need of focused conservation action, 2) create a database with statewide maps of species distributions, species richness, and species assemblages, and 3) establish a replicable framework to periodically re-evaluate the effectiveness of Vermont Conservation Design for conserving biodiversity and SGCN species as the climate changes or new threats are identified.
The postdoctoral researcher will work closely with VCE scientists to develop the models, tools, and publications associated with this project. The incoming postdoctoral researcher will also have opportunities to contribute to the analysis and development of data exploration tools for other VCE projects.

To learn more about this position visit-  https://vtecostudies.org/about-us/employment/