Evan

Thanks for checking out A Rock In A Hard Place! My name is Evan Craig and I am a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer (RPCV) and Environmental Studies PhD student at Antioch University-New England. So far my wheelhouse has been in wildlife research and environmental education, but the idea of starting a blog piqued my interest, so here I am we are.

I’m a proud Pointer and alumnus of University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point where I earned a bachelor’s degree in Wildlife Ecology. (If you’re looking for a great natural resources program, I recommend you check out the College of Natural Resources at UWSP). It didn’t all start there, however. After I stumbled out of high school I attended a two-year college where I went through phases of wanting to be an audio engineer, an economist, and most awkwardly (in hindsight) – a fashion designer. Ten years later, it’s funny to think back on a typical day during that period; I would get home from class and proceed to watch Planet Earth for the 64th time while trying to figure out what I wanted to do with my life! Luckily, somewhere along the line I realized that my lifelong fascination with animals was just as viable a career choice as any other. For whatever reason, I think I had subconsciously filed it away as an interest, and therefore I didn’t see it as an option. But when it hit me, it stuck. I packed up for Stevens Point, enrolled in Wildlife Ecology and never looked back.

My undergraduate career provided me with everything I needed to pursue a future in natural resources, but grades weren’t one of them. I developed a close relationship with many of my professors. I would find excuses to swing by their offices to ask irrelevant questions or corner them into agreeing to go for a cup of coffee. The truth is I was in awe of them, they were doing things with their lives that I could only dream of doing. Looking back, I think they noticed it too. I’m forever grateful to these professors for converting my fascination to a passion. When I mentioned earlier that my undergraduate career provided me with everything that I needed, it was the confidence they had in me that I needed, and their inspiration was everything.

More recently during the summer of 2016 my wife and I returned to Central Wisconsin from the most ‘insert hyperbolic adjective’ couple of years living in Ethiopia. We were there to serve our Peace Corps sentence, which turned out to be the most transformative period of my life (and career) thus far. I met a wonderful group of high school students interested in learning more about the environment, and together we developed of an after-school program called Club Wild. It was also there that I met my good friend and colleague Dr. Meheretu Yonas at Mekelle University. Together we worked on wildlife research projects in northern Ethiopia, including bat surveys that had to be aborted early due to a tipsy farmer, and leopard research in collaboration with another PCV. Our duo became a trio when we invited Bill Stanley from the Field Museum of Natural History to conduct a small mammal survey of the Simien Mountains. Bill influenced my life like few ever have, and the time we spent together on that mountain will forever be one of my fondest memories. Half of my heart is always in Ethiopia, partitioned between amazing friends and colleagues, and a culture that I was so fortunate to have experienced.