University of Wisconsin-River Falls

Geology Alumni

hr


The following are short notes concerning our geology/earth science alumni.

           
 

1985

Bob Theim

Spouse/Kids:
not yet
email:
LONG-RANGE@juno.com or rtheim@bop.gov
Telephone:
(715) 228-2089 (fax)
City of Residence:
Friendship, WI
Current Occupation:
Teacher at the Bureau of Prisons
I still enjoy hunting and outdoor activities. Plan on going to Alaska next year and doing a moose hunt. Am actively involved in competitive shooting and marksmanship training. Starting to dabble in taxidermy a little bit. Would like to get back into photography a little again too. I am currently exploring those options. That's just a tid bit of what I've been up to. Hope to hear from any of the other people I went to school with. It's been a long time.
 

1987

Mike Terry

Spouse/Kids:
email:
mterry@bowdoin.edu
Telephone:
City of Residence:
Brunswick, ME
Current Occupation:
Visiting Assistant Professor
Over the last year Mike has been a visiting scientist at the Department of Geology, Bowdoin College. Mike is about to leave for Germany to become the visiting scientist at the University of Bayreuth http://www.bgi.uni-bayreuth.de/
 

1988

Eric Kovatch

Spouse/Kids:
Doreen   (kids Acieona (11), Martelle (9), and Ekaterin (6))
email:
ekovatch@naturalrt.com
Telephone:
262/523-9000 (phone) and 262/523-9001 (fax)
City of Residence:
Waukesha, WI
Current Occupation:
Hydrogeologist for Natural Resource Technology, Inc. (NRT)
After leaving RF in 1988, I worked at a box making factory and finished some calculus classes while Doreen finished school in 1989.  Following her graduation, we moved to Moscow ID where I received my MS in Hydrology from Un. of Idaho in 1991.  Worked for Radian Corp. for 2.5 years traveling around the U.S. working on a number of different environmental sites (RCRA, military sites, RR facilities, etc.).  In 1993 I joined NRT and was the 4th person in the company (Pres., V.P., and Sec. when I started).  In early 1994 I saw Becky Koepke (UWRF, 1991) lying in a gutter in Green Bay and was able to get her a job here also - currently, she is clean and sober and able to put in about 12 hours each week, for which she is compensated accordingly. Currently we have 21 employees and we are into a number of different areas while being able to stay out of the UST business for the most part. We have maintained our focus on soil and groundwater investigations but I am also involved in river sediment investigations.  Currently we are involved in some of the biggest sediment issues in the state.  

1989

Lori (Key) Rosemore

Spouse:
Ralph Kids: Cassie, 8, Elizabeth, 4, Rachel, 4
email:
rosemorl@ayres-eau.com
Telephone:
715-833-0813
City of Residence:
Eau Claire, Wisconsin
Current Occupation:
Ayres Associates
Approximately 1 year after graduation, I enlisted in the US Army and have nearly 3 years military experience in terrain analysis (military geology according to the dictionary of geological terms), including assignment during the Gulf War. (remember, Mike, how you joke about me in a "fox hole"?) After my enlistment was finished, I started my employment with Ayres Associates.

While at Ayres Associates I completed the required hydrogeology courses to receive the Wisconsin Hydrogeologist Certification. The projects that I am involved with include remedial site investigations, underground tank assessments, management of the ground water monitoring program, and unsaturated and saturated computer modeling.

 

Sue (Benson) West

Spouse:
Michael West from Brooklyn Park, Mick West is 2
email:
swest@baldwin-telecom.net
Telephone:
City of Residence:
Spring Valley, WI
Current Occupation:
"SAHM" and husband and I are self-employed running family janitorial business in the Twin Cities
Musician in Rush River Ramblers, volunteer for Pierce County Democratic Party and UWEX Master Gardener. This spring will find me working very part-time at Rush Creek Growers and Rush River Nursery and Vineyard. We are lucky to have my mom staying with us, to enjoy her grandchild. We are enjoying the hobby farm life, raising rare-breed chickens, making maple syrup, raising our own organic food, doing traditional crafts, nature study, all that sort of thing. Last year we raised 60 varieties of heirloom tomatoes, that was fun!
 
 

1991

Stacey Larson

is still working for Foth & VanDyke in Eagan, MN. This past September, Stacey married Chris Elfmann. Stacey says the dinner tables at her wedding reception were decorated with color coordinated polished Tiger's Eye Quartz and Sodalite, but that most of the stones were pilfered by fellow geologists (and UWRF alumni), Becky Koepke (1991), Michelle Burton (1992), and Emily Bauer (1991). Nice going you three.
 

Sharon Masek

Spouse:
Richard
email:
sjm-cecinc@charter.net
Telephone:
715-234-0509
City of Residence:
Almena, WI
Current Occupation:
Hydrologist with Cooper Engineering,Rice Lake
Still have two kids, Lara and Cody. Both grown up, but one still in college. Two grandsons (hard to believe!), Satchel and Silas. Recently received license as a Professional Hydrologist (WI), also a Professional Geologist in IL and MN. Still at Cooper Engineering in Rice Lake, hydrogeologist and manager. I mostly work on sites with contamination (LUST sites, landfills, sludge, spills, all the yucky stuff). I really enjoy doing an occasional Phase I on a completely undeveloped farm field. I also spend a lot of time on administrative duties because I supervise 14 people (science is more fun!).
 
 

Rebecca (Becky) Koepke

(or affectionately - Kopeky)
Spouse:
Not yet
email:
Kopeky@hotmail.com or Rkoepke@naturalrt.com
Telephone:
home: 292-843-2755  work:  262-523-9000
City of Residence:
Salem, Wisconsin (with all the other witches!)
Current Occupation:
Hydrogeologist with Natural Resource Technology, Inc.
I am Fixing up an itty-bitty house in Salem, WI and saving capitol for starting a business for James.   I currently hold a high blue belt in Tae Kwon Do, due to recent health set backs, I will not be able to test for my black in December as originally  scheduled, but sometime late next summer I will test for my black belt and then the real commitment starts!  Discovered the joy of riding a Harley this summer, plan to take motorcycle riding lessons next summer and hopefully get my own bike in a year or two!
 
 

1993

Rick Van Allen

e-mail:
rvallen@summite.com
Spouse/Kids:
wife Laurie and daughters, Kayla and Julia.
Telephone:
(651) 644-8080
City of Residence:
Hudson
Current Occupation: 
Summit Envirosolutions, Inc.
Rick is working as a Project Manager for Summit Envirosolutions and after spending 1 1/2 years in Milwaukee, is now living back in Hudson, WI.

 

Andrea (Sykora) Holland

e-mail:
holland@southwind.net
Spouse/Kids:
Richard.
Telephone:
(316) 776-0817
City of Residence:
Rose Hill, Kansas
Current Occupation: 
Geologist.
Currently working for a environmental firm in Wichita with plans to begin the secondary education program at Friends University to obtain teaching certification and get back to actual science. Say goodbye to environmental consulting forever!!

 

1994

Mark Janovec

e-mail: 
mjanovec@pressenter.com or mjanovec@northern-env.com
Telephone:
425-6558 home/1-651-635-9100 work
City of Residence: 
River Falls
Current Occupation: 
Hydrologist,  Northern Environmental
Working at Northern as a Hydrogeologist. My primary tasks are working with municipal water suppliers, helping them conduct aquifer tests on their wells, helping them locate sites for new wells, and generating capture zone delineation's for their wellfield (for Minnesota's Wellhead Protection program). I use tools such as groundwater models (MLAEM, Modflow, others), GIS (Arcview), and specialized databases to accomplish a lot of my tasks. I also do surface water sampling of the South Washington Watershed District to look for trends in contaminants of storm water runoff. Plus, there's an endless variety of daily tasks I help perform in the office (computer drafting, playing the role of "Mr. Fixit" for the office computers, assisting with site investigations when needed, etc.).
For hobbies, I collect records, listen to music, practice amateur photography, and watch way too much of the History Channel.


  Stephanie Van Dyke

e-mail:
svandyke@us.ibm.com
Telephone:
(507)529-8003
City of Residence:
Rocherster, MN
Current Occupation:
Safety Engineer - IBM

 

1995

Candy (Schwantez) Anderson

email:
candy.anderson@redflintgroup.com
Telephone:
715-833-0794
City of Residence:
Eau Clair WI.
Current Occupation:
Geologist- American Materials Corporation in Eau Claire
My job duties revolve around scouting for new rock resources, testing potential lands for rock resources, leasing, purchasing and buying land as well as designing operations and reclamation plans of our pits and quarries for permitting, which I do as well. I also take care of the environmental compliance issues for American. For fun I go to school at night to receive a Masters Degree in Business Administration..
 

Jen (Lien) Schuetz

email:
geojen@tkcllc.com
Telephone:
(608) 546-2255 (work)
City of Residence:
Madison, WI.
Current Occupation:
Senior geologist - The Kraemer Company
I attended UW-Madison from September 1996 - December 1998, graduated with a master's degree in Sedimentary/Stratigraphy geology...thesis title "The Sedimentology and Sequence Stratigraphy of the Middle Ordovician Glenwood Formation in the Upper Mississippi River Valley".  To see what I am doing for the Kraemer Company, refer to Candy's description - we do just about the same thing. I love exploring the world with my husband and my little boy. He likes rocks, puts them in his mouth just like his momma! My husband & son are: Gary (UW River Falls Alum 1995), Elias (born May 2003)
 

This is not Jen


 

1996

Rob Meyerson [ Our late friend & colleague ]

Rob died after a short bout with cancer on February 20, 2003.
 


 

Ann Nelson

e-mail: 
nelsonai@dellnet.com
Telephone:
(307) 635-7771
City of Residence:
Cheyenne, WY 
Current Occupation: 
 Water Management Specialist
I successfully defended my thesis on Thursday, July 28. Owing to the weird way Auburn schedules deadlines, I will not officially graduate until December 16, 2000.

Currently, I am living in Cheyenne, Wyoming where I work for the State Engineer's Office as a Water Management Specialist. My job has 2 main functions. The first is researching water rights (very important since water is scarce, especially during such a dry year). The second function is developing GIS projects, primarily focused on solving water rights issues. Since I don't know much about either, I am on a pretty steep learning curve (and I thought I was all done learning!). I hope I will be able to get involved, as a volunteer, with either the Wyoming state geology office or with the USGS program.
 
 

1997

Erin Eid

e-mail: 
erin.eid@pca.state.mn.us
Telephone:
651-647-9323
City of Residence:
St. Paul
Current Occupation:
Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
Erin has been wonderful in keeping us informed of the latest job openings and internships. Erin stopped by for a visit in March and provided us with information on many UWRF alumni.

Joe Gilbert

email:
jjg@nevada.edu
Telephone:
702-597-5390
City of Residence:
Las Vegas NV.
Current Occupation:
Graduate Student at UNLV
Joe's thesis project is a structural/tectonic study in the Central Pancake range in Nevada. He will be doing a field based thesis and mapping the Mesozioc thrust features in the "Central Nevada Thrust Belt". The central nevada thrust belt has been poorly mapped and the extent of the structures is poorly constrained both spacially and temporally. Thesis work will involve the "removal" of cenozoic Basin and range extension through balanced cross sections, fault kinematics, and detailed mapping.

The current picture of Joe below shows that he has matured since he was with us (A LOT has changed, Denver for 2 years can toughen up a guy.)
 

Alison Kammer

email:
alison_kammer@und.nodak.edu
Telephone:
.
City of Residence:
Grand Forks N.D.
Current Occupation:
Graduate Student/Assistant at UND
Denver was a great experience working as a Geologic Tech., but I didn't take to city life very well and decided to move back to the midwest to pursue graduate school. I expect to defend my thesis sometime in January. I really like UND. It's a small graduate program, so it's very personal, kind of like UWRF with a graduate program. My thesis topic is natural attenuation of nitrate, or as it is called in the literature, denitrification. I've also just started working for ProSource Technologies, Inc. They have a one person (now 2!) office in Grand Forks. They are based in Coon Rapids. I'm working on a site that has a DNAPL plume next to the Red River, mostly coal tar. The project involves excavating 250,000 tons of contaminated soil, treating it with thermal desorbtion and filling the hole back in. It's in the area where the levee is being built to protect Grand Forks from another flood.
 
 
 

1998

Kellie (Milliren) Raven

Email: 
kraven@lanl.gov
Telephone: 
(505) 665-3769
City of Residence:
Los Alamos, NM
Current Occupation:
chemical technician
Kellie (Milliren) Raven got married to Tadeusz Raven in May of 1999. She has one daughter, born October 24, 2001, named Marian Grace Raven. She is currently working at Los Alamos National Labs in the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division as a chemical technician.
 
 

1999

Kelly LaBlanc

Email: 
klablanc@geology.wisc.edu
Telephone: 
608-257-4125
City of Residence:
Madison WI.
Current Occupation:
Graduate student pursuing MS in Quaternary/Glacial Geology.
I am working on research project under Dr. Dave Mickelson.  I am developing a new technique for mapping land forms on GIS using digital elevation models. The maps I am making are of glacial land forms that were produced by the Lake Michigan Lobe.  Included in my mapping area is Eastern Wisconsin and parts of Illinois, Indiana, and Michigan.


 

Dan Geister

e-mail: 
dgeister@niu.edu
Address:
1115 Annie Glidden Rd Dakalb Il 60115
City of Residence: 
Madison
Current Occupation: 
University of Wisconsin - Graduates School
Working with USGS reducing/interpreting gravity data from central and southern Wisconsin which will hopefully be a part of my Masters at Northern Illinois University.  Also taking classes and I have a Teaching Assistantship at Northern.
 

Jennifer Hunstock

Email: 
we_be_cavin@hotmail.com
Telephone: 
??
City of Residence:
Idyllwild, CA
Current Occupation:
Astrocamp Teacher
Jennifer is currently teaching at Astrocamp, an astronomy camp for kids 4th-9th grade, in Idyllwild, California. I am loving life in So. Cal. and have managed to remain single and childless.
 

Tony Silva

e-mail: 
anthony.silva@pca.state.mn.us
Telephone:
651-695-9478
City of Residence: 
St. Paul MN
Current Occupation: 
Pollution Control Specialist, Minnesota Pollution Control Agency
I am doing ground water research along with Erin Eid and Jim Stockinger, both also River Falls Alumni. I am currently pursuing grad school opportunities and hope to attend in the fall of 2000.


 
 

2001

Lisa Marie (Erickson) Mertz

e-mail: 
lmeric@ufl.edu
Telephone:
City of Residence: 
Gainesville, FL
Current Occupation: 
Graduate student at the University of Florida
Spouse: Mike. Graduate student at the University of Florida with a teaching assistantship and a research assistantship. What now: Working on my thesis: Sedimentary evidence of hurricanes in the salt marshes of St.Vincent Island, FL with Dr. John Jaeger.






           
 
 

If you would like to add some information concerning yourself to this alumni page, please email the pagemaster ian.williams@uwrf.edu. You can sumbit current information, If you'd like to be included on the UWRF Geology alum page please send us whatever you wish to include from the following list . . .

Name (obviously we need this)
Year of graduation
Name of spouse/kids
email address
Telephone number
City of residence
Current job
Photograph (please send as a Jpeg or a GIF, al least 200x200 pixels)
What you are doing now?
 
 

hr

CAFES Geology


UW-River Falls Home | Information | Search

pagemaster: ian.williams@uwrf.edu