A small-town girl with a serious case of wanderlust and a love for animals grew into a scientist, educator, and writer. For Sarah, the process of acquiring knowledge, synthesizing it, and then sharing what she has learned with others is the common thread that underlies her expertise in ecological research, environmental education, and writing. Whether working with peers, students, or a general audience, Sarah finds reward in both the learning and the communicating.

Sarah earned a B.S. in Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior from the University of Minnesota and spent several years traveling and gaining a wide range of experience in field research and education programs. She earned a Ph.D. in Behavioral Ecology from the University of Miami, with a dissertation on reproductive behavior and physiology of a little-known tropical wood duck.

After teaching at the university level, Sarah transitioned into the consulting world where her diverse skills and interests found a host of practical applications. During her 20 years as an ecological consultant, she has supported surveys and permitting processes for energy infrastructure development, coordinated writing and editing of large multi-authored documents, and used her extensive teaching and writing experience to interpret technical information for varied stakeholders.

Sarah is a Certified Senior Ecologist with the Ecological Society of America and has been a small business owner through her company EcoSmith Consulting LLC since 2008. She lives in western Wisconsin with her husband and their three boys on five acres they have named Three Oaks Farmstead. Over the years and in between baseball games, violin lessons, and all the rest, they have been striving to connect people to the land, history, nature, and each other. Sarah’s most recent effort on that front is serving as founder and director of a 501(c)(3) nonprofit called Oak Hill Learners Guild, a small part-time learning community providing flexibility for homeschooling and distance-learning families, hosted at Three Oaks Farmstead.

For the next leg of the journey, Sarah is working to bring her lifelong love of history to the forefront and integrate it with other passions by creating unique historical immersion experiences for people and writing historical and STEM-focused fiction.