Career Conversation with Cinda Scott, Ph.D. '99

Since completing her Ph.D. in 2009, with a research focus on the heritability of evolved differences in gene expression to better understand the biological significance of genetic variation, Dr. Scott decided to explore an important and pressing issue that continues to affect the education of young people in the United States; low retention of students, particularly women and minority students, in science, technology, education and mathematics (STEM) programs. Dr. Scott’s interests lie at the crossroads of improving undergraduate STEM laboratory experiences and the administrative entities that work to provide students with educational opportunities. Prior to her current role as the Center Director at The School for Field Studies (SFS) Center for Tropical Island Biodiversity Studies (TIBS), in Panamá, she served as the National Science Foundation Innovation through Institutional Innovation (I3) Program Manager at New York City College of Technology. In this role, she worked to bring more real-world, hands on opportunities for students in STEM laboratories to encourage students to pursue degrees in STEM.
Her research interests have varied greatly over the years, but she has always been captivated by marine organisms, especially fish. As an undergraduate student, she had the opportunity to work side by side with some of the foremost marine biologists at Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory in Salisbury Cove, Maine. As a graduate student, Dr. Scott completed a post-bacc premedical program at Columbia University, and completed her Ph.D. in marine molecular evolutionary genomics and focused her research on answering questions regarding the variation in mRNA expression and whether the heritability of gene expression is primarily a function of genetics or the environment.