About

Contact Me: devra.hock@huskers.unl.edu

Fall 2019, I am continuing my Ph.D. at UNL, working on turning my Master’s research into a manuscript to submit for publication and continuing work on regional paleoecological interpretations. I am also continuing research in museum informal learning for my dissertation to understand how experts and novices think about paleontology, as well as being part of an international research group interested in the nature of science in natural history museums. I’ll be presenting research comparing big-data datasets and their application within my multi-proxy model at SVP this year, which will be in Brisbane, Australia.

Fall 2018, I am starting my Ph.D. at UNL, with research goals of continuing to refine the model from my Master’s research and apply it to the fossil record. I will also be expanding into museum research and exploring how to teach the process of science in museum settings.

Summer 2018, I defended and graduated with my Master’s in Science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln with Dr. Ross Secord. My thesis focused on building a multi-proxy model based on modern North American mammalian distribution and their traits. While at UNL, I also continued and expanded my undergraduate research looking at vertebrate species richness across the Miocene-Pliocene boundary at Lothagam in the Turkana Basin, Kenya. In 2017, I presented a poster at SVP and will be presenting an oral presentation at GSA in October.

December 2015, I graduated Montana State University with a Bachelor of Science, Magma Cum Laude, in Earth Sciences with a concentration in Paleontology. I also graduated with an Honor’s degree and a minor in Museum Studies. During my time associated with MSU, I’ve worked three field seasons at Egg Mountain with Jack Horner and David Varricchio and I am currently doing prep work in the Museum of the Rockies’ paleontology lab for Jack. Even before I started MSU, I was invited by Frankie Jackson to be an intern of MSU’s MSSE Field Class. In 2013, I was in the last group to be a part of MSU’s Department of Earth Sciences International Research Experience for Students trip to Hangzhou, Zhejiang in China where we spent 5 weeks doing research in dinosaur eggs with the Zhejiang Natural History Museum. As a follow-up from our research conducted on Dictyoolithus eggs, I applied and received a USP grant to continue research on samples we brought back from China. I finished an internship at MOR this summer and fall for my Museum Studies minor that culminated in a research project which I presented at SVP in Dallas and an oral presentation at GSA in Baltimore.