Will Smith - MS student

        I graduated from North Carolina State University at Raleigh in May of 2003 with a degree in Zoology.  My focus had been in vertebrate anatomy and physiology.  After taking a class in Marine Biology and living at the beach for two summers, I decided that it was time to concentrate on a field that kept me outside and in the water.  The solution: fisheries.  My first fisheries employment was with the Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit at State, and it had me on the Deep River (a tributary to the Cape Fear River) tracking flathead catfish using radio telemetry, on the Roanoke River setting up side-scanning acoustic arrays and a fish wheel, on the Neuse River pulling plankton nets for fish eggs, and conducting fish surveys using both boat and backpack electrofishers.  When my time at the Coop Unit was completed, I was “hooked” and ready to sign up for graduate school.

        I landed a graduate assistantship at the University of North Carolina Wilmington under the direction of Dr. Fred Scharf in the spring of 2005.  My assignment is to assess the effects of recent management changes in the southern flounder fishery of North Carolina.  The method to complete this task has been to conduct a tag-return study in the New River, NC to examine changes in harvest pressure and population demographics.  In addition to my graduate work, I have been working with other fisheries graduate students at UNCW to start a student subunit of the American Fisheries Society.  Such an organization would be beneficial to students looking to network with professionals or seeking jobs and beneficial to professors who are looking for potential field technicians or future graduate students. 

        Will completed his MS degree at UNCW in December 2007 and is currently working on a PhD in Tom Kwak's fisheries lab at North Carolina State University.