Known for her distinctive laugh and eating cucumbers, Cassie Stitzman is a first generation college student pursuing her bachelor’s in Fisheries and Wildlife Management at Northern Michigan University. Cassie is an active volunteer of the Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Science Lab on campus, where she assists in the Yooper Wildlife Watch project that studies Marquette County wildlife. She is also the secretary of the Northern Michigan University Fisheries and Wildlife Association, whose mission is to immerse students into the field and network with professionals. Cassie was a dog daycare attendant for two years, and is notorious for working multiple jobs along with additional projects. Wildlife has always been the fire that fuels Cassie during hardships, and always felt a connection to nature. The resiliency wildlife possesses in nature’s brutality is her reminder that all hardships can be withstood. As a new member to the Conservation Data Lab, Cassie has developed maps of Mississippi National Forests using LANDFIRE data. Cassie hopes to learn more about geographic information systems and R software to broaden her skill set for the wildlife field. Cassie has yet to find her role in conservation, but has a variety of interests including mesocarnivores, species reintroduction programs, and conservation detection dog work.