Alumni Updates

Maggie Demorest

Environmental Studies, 2024

Maggie graduated with an Environmental Studies Degree with an emphasis in Ecology and Conservation from Cal Poly Humboldt in the spring of 2024. For the next year, she continued working at Freshwater Elementary School as an Instructional Aide, After School Program lead, and Nature Club teacher. She worked there until starting the Watershed Stewards Program (WSP) in October 2025. Her site placement as a WSP Corpsmember is with the Eel River Watershed Improvement Group and the CCC-Fortuna Fisheries Department. This position grants her the opportunity to help restore the Eel River Watershed through habitat surveys, spawner surveys, designing and conducting large wood installations that provide stream diversity and salmonid habitat. She also has the pleasure of being able to plan the Creek Days Environmental Education Fair, which provides over 300 elementary school students with hands-on environmental education every spring. Maggie says it is a blessing to be able to blend my environmental studies background with direct field work while exploring the beauty of Humboldt County every day. 

Paige Williams

Environmental Studies, 2016

Paige has been living in Portland for the past 10 years and working as a software engineer for the past six years, mostly trying to work on applying software to environmental justice issues. Paige worked at a startup that was monitoring air quality in environmental justice communities for five years. She recently started working as a software engineer at Ecotrust, a non-profit based in Portland that works at the intersection of equity, environment, and economy. Paige has been focused on an Indigenous knowledge database, which has been built in partnership with the Tribal Marine Stewardship Network. She is excited about working with tribes in the Humboldt area. Ecotrust also has a partnership with Cal Poly Humboldt on their Indigenous Agroforestry Network. Paige says working here has really felt like a full-circle moment. She cites her interdisciplinary degree as one of the successes she's had over the past 10 years. She feels that it has given her a compass for which to apply her skills.

Ira Goldstein

Geography, 1991

Ira has been a Watchmaker for over 30 years, but he will always be a Geographer at heart. Ira still loves looking at maps and traveling with his wife Barbara, whom he met at Humboldt. Ira owns a Timekeeper watch repair in Eagle, Idaho. 

Brian Brown

Forestry & Wildland Resources, 1990

Brian retired in 2025 after 21 years leading the California Project WET (Water Education for Teachers) program with the Water Education Foundation and 32 years as an Education Specialist at the Forestry Institute for Teachers, a program of the California Society of American Foresters. His entire career post Humboldt has been dedicated to educating K-12 students, teachers, and the general public about science and management of natural resources using much of what he learned in the HSU Forestry and Social Sciences teaching program - and plenty more learned from all the amazing teachers and partners he worked with since 1990. 

Brian retired, moved to Missouri, and was married in September of 2025, and now he finds himself standing at the same crossroads he stood on upon graduation from Humboldt. He's spent all these years on the path of teaching and education, and he is now enjoying the start of his journey into forest and land management, as he learns about the forests and other habitats of the Missouri Ozarks right in his own backyard. Life has been and continues to be quite an adventure!

Steven Berke

Geography, 1974

Steve has lived in North Idaho for the past 40 years. He has had careers as a cartographer, landman, and right-of-way agent. Steve is currently retired and enjoying traveling and golf.

David Mackey

Geography, 1983

David currently serves as the Senior Manager of the Procure to Pay team at Cerus Corporation, where he works at the global headquarters located in Concord, California. He lives in Martinez, California, which is conveniently close to his workplace.

David began his educational journey at Cal Poly Humboldt, graduating in 1983. He then pursued a Master of International Business at the Monterey Institute of International Studies, completing his degree in 1988. His background in geography provided a strong foundation for his specialization in International Trade Management, a focus that has been instrumental throughout his career.

Over the past 30 years, David has held managerial roles in global operations and processes across seven different companies within the Bio-Tech, Pharma, and Medical Devices sectors. His passion for geography has enabled him to make significant contributions to various projects and operations, including establishing new sites worldwide, sourcing materials globally, providing support to international customers, and managing export and import operations along with their associated regulations.

Throughout his career, David has undertaken two expatriate assignments: one in Paris, where he supported the Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region, and another in Singapore, overseeing operations in the Asia Pacific region. When not on assignment abroad, he primarily operates from an office in the San Francisco Bay Area. For more information about his professional background, David can be found on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/davidwmackey.

Mark McKenna

Environmental Science & Management, 2024

Mark has been fully employed since April 2025 by the East Bay Regional Park District as a Park Services Attendant, currently working at Lake Del Valle in Livermore, CA, and plans to move up to Naturalist within the same company. 

Christopher Tuck

Geography, 2024

Since graduating from Humboldt with a double major in Geography and Geospatial Science & Technology, Chris has been working as a Location Intelligence Analyst (GIS Analyst) at GHD, a global Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) firm. He provides GIS support on a wide range of projects taking place across North America and sometimes other parts of the world. His day-to-day roles involve data management, spatial analysis, and figure/map production for contaminated site assessments, environmental permitting, transportation planning, utilities and infrastructure mapping, sea level rise impact assessments, and the list goes on. A recent and significant project that he had the opportunity to work on was a stormwater features data collection effort for Del Norte County, where they gathered the location of nearly 12,000 spatial features, including stormwater pipes, culverts, channels/ditches, junctions, outfalls, manholes, and drainage inlets with a high-accuracy GPS unit. Chris started at GHD's Eureka office as an intern but has since been promoted to a full-time role and relocated to their Concord, California, office in the East Bay Area. 

LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christopher-tuck-b47684283/?lipi=urn%3Ali%3Apage%3Ad_flagship3_profile_view_base_contact_details%3BDXlkvIq1Qc6%2BgYZi%2BmBZ7g%3D%3D

Lowell Cottle

Geography, 1998

After graduation, Lowell stayed in Trinidad for a few years and ran the first private kayaking company there, North Coast Adventures. After leaving Trinidad, he worked as an environmental consultant in Humboldt and Mendocino Counties, doing stormwater monitoring, sampling, and stream restoration on Caltrans, PG&E, and privately funded projects. Lowell moved to Folsom in 2019 and now works as a Senior Environmental Scientist for the Regional Water Quality Control Board for the State. There, he supervises two compliance and enforcement units, making sure construction and industrial sites are doing the right thing and not harming our most precious resource, water. He oversees about 2,600 permitted sites across most of the 22 counties and still gets into the field regularly with his teams. He says he really loves working for the Water Board, it's a very challenging but fulfilling job...and his company loves Humboldt Grads! They hire Environmental Scientists (Geography grads are especially welcome!), Geologists, Engineers, and anyone with a science background. He would love to hear from my old classmates or anyone else from the Geography Department - Cheers!

David Kmetovic

Natural Resources, 1975

David attended HSU from 1973-1975, earning a degree in Natural Resources. Returning to Santa Cruz after graduation, he started my own small consulting firm, Kmetovic and Associates, primarily writing Environmental Impact Reports under CEQA criteria. He then moved to the Bay Area, working for larger firms, followed by a move to Portland to begin a family. His last position as a Project Manager was for Intel, managing the design and construction of a large cryogenic nitrogen system. 

His time at Humboldt was inspiring; being in the presence of dedicated professors such as Stanley Harris is something he still appreciates over 50 years later.

At Humboldt, David also grew to love basketball, playing weekends in the old gym. At 73, he says he is lucky to still be running full court. He's written an appreciation piece that is planned to appear soon.