She has been at Ball State since 2003. Her teaching interests are in climatology, meteorology, and Geographic Information Systems (GIS). Her research interests are in climatology (especially hydroclimatology and climate change), spatial modeling of human-environment relationships, and quantitative methods. She is also interested in the influence of the physical environment on human population, as well as using GIS in education. Her current research is in the development of a rules-based spatial population distribution model founded on environmental characteristics. She was also selected for participation in a competitive National Science Foundation (NSF) workshop on spatial analysis and GIS in undergraduate education, and recently presented at the American Geophysical Union (AGU) and the Association of American Geographers (AAG) meetings. She earned her PhD in climatology from the University of Delaware.