My MycoAction Plan: Merje Toome

Increasing interest in plant pathogenic fungi among students at university level

My MycoAction Plan focuses on the grassroots need for better mycological awareness through education.
At university, students are exposed to many exciting subjects and only very few of them have prior
mycological interest and knowledge. Therefore mycology lecturers need to awaken this interest and
motivate young potential scientists to study mycology. I am especially interested in fungi that are plant
pathogens and therefore my “mycoaction plan” is focusing on ways I can increase interest and spread
knowledge about pathogenic fungi among students mostly at undergraduate level.
Collaboration
Contact agricultural companies and nature reserves to arrange field trips with students to various
environments where plants may be infected by fungi. By becoming aware of the significance of plant
pathogens in our everyday life, students often grasp the importance and beauty of this research area.
Invite visiting lecturers from other universities or work groups to talk about their specific research or
extension projects to enrich the course for students and also enable me to learn from other colleagues.
Education
Organize “outdoor sessions” during the mycology and plant pathology classes. If students realize that
fungi are everywhere and they can find them even without having prior knowledge about them, it
increases their interest to find more and learn how to identify their collected specimens.
Propose opportunities for students to do individual research (both literature and lab based) and enable
them to collect points toward their final scores for doing that.
Vary teaching methods used in class (group work, individual work, short and long term projects, labs
etc.) and provide ample time during and after classes to answer questions and discuss with students
who would like to do so. This enables more interactive classes and gives an opportunity to every
student to show what they have learned. It is important that students would enjoy coming to class and
remember it as a good time while learning.
Assign individual sample collections before classes. This way the students can work on their own
material which is often from the vicinity of their home and might be of higher interest than just dried
specimens provided by the lecturer.
Promotion
Inform students by email about activities and newspaper articles connected to mycology or plant
pathology and by having a positive and enthusiastic attitude, show that fungi can be very exciting
subjects to study.
Translate mycological or plant pathological materials to Estonian to enable Estonian students to
receive the necessary information in their mother tongue.
Answer the readers‟ questions about plant pathogenic fungi in local horticultural journals and garden
related magazines and draw the attention of students to these articles.
To follow my plan and achieve my goal to educate students about plant pathogenic fungi, it is very
important to stay active in research and acquire new teaching skills at the same time. I believe that
exchanging experiences and ideas with fellow mycology lecturers is essential, since in the modern world
it is very important to keep the courses innovative and interactive, which in my opinion is a key to
motivating students and providing good education.
Nicole Hynson: Personal Mycoaction Plan
Collaboration: currently I am a member of the Mycological Society of America. I
am directly involved with the society as a member of the Ecology Committee and by
attending MSA‟s annual meetings. As a postdoctoral researcher I actively recruit new
student members for the society and encourage them to contribute papers for the annual
meeting. I am also an active participant in amateur mycological clubs in California, and
collaborate with other academic mycologists both in the U.S. and abroad.
Promotion: It is important to spotlight fungal research in journals with broad
readership so that mycology gains more national and international attention. Because the
majority of my research involves the study of plant symbiotic fungi many of my studies
have been published in top-tier non-mycological journals such as New Phytologist. I plan
to continue publishing in these traditionally more plant-focused journals as well as
publishing in journals grounded in ecology such as Oecologia. In addition to my
publications in peer-reviewed academic journals I also contribute to amateur naturalist
newsletters and clubs through invited articles and guest lectures. Through grant writing to
both federal agencies, such as NSF, and private foundations I am continually seeking-out
support for mycological research. I devote at least one-quarter to one-half of my time to
the efforts listed above.
Education: I am a strong advocate for education to promote and sustain the field
of mycology. I was fortunate to have had many excellent mentors in mycology and I see
teaching and mentoring as critical components of my career. As a Graduate Student
Instructor I taught undergraduate courses in fungal biology and mushroom identification.
Currently as a postdoc, I work closely with five graduate and two undergraduate students
on fungal related research projects. I provide these students with training in molecular
methods in mycology, and share information on the biology and ecology of the fungi they
are working with. I hope that through these interactions my enthusiasm for fungi is at
least somewhat infectious. As an assistant professor I plan to create a new course on
fungal biology and mushroom identification to train a new generation of students in
mycology. I will also continue my outreach efforts by staying involved with local
naturalist clubs.
Conservation: Because my research is largely based on public lands, I regularly
interact with government biologists and land managers. As an outreach and conservation
effort I am currently organizing a cross-agency meeting to provide information on the
role of symbiotic fungi in abetting plant invasions. At this meeting we will also workshop
tractable management practices that could help to limit the negative effects of these plant
and fungal introductions. Concurrently, an additional component of my research involves
using DNA fingerprinting methods to analyze the diversity of fungi in various
ecosystems. The DNA sequences I collect from fungi, along with fungal fruit bodies are
always deposited into either international databases such as NCBI‟s Genbank, or into
local University‟s herbaria. Under both circumstances, these records are readily available
to researchers and the general public through the Internet and will hopefully be useful for
future biodiversity conservation efforts.
Summary: My dedication to teaching, and my work in the field of fungal ecology
both stem from my sense of responsibility to maintain a livable world for future
generations. Furthermore, advocating for mycology is a key component of my career.
My Educational and Outreach Myco-Action Plan by Peter Avis
This plan is in-action and has two parts: I) Courses and II) Outreach. It aims to increase the number of students and
people in the Northwest Indiana region exposed to mycology:

I) Courses: I teach courses that regularly educate students about fungi. The main course is called ―Fungi‖ (BIOL
L351, lecture, ~12 students per course; and L352, lab, ~6 students). I use a modern phylogenetic-based approach I
believe does well to attract and educate students. I first taught this course in a traditional ―bottom up‖ way (i.e.
starting with basal lineages and working up the tree) but shifted to a ―top down‖ approach (i.e. I now start with
basidiomycetes). I did this because I found that students had a better experience when starting with familiarity (i.e.
mushrooms) and expanding from there. In addition, I pulled the lectures into a lab setting instead of lecture hall in
order to get all students, even those not enrolled in the lab (an unfortunate nuance that the IU system allows), to
handle and observe fungi in the flesh, macro- and microscopically during every lecture. The more IUN students
directly engage fungi, the better I say, because our students tend to get a relatively poor education in organismal
biology in general. To date, I have taught this course twice („09, ‟ 11, right now!) in the spring semester but will
teach it in the future during fall semesters. This shift will have an important impact on the class as from the very
beginning we will foray in local habitats and build a semester long collections-based project into the lecture and lab.
Although the forays and collections are the most interest generating aspect of the course (based student evaluations),
it‟ s a limited option during the January start of a spring semester. The lab section uses a combination of
morphology, culturing and molecular methods (see http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlKR9M8xR5Y and
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X91IPLZyjfY ). In the other courses I teach, though not focused on fungi, I
strive to always include mycology where relevant (e.g. intro bio students learn about ―sugar fungus beer maker‖
during their studies of cellular respiration). I teach these other courses more regularly and to more students, so even
these small kernels of mycological intrigue lead many students to take the ―Fungi‖ course when offered and/or to
generate enthusiasm for a deeper study of fungi.

II) Outreach: My outreach activities are focused at exposing students and the public to the interest and importance of
fungi. At a small scale and during peak mushroom fruiting periods, I put out an annotated and labeled daily to
weekly display of fresh fungi outside my office door in a high-traffic hallway. I know this raises interest because of
the number people who make unsolicited stops, ask questions, and bring me collections out of the blue. At a larger
scale, my research has been on display at museums (Field Museum, Bell Museum). Via teaching outreach to local
high schools and research talks to local/regional groups, fungi are typically the focal points of generating student
enthusiasm and recruiting efforts. Last, I direct a unique ecological monitoring project (NIRMI) that aids restoration-
minded organizations and individuals. In the future, NIRMI will include an emphasis on fungi in restorations in
addition to current measures
Peter Kennedy FESIN 2011 ―Mycoaction‖ plan

As a graduate student and post-doc at UC Berkeley I received extensive training in mycology. Since
taking a faculty position, however, I have only been able to maintain a mycological focus in my research.
While I am happy to have a active research laboratory and train individual students in fungal ecology, I would
very much like to extend my efforts in mycology to the courses I teach as well as greater outreach to the public.
At Lewis & Clark College, I teach an upper division microbiology course, which currently includes only a small
module on fungi (3 lectures). Given its importance, I feel that exposing undergraduates from diverse
backgrounds to fungal biology is essential, especially since there are no other classes about fungi at my college.
To improve that portion of the class, I am excited to interact with other experienced faculty members at the
workshop and discuss ideas about how to best teach about fungi. In particular, I am interested in learning about
experiments used in mycology laboratory courses, which I could adapt to the laboratory portion of my
microbiology course. Lewis & Clark puts a premium on experimentation in their labs, so adding an
experimental mycology lab to my current laboratory course would be excellent.

The second way that I would like to increase knowledge about fungi is by creating a new podcast about
fungi. I have searched the internet extensively and found many excellent science podcasts, but none specifically
devoted to fungi. I particularly like the format of ―This Week in Virology‖ and would like to model a podcast
about fungi after that podcast. I am envisioning one or two other co-hosts who are experts in other areas of
mycology. The bi-weekly podcast would involve discussing scientific research about fungi, interviewing
mycologists about their research and how they got into mycology, and responding to listener e-mail. Seeing the
success and diverse audience for podcasts such as TWIV, I am convinced this new media format would be a
great way to spread the word about the science of mycology beyond the traditional bounds of academia and
hopefully inspire a new generation of mycologists. Attending this year‘s FESIN workshop would be a great
way for me to network with like-minded scientists and discuss ways to best create a mycologically-focused
podcast.
Personal MycoAction Plan for Anthony Amend
Collaboration
· I have renewed my membership to MSA for 2011.
· Last year I led a FESIN workshop on data analysis, and this year I plan lead a similar
workshop for my labmates at my University.
· I am attending a workshop later in the month to submit an NSF network grant to
coordinate research on symbioses. I‟m proposing to fund further studies on fungi
involved in Coral symbioses, which has heretofore been largely ignored.
· I am an active member of the Beta Diversity working group for the International Census
of Marine Microbes in which I am presently the only researcher analyzing patterns of
marine myco-plankton.
Promotion
· All of my recent papers have been published in non-mycological journals.
· Last year I presented for a local mushroom society, published a non-scientific paper on
Matsutake which was widely syndicated, and was interviewed by the popular press
about my research.
· This year I plan to join my new amateur mushroom group (the San Diego Mycological
Society) and join them for forays.
· This year I created a website to promote my mycological research. I hope to expand on
this site to include a periodic, common-interest blog.
· I will continue to answer every e-mail about my research and every inquiry into my nonexistent
lab in a polite and timely manne.
· Although I don‟t actually have a permanent job yet, I sincerely hope to introduce a
Mushroom Society in the location of my future employ.
· I wear MSA and Berkeley mycology t-shirts out in public and have a mushroom tattoo
on my ankle.
Education
· I am currently mentoring one graduate student and one undergraduate student. Next
year I hope to have my own lab and students researching mycological themes.
· This year I have already presented my research at Sonoma State University, UC Irvine,
UC Berkeley and University of Hawaii. I have been invited to speak at Stanford and at
UC Riverside at some point later this year.
· I am in the process of applying for and interviewing for teaching positions. Although the
majority of these jobs are in departments organized around other organisms (e.g. plants
and microbes) it is my desire to either teach mycology or instill aspects of mycology into
more general courses.
Conservation
· This year I participated in the survey of Mushrooms of Yosemite and deposited georeferenced
mushroom material and DNA to the UC Berkeley herbarium.
· This year I deposited over 1,000,000 DNA sequences to public repositories. Because I
think that the SRA archive at NCBI is difficult to navigate, I also published critical
metadata on my website for others to download and use.
Personal MycoAction Plan Stephen Russell
Collaboration

o MSA, NAMA, NEMF, Asheville Foray

o Brown County State Park – May 7th and others

o Particularly efforts in bioremediation and mycorrhiza

ification, ecology,
etc.

Promotion
-mycological organizations each year (Local
nature groups, gardening clubs, etc).
online.

Education

online for the benefit of others.

detect potential ecological associations.

o Particularly biochemistry, molecular biology, mycorrhiza, terrestrial ecosystem ecology

week to find and identify fungi

Conservation

i)
– permaculture, gardening, etc
– how can we incorporate mycoremediation?
o April – Phytoremediation & Bacterial bioremediation at Bloomington, IN park
MycoAction plan for promoting mycological education in Australia Alistair McTaggart
Students wishing to study mycology within Australia often have to look outside universities for an education.
Mycology is not offered as a subject at most universities, and can only be studied in conjunction with plant
pathology. To incorporate mycology into a university curriculum it would be necessary to do so in a
systematic and molecular context, attaching a morphological focus as a secondary outcome. It is important to
provide a link between Herbaria, industries and the universities so that there are options available for students
who want to take mycology further. The university education should focus on training in systematics and
provide a broad understanding of fungi. This would then be built on by collaboration with external parties. If
I were to include fungi in my future teaching, the two crucial steps would be collaboration and promotion.
Collaboration would expand my resources, and promotion would secure students and funding, and make fungi
known within the wider scientific community. Collaboration --•
] Develop overseas contacts to help draw support and build resources. --•
] Develop ties with Australian mycologists from non--•]
university institutes, such as Herbaria and agricultural industries, to seek their expertise and encourage their
participation in education of students. --•
] Begin a mycological focus group within a university or Government institute to discuss literature and
conduct surveys. Promotion --•
] Promote the importance of fungi within schools of Life Science and Ecology at Universities. --•
] Advertise new species descriptions and the vast amount of fungi awaiting discovery. --•
] Ensure that mycology is attractive to students by incorporating field trips and interesting practical work into
the curriculum. Education --•
] As a primary step, offer workshops on different groups of fungi, allowing students to collect and identify
specimens and become familiar with the systematics of the major groups. --•
] Incorporate fungal examples into discussions on all aspects of biology, such as ecological studies,
biodiversity studies, phylogenetics and latest scientific techniques (e.g. pyrosequencing and ecological
genomics).
Conservation --•
] Make students aware of fungal biodiversity and the potential wealth of undeveloped compounds, biocontrols
and panaceas that may be available within the fungal kingdom. --•
] Promote the conservation of all environments, as they are a habitat to unknown fungi.
MycoAction Plan
else c vellinga
Mycological community
• start a program to record and voucher 100 selected species in the U.S.A., in connection
with Mushroom Observer (www.mushroomobserver.org). The selection has to
encompass easily identifiable, epigeous species, some widespread, some regional,
some ectomycorrhizal, some parasitic and some saprotrophic.
• start a program to report, record, and voucher a set of exotic ectomycorrhizal and
saprotrophic species, such as Suillus luteus, Hydnangium carneum, Amanita phalloides,
Clathrus ruber, and Leratiomyces ceres.
• serve as „mycological godmother‟ for inexperienced authors (students, amateur
mycologists) and coach them through the process of publishing their taxonomic
work.
• develop new talks on fungi and mushrooms, focusing on spore dispersal, life histories,
and ecological roles.
• write articles for the newsletters of amateur mycological societies.
Publicity
• in coordination with other fungal taxonomists send information on new species to the
press, to show that new fungal species are being discovered here in the U.S.A., and to
draw the attention to organisms that are considered less charismatic than rain forest
frogs, deep sea creatures, and soft-furred, big-eyed mammals.
• select a state mushroom for California and lobby for its recognition in collaboration with
the various California mushroom clubs.
Local community
• give talks for public gardens and gardeners (such as San Francisco Botanical Garden,
and Berkeley Garden Club).
• participate once a year in a science fair of a local elementary school
• inform the local parks and natural areas on their fungal communities and interesting
species.
• make before the 2011 fall mushroom season a mushroom poster for the Shorebird Park
Nature Center in Berkeley and other similar nature centers in the area.
• wear once a week a mycological t-shirt.
• make name cards for the mushrooms in gardens encountered on my daily walk, with
reference to a blog with more information (similar to the yarnbombing that takes
place in our area).
Valerie Wong

Although today mycology occupies a large portion of my life, I am ashamed to admit that through years of
education and training n biology (2 years of which were next door to a Saccharomyces lab!), I only thought of
fungi in the context of pizza toppings or fridge mold. However sad this may be, I suspect that I am in good
company.It is a generous high school or small college curriculum that spends even a single day on fungi. As a
convert to the •gunderground movement•h, my mycoaction plan focuses on a combination of basic research,
curriculum development, and outreach. I am near graduation and at a point in my career where I can soon
develop and apply ideas from the upcoming FESIN workshop. As a graduate student I have been doing
research on mycorrhizal symbiosis and Penicillium genomics. As an active part of the scientific community,
I have presented my findings at domestic and international conferences (several MSA meetings and
IMC9). In the course of my research I have had the pleasure of mentoring an undergraduate in the lab. As
a postdoc, I will be working on the genomics and genetics of fungal endophytes, an understudied area with
a hyperdiversity of species. However, while basic research is critical to expanding our understanding of
fungi, readers of scientific papers usually already have a healthy appreciation for fungi. Mycology is an
acutely underrecognized field, and this stems from low awareness in the general populace and scientists
alike. Education at all levels is critical for addressing this viscous circle. At UC Berkeley I have taught
laboratory classes in Biology of Fungi to science majors interested in an intensive introduction to fungi.
This is a class with growing enrollment, but it is also important to reach a broader audience. Mycology is
often thought of as a specialty field too narrow for general biology. While teaching non--•]majors courses
such as Genetic Revolutions and the Science of Living Organisms, I have reworked the curricula in my
discussion sections to include examples from fungi in unconventional ways. or instance, I expanded a unit
on sex chromosomes in vertebrates to include mating types in fungi. For most of these students, an
introductory course is their only exposure to biology, much less fungi. My long term career goal is to
become an educator as well as a researcher, and in that capacity I will continue teaching mycology and
nfusing mycology into classes not specifically devoted to he discipline. The first day f essions at FESIN
will be very helpful in informing my future teaching practices and curriculum development. As a
biochemist by training with a focus on genetics and genomics, I am especially interested in ways to
incorporate evolution, ecology, and systematics. Outreach to the non--•]university population is critical
for spreading the word about fungi beyond the ivory tower. I have given talks about my research to
mycological societies such as MSSF and SOMA as well as to students at Berkeley City College. I have
volunteered for the past six years at the MSSF Fungus Fair, an annual event attracting thousands of people.
I have also taken the mycology message to children by teaching a mushroom lesson to ESL students at
Downer Elementary School and presenting fungi at the Pleasant Hill Elementary School Science Fair.
These experiences have been extremely gratifying, and I wish to continue participating further in such
outreach efforts. I look forward to the second day at FESIN
Education-focused personal MycoAction plan
Louis Lamit
Introduction: As a scientist in training, and someone who came to mycology through a sordid ecology
and botany focused past, I have a long road to travel before I become confident with myself as a “true”
mycologist and mycology teacher. The following MycoAction plan reflects my need for more personal
mycological education and my goals associated with teaching, because the two goals are complementary.
Personal mycology education goals
a.) Become more skilled at identification
- Spend more time keying lichens and mushrooms in the field and lab, including working
through difficult places in keys that involve microscopy and staining.
- Attempt to morphologically identify endophyte cultures isolated during my dissertation
work, instead of just skipping directly to sequencing.
- Spend time identifying at least 3-5 additional fungi that I would not usually collect each
time I go foraging for wild mushrooms (I admit that it is really easy to focus on the easily
identifiable edibles and disregard others such as the less charismatic LBMs).
b.) Develop a deeper understanding of the fungal phylogeny
- Spend more time reading and dissecting the major fungal phylogenetic works to
developed a stronger working knowledge of current hypotheses about how different
clades related to each other.
Near future mycology education goals
a.) As a participant in the Graduate Fellows in K through 12 Education (GK-12) program next
year, strive to integrate fungi into the lessons I deliver.
- Develop an endophyte culturing module to examine endophyte diversity between
different host plants, and highlight hidden fungal communities all around us.
- Develop a mycorrhizal inoculum study with corn, to demonstrate the powerful effects
fungi have on plants, and highlight the beautiful AMF structures hidden in roots.
- Develop a lichen survey to show how substrate pH affects lichens. This will
incorporate themes on biodiversity, chemistry and mathematics (graphing the simple
y=mx +b equation of pH predicting lichens).
b.) Help lead both informal and more formalized mushroom forays during the rainy season with
the local community. Informally, I have many friends in the community who want to learn more
about fungi, and there may also be opportunities to volunteer at local educational organizations.
c.) Set up a fungus education table at the next Flagstaff Festival of Science.
Distant future mycology education goals
a.) Teach courses in mycology at the university level.
b.) Become involved in the local mushroom society (start one if there is not one).
c.) Supervise graduate and undergraduate students in fungal research.
c.) Raise non-mycophobic children
- First daughter coming June 2011!
Posy Busby
MycoAction Plan
Collaboration
I am a member of the Mycological Society of America, and plan to present my work at the 2011
annual meeting, and in future meetings. By participating in the FESIN Workshop, I hope to interact with
and learn from a range of mycologists (from PhD students to tenured faculty) that are committed to
integrating mycology into biology education.
Promotion
Fungi can be the most diverse and influential organisms in an ecosystem, yet they are vastly
understudied and underappreciated. Developing new ways to educate students and the public on the
importance of fungi will help promote and expand the field of mycology. Much as the human
microbiome has become appreciated for it’s integral role in human health, my future teaching and
outreach will emphasize the importance of fungi for plants.
In the past, I have shared my experiences and knowledge with teachers and students in local
schools, and centers for environmental education. Most recently, I visited local schools in the Bay Area
to help teachers incorporate field ecology into traditional curriculum. This outreach is part of a Stanford
SEEDS project (“Ecology in temperate and tropical ecosystems: A tool to improving graduate and K‐12
education and to foster graduate student/teacher interaction”) that connects graduate students in
Rodolfo Dirzo’s lab with classrooms in underserved local schools. This project integrates field
experiences into a traditional curriculum to inspire students to study ecology and conservation, and to
appreciate biodiversity. My personal objective is to integrate fungi into these types of programs, which
could be as simple as sampling sporocarp diversity in the playground. In addition to integrating
mycology into local schools, broad outreach will also be important for educating the public on the
importance of fungi. For example, my PhD work on fungal pathogens and endophytes is being
promoted in an NSF sponsored PBS documentary on cottonwoods.
Education
My PhD research has provided two undergraduate students with field and laboratory experience
in mycology. In a future teaching and research position, I will supervise undergraduate and graduate
students studying plant‐fungi interactions. I also plan to design a field and laboratory mycology course
that allows students to participate in ongoing research in my lab. For example, students can test
hypotheses about the role of fungi in plant nutrient acquisition or disease resistance by conducting
inoculation experiments in a greenhouse.
Conservation
Discovering and protecting fungal biodiversity is an important objective of conservation biology.
In my PhD research, I have collected several fungal specimens that will be submitted to the Systematic
Mycology and Microbiology Laboratory Fungal Database. I am also describing a new species of Septoria
in an upcoming publication. An important component of my future research and teaching will be
describing new fungi, and determining their functional roles in plants.
Stephen Miller
MycoAction Plan
Education
The ubiquitous nature of fungi permeates throughout our ecosystem and daily lives. However, despite the unique
roles fungi play in our daily lives and environment, mycology is often overshadowed by its bigger siblings of Botany
and Microbiology. The presence of mycology in many undergraduate courses is often rare and is quickly covered
and forgotten in general biology classes. I believe education among undergraduate classes as well educating children
in elementary to high school is key to addressing the perception and knowledge mycology faces.
Recently, I had an opportunity to go to a career day at a school where my sister is a third grade teacher. I had a
wonderful time telling students about locations that I got to travel to and study, and all the unique opportunities
available in mycology. I also talked about my research with one of the high school biology teachers there. He was
very fascinated by the work I was doing in mycology. I told him I would love to come to his class and talk with his
students and possibly go on a small nature walk around the school to locate and identify plant diseases as well as
other fungi.
I have also arranged a day where I will be going in to my sister‘s 3rd grade class room to do fun experiments
involved in fungi. There are many experiments and lesson plans on APS.net as well as in pamphlets such as ―How
the mushroom got its spots‖. I plan on spending the day with the third grade students doing some of the simple
experiments with the children. Getting younger students interested in mycology now, will justify the need for in
depth mycology education in the future.
Conservation
Currently I am doing a thorough culturing of foliar endophytes in Cornus spp. as well as using metagenomics to
identify the diversity within the foliage. I plan to store and identify these cultures and to secure them within the
Rutgers University herbarium where a list of available cultures is online. I also would like to contact the director of
the mycology collection to let him know that I am available for identification on particular groups I am familiar with,
updating as often as I can.
Promotion
I plan on starting a blog about my work and experiences with fungi. When doing an internet such on botany, it is
easy to find many blogs, even sites listing the top 50 botany blogs. There are very few blogs involving mycology.
There are also many master gardeners and other lectures given by Rutgers extension. I will contact the extension
specialists to let them know I am available for giving talks to non-scientists and try to get at least 1 talk each year.
Promote the need to take mycology at a graduate level and encourage students to take more advanced mycology.
Promote mycology classes offered in Plant Sciences in the ecology department and vice versa. Finally, I plan to
identify mycologists in other departments and encourage them to join MSA this year and collaborate with them in
giving various presentations or nature walks.
Personal ―MycoAction Plan‖ ( sensu Hawksworth, 2003) Yazmin Rivera
The proposed ―MycoAction Plan‖ described below is designed to increase the fungal literacy among younger
generations with the final objective of increasing the number of graduate students and future scientists informed and
interested in mycology. Outreach programs involving academic institutions and local schools are a crucial element of
this plan. This will take action during my current and future academic positions and will be developed further as I
gather feedback from students and colleagues and workshops such as that offered by FESIN.
Objective
- To design and deliver mycology-related outreach activities for different groups outside the academic community.
- To promote mycology-related activities in the undergraduate academic curriculum as well as in local school
programs.

Collaboration
- Identify local teachers or schools to start collaborations and incorporate mycology-related activities into their
science curriculum.
- Engage other mycologists in the area to participate in already established outreach programs at least once a year.
- Involve local amateur Mycological Clubs in Outreach Programs and serve as a liaison with local schools and higher
education institutions.

Promotion
- Advertise Nature Walks/Mushroom Forays to the local community and organize mushroom forays and shows/fairs
with activities targeted to middle school or high school students. This can be done through ongoing collaboration
with local schools or teachers and local amateur Mycological Clubs.

Education
- Identify areas of interest by age group in order to design activities targeted specifically to each group.
- Evaluate general biology, genetics and other undergraduate courses and identify laboratory activities that can be
modified to incorporate fungi.

Conservation
- Increase awareness on the local population about fungi and their different role in the environment through
newsletters.
- Describe and document visited sites and share this information with other scientists.
- Contribute to local herbaria by depositing specimens in a regular basis.

Reference: Hawksworth, D.L. (2003) Monitoring and safeguarding fungal resources worldwide: the need for an
international collaborative MycoAction Plan. Fungal Diversity 13:29-45.
MycoAction Plan Allison Walker

I plan to include fungi in my future teaching and outreach activities as follows:

Give one marine mycology talk per year to undergraduates
Give at least one mycology talk to non-scientist audience per year e.g. Gulf States Mycological Society, Mississippi
Coast Audubon Society
Continue to mentor at least one undergraduate research project in mycology per semester
Create field opportunities in marine mycology for undergraduate and graduate students as part of the University of
Southern Mississippi‘s Gulf Coast Research Laboratory‘s Summer Field Program, modeled on the curriculum
developed by Jinx Campbell and myself for a 2009 two-week summer field class. Examples include half-day
kayaking trips to collect saltmarsh fungi with identification lab in afternoon and excursions to barrier islands and
local mainland beaches to collect intertidal fungi followed by lab ID. The full two-week class includes basic culture
and preservation techniques for marine fungi, and could also include basic molecular biology techniques – DNA
extraction and PCR.
Lead or coordinate a local fungus walk each year for both students and naturalists
Invite aquatic and marine mycologists and mycology students to speak at USM GCRL Seminar Series and USM
GCRL Graduate Student Symposium each spring
Continue to maintain informational fungi signs on USM GCRL campus nature trail and bayou boardwalk
Incorporate fungi into local Mississippi Coast events via booth with interactive displays e.g. Pascagoula River
Nature Festival, Walter Anderson Art Festival. In the past I have helped developed an interactive marine fungal
touchtank with saltmarsh mesocosm
Continue the interactive ―Fungal Jungle‖ program I have developed at GCRL for regional Girl Scout activities
hosted on campus – one-day introduction to coastal fungi & their ecological role, basic microscope use and
identification
Create an informational marine fungi video to be shown in classrooms as part of the USM GCRL Marine Education
Center‘s Mobile Classroom program
Continue to promote fungi as judge of fungi- and lichen-related projects at Ocean Springs High School annual
Science Fair
Leonora Bittleston

MYCOACTION PLAN—LEONORA BITTLESTON

My personal MycoAction plan has two distinct parts and varying timescales:

VISIBILITY AND GENERAL AWARENESS:

Fungi tend to be difficult to see, and this fact may partly contribute to the dearth of studies on fungi, as we are a
very visual species. Often fungi are hidden in substrate: soil, wood, leaves, or animals. Mushrooms that
occasionally appear do not tell the whole story of extensive underground mycelia, and myriad associations with
diverse organisms.
Microbiologists have developed many tools that make microscopic fungi easier to study, but awareness of the
many fungi around us has not advanced as quickly. A few ways to increase the metaphorical visibility of fungi
are through joining societies, collaborating with other scientists, speaking publicly, and publishing in widely
read journals.
• Join the Mycological Society of America in order to stay updated on issues in fungal biology, and to meet
and collaborate with other mycologists.
• Give a fungal-themed talk at least once a year to the scientific community or to non-scientists
• Continue to publish on fungi in broad-interest journals in order to reach a wider readership

EDUCATION AND OUTREACH:

Education is essential for increasing understanding of the world around us. My experience as a biology
undergraduate student underscores the need for aspects of mycology to be included in introductory courses.
Many natural science students graduate without realizing that fungi are a large and fascinating group of
organisms that are intricately linked to our own survival and fitness. I believe that a basic knowledge of fungi
introduced early in middle school, high school or undergraduate education will increase the amount of
people who study mycology, and who are curious about how fungi figure into other disciplines.
• As part of my NSF fellowship, I plan to create a Fungal Bingo game in collaboration with local children in
the Malaysian part of Borneo. I will bring cheap digital cameras and take classes on nature walks to
learn about and document local fungi. I will use the children‘s photographs to make a laminated bingo game
that will assist in recognizing the wide diversity of shapes, colors and functions among fungi.
• During my time at Harvard University I plan to be a graduate teaching assistant for a Biology of Fungi
course. I will organize and direct the laboratory section of the class, and help students to learn about fungi.
• In the future, I hope to become a professor, and I plan to bring mycology into my own teaching. Whether I
teach ecology, evolution, symbiosis, entomology or mycology, fungi will be an integral aspect of the courses
and I will dedicate time to interactions between different organisms.
Emily Bruns

Personal Myco--•]Action plan Teaching My educational goals are to find ways of including fungi into the
curriculum of general biology, ecology, and evolution, since these are courses I will likely teach down the
road. I have thought the most about how to incorporate fungi into an evolution course, since I had the
opportunity to develop an evolution syllabus through a •gPreparing Future Faculty•h course I participated
in. Here are some ideas I came up with: . Replace the over--•]used example of the evolution of anti--
•]biotic resistance in bacteria with examples of rapid evolution in fungi, such as evolution of irulence in
cereal rusts or evolution f fungicide resistance in Candida. . Emphasize the diversity of eukaryotes when
discussing the history of life, rather than focusing solely on plants and animals. Drive home the point that
fungi are more closely related to animals than they are to plants. . Develop abs that use fungi to explore key
concepts in evolution. I saw a good example of this in a course taught by Brett Couch, where students gained
hands on experience inferring phylogenies by sequencing the 18S region of cold--•]tolerant yeasts from
Antarctica and adding this sequence into a larger fungal phylogeny with sequences from AFTOL. . Use fungi
as model organisms when discussing genetics instead of relying solely on plant and animal models.
Emphasize the important contributions of work on Neurospora and Aspergillus to our current understanding
of genetics. One way that I can act on these teaching goals as a graduate student is to seek out opportunities
to guest lecture. I gave a guest lecture to a freshman biology course at the Saint Catherine•fs on plant
defenses that included examples of endophytic fungi that contribute to plant defense in grasses. Public out--
•]reach I was fortunate enough to grown up in a household that properlyappreciated f unga ldiversity, but
many people never learn about fungi until college (if at all!) My personal public out--•]reach goal is to
introduce elementary school kids to the fascinating world of fungi by developing and teaching hands--•]on
science lessons for K--•]12 kids that focus on Fungi. I have already taught one lesson on fungal diversity in
a fourth grade Minneapolis classroom. I want to develop a second lesson focused on fungi as decomposers.
Both of these lessons will be deposited in the permanent teaching portfolio for Teach .SMART, the volunteer
organization I work with, so that it is available for others to use.
„Mycoaction‟ plan Linda van Diepen
Several departments at the University of New Hampshire, including that with which
I‟m affiliated (Natural resources & the Environment), have either a direct or indirect
connection with mycology. However, of all the classes being taught at these departments
only one is a true mycology class and in the other classes, fungi represent only a part (in
many cases minor) of the class-curriculum.
Ever since I started my graduate studies in ecosystem ecology in 2004, my interest in
fungi and their physiology/ecology has developed into a quest to understand the function
of fungi within ecosystem processes, particularly relating soil fungal diversity to
function. However, during my graduate studies I did not have access to a good basic
mycology class. I mostly gained my current knowledge about fungi and their role with
ecosystem ecology through my own research and the reading of books and publications.
Even if a basic mycology class would not be feasible within a school‟s curriculum, I see
great importance in giving mycology more prominence within other classes, and clearly
stress the link between fungi and the subject of a particular class.
Within my graduate studies, I did not gain extensive teaching experience. However,
within my previous postdoc at the University of Michigan, I had the unique opportunity
to take a teaching course that demonstrated the different teaching styles and emphasized
“active learning” by stepping away from the standard lecture-style classes. Taking this
course, and through the practical mini-classes I have taught to elementary student groups,
I am convinced that the “active learning” teaching style would be a great way of
introducing fungi to students of any knowledge level.
In my current postdoc position I will be teaching a couple of classes within two
different courses; Studio Soils and Soil Ecology and currently both courses discuss fungi
at some level. Attending the FESIN workshop would directly benefit my teaching in
these two courses, and will give me the opportunity to incorporate fungi in the classroom.
In particular, as the term „Studio‟ might indicate already, this class has a unique format
using „active learning‟ in a group setting instead of lectures. And we hope to implement
that teaching style in the Soil Ecology course as well, which will give me a first hand
opportunity to apply the ideas and new teaching tools I gain during the FESIN workshop
in this course.
The teaching experience I will gain within my current postdoc will pave the way to the
teaching I will be doing in my future academic career. I aspire to continue doing research
to understand the role of fungi in ecosystem processes in combination with teaching and
outreach activities in which I hope to convey my enthusiasm for fungi. I envision
teaching classes such as soil biology and global change ecology, in which there will be
great opportunities to illustrate the relevance of fungi in many different ways. As within
any research field, it‟s important to have scientist from different disciplines presenting
their perspectives on issues to ensure complete understanding and awareness as well as
enhancing communication between disciplines. I believe that the FESIN workshop will
greatly enhance communication between scientists using mycology to any degree within
their teaching and/or research, and therefore hope I will be able to participate in the
workshop.
PERSONAL MYCOACTION PLAN FOR MATTHEW P. NELSEN
Summary: I have found teaching about mycology (both as a teaching assistant as well as to
naturalists and the general public) to be one of the most rewarding and fulfilling experiences I
have had as a graduate student. Moreover, these are also some of the most important experiences
I have had, as I feel it is vital to educate specialists and non-specialists alike about these
extremely important yet often overlooked organisms. Once finished with my PhD, I hope to teach
courses in mycology, evolution and symbiotic associations. In the latter two courses, fungal case
studies will be used to explore evolutionary trends and the nature and evolution of symbiotic
associations. Until such a time, I will focus my efforts towards educating the general public and
interested naturalists about fungi. Below I have outlined a MycoAction plan detailing how I
intend to achieve this goal.
Collaboration
Increase my involvement in Illinois Mycological Association by attending meetings and
forays.
Work together with other area mycologists to organize fungal forays/workshops geared
towards naturalists.
Promotion
Continue assisting with and explaining the lichen display at Field Museum‟s Member‟s
Night.
Participate in the Pritzker Lab‟s (Field Museum) “Talk to the Scientist” hour and discuss
my research (which focuses on lichen-forming fungi) with the general public.
Contribute to Tom Volk‟s “Fungus of the Month” webpage.
Education
Continue leading walks and giving talks to naturalists.
Organize a more in-depth workshop on lichens for naturalists (2-3 day workshop where
microscopes and chemicals can be used).
Inquire about setting up a mycological table at “Dozin‟ with the Dinos”. Several nights a
year, parents and children purchase tickets to spend the night in the Field Museum where
they participate in various activities. This would be an excellent opportunity to reach out
to young kids teach them about fungi.
Create a “Rapid Color Guide” for commonly encountered lichens of the Chicago region.
(http://fm2.fieldmuseum.org/plantguides/rcg_intro.asp)
Conservation
Continue attending fungal forays (which typically are focused on non-lichenized
macrofungi) to both learn more about non-lichenized fungi as well as to teach others
about lichen-forming fungi.
Begin recording lists of lichenized taxa observed during weekend visits to parks.
 Mycoaction Plan Jon Carver
Collaboration:
Join the Mycological Society of America (MSA) and attend their annual meeting in 2011
o Make connections with researchers at this meeting to share ideas and potentially collaborate on
research into dark septate endophytes
o Contact mycologists that may be interested in giving a talk for the proposed mycology club at
UWL
Involve undergraduate students with the mycology research I will be conducting at UWL
Promotion:
Work with other graduate students to start a mycology club at UWL where we can encourage the
participation of the university students and faculty as well as the wider La Crosse community
Present an educational poster at the 2011 MSA meeting which will then also be published online
Write an article about fungi for my undergraduate college‘s magazine, and for the ―where are they now‖
section of my hometown newspaper
Write up research findings and submit them for publication in a well read mycology journal
Education:
Actively try to incorporate fungal biology into the introductory biology labs I currently teach.
Specifically, discuss the ecological role of fungi during the ecology and biodiversity labs and cover the
fungal cell type during the cell labs.
Lead forays for La Crosse community members and for the proposed mycology club
Design and teach educational workshops on mushroom identification and other topics of interest to the
mycology club and greater La Crosse community
Publish the fungus of the month page I have created on Lycogala epidendrum as well as prepare several
more fungus of the month pages during the summer months.
Eventually apply for teaching positions at the university level, where I can teach classes in mycology as
well as incorporate mycology into other subject matters I will teach, such as general biology and botany.
Conservation:
As part of my research on fungal endophytes of agricultural crops I will create voucher cultures that will
be sent to fungal herbaria (mycaria?, fungaria?) as well as isolate DNA samples from those cultures
which will then be sent to genetic banks for storage.
Emphasize the importance of conservation and collection practices as part of the mycology club and
local forays
Personal Mycoaction Plan – Andrew Wilson
My experience in mycology is long and diverse. From my undergraduate years at
San Francisco State University, through graduate school at Clark University in
Massachusetts to my current postdoctoral position at the Chicago Botanic Garden, I have
either been deeply involved in fungal education. As a student, I have had the benefit of
taking mycology courses from Dr. Dennis Desjardin who initially inspired me to be come a
mycologist through his contagious enthusiasm for fungi. I have had the fortune of working
with and being mentored by him, along with Dr. David Hibbett and now Dr. Greg Mueller.
Their influence has helped me develop into a mycologist that not only loves to study fungi,
but also to teach about them and share their wonders with the rest of the world.
Since my early years in graduate school, I have had numerous opportunities to
teach mycology. First I was a TA for Dennis‟ spring fungi course in the Sierras. Later, as
a Ph.D. student, I helped David run a workshop for high school biology teachers. This was
an AFTOL program that was designed to help teachers incorporate fungi into their
curriculum. I later helped TA a First Semester Biology Seminar where students were
involved in a semester long project that used molecular tools to explore fungal diversity. I
have also mentored many students interested in exploring questions in mycology. The
projects studied fungal systematics and used molecular tools to describe ectomycorrhizal
and saprotrophic fungal communities. I am currently working with a couple undergraduate
students exploring the question of how the leaf litter from invasive buckthorn (Rhamnus
cathartica) affects the composition of fungi communities compared to those found under
native oaks. This project requires the use of complex techniques in molecular biology
making my job as a mentor that much more challenging.
Despite the challenges, I remain enthusiastic about teaching mycology to students
at all levels and I hope that I am able to impart some of my enthusiasm to others. This is in
part why I intend to continue my career in academia where I hope to instruct future
scientists in how to study fungi, but also to teach about fungal diversity from both
ecological and evolutionary perspectives. To this end I‟ve been working towards building
a course in fungal biology that could be taught to undergraduates. This course would
involve a regular lecture that would help instruct students about fungal biology. However,
there would also be a laboratory component that would incorporate traditional mycology
(culturing, microscopy, morphological taxonomy) with more recent molecular methods
used to describe fungal diversity and ecology.
In addition to teaching in the classroom, I feel it is important to communicate about
fungi to society at large. This is where amateur societies play such an important role since
they are the bridge between the scientists and laypeople. As the president of the Illinois
Mycological Association, I try to help foster a greater understanding of fungal biology, and
how mycologists such as myself study them. To this end I anticipate sharing my
experiences of this workshop and the overall MSA meeting in Fairbanks AK, with the
IMA upon my return.
I am eager to understand how fungal biology is going to be taught to future
mycologists, given the rapid advance of next generation sequencing technology. In
addition, how will we describe the exciting new discoveries that these innovations bring to
society in general. To this end I am very eager to participate in the FESIN metamycology
and beyond workshop to discuss and develop ways to instruct the next generation of
mycologists.
Naupaka Zimmerman
Personal MycoAction Plan – April 2011
Collaboration
Encourage other graduate students in ecology to join the Mycological Society of
America if they are studying fungi.
Encourage the department to hire at least one mycologist or fungal specialist
when making new hiring decisions
Give a lab talk in a mycology lab local to my research (Brian Perry‟s lab at UH
Hilo) and continue to pursue collaborations on projects there
Promotion
Highlighting the beauty of fungi via photography – either colorful and unique
fruiting bodies, or the spectacular patterns some make when you grow them on
culture media. Submit a fungal picture to the EcoArt competition this year at the
ESA meeting.
Write an article about my endophyte research for the local Hawaii paper
explaining these fungi
Education
Continue to engage undergraduate through „BioCore Explorations‟ courses
focused on foliar fungal endophytes as a fantastic system with which to introduce
ecological concepts of succession, community assembly, diversity (alpha, beta,
gamma) and richness, nested communities, and interactions across kingdoms.
These short courses I have taught are entitled “Phyte Club: The Secret Fungal
Communities within Leaves”.
Highlight fungi in lectures on ecological concepts – from community assembly
(endophytes), to species interactions (mycorrhizae), to nutrient cycling
Learn about species of fungi local to wherever I am teaching, and take students on
mini-forays to look for interesting species of fungi and lead them in thinking
about how those fungi fit into the system they are a part of – e.g. what species of
tree are they under? What are the biophysical implications of their sporocarp
morphology – height for spores to drop from etc?
Mentor undergraduates working on honors projects related to fungi
Conservation
Contribute to the describing the distribution and help to understand the ecosystem
function of foliar endophytes in Hawaii
Submit all sequence information (well-annotated and cleaned) to public databases
for future analyses
Find a place in Hawaii to maintain a culture collection of endophytes cultured
from leaves (perhaps in collaboration with Brian Perry or Don Hemmes at UHH?)
MYCOACTIONPLAN
- Mia Rose Maltz

Kingdom Fungi is composed of diverse organisms spanning a variety of nutritional modes. Over the past billion years 1, fungi
have co-evolved with plants, animals, and bacteria.2 Members of Kingdom Fungi have functioned as keystone organisms,
performing ecosystem services such as decomposing detritus and supplying nutrients to plants.3 Studying fungi offers numerous
opportunities to explore these ecological relationships.
Habitat is disappearing at an alarming rate, however our ability to document and analyze molecular sequences from fungal taxa is
rapidly increasing. It is important to document fungi through describing rare taxa, extracting DNA, and analyzing their
phylogenetic relationships within the fungal tree of life. With the support of facilities, such as the Center for Genome Research and
Biocomputing at Oregon State University4, mycological researchers can use computer programs to elucidate patterns and meaning
from environmental sampling, metagenomic approaches, and high throughput sequencing. Despite these current advancements,
most amateur mycologists, biology teachers, and researchers in remote locations do not have access to these sophisticated tools.
Many teachers struggle to meet state-standardized integrated curriculum, therefore biology classes often lack depth with regards
to mycological education. However, the development and refinement of a regional standardized mycological curriculum for use in
the classroom, laboratory, and field, can alleviate pressure on overworked teachers, while providing activities within a variety of
modalities geared towards different experiential learning types.5
Guided mushroom forays can educate students about identifying, describing, and depositing fungal specimens in herbaria. As
mycological societies provide lesson plans, exercises, and resources for teachers, students will have the opportunity to learn about
fungi through unusual subjects including history, reading, science, mathematics, statistics, photography, chemistry, microbiology,
and biocomputing. Senior mycologists can mentor junior mycologists through programs that inform junior mycologists about
advancements in the discipline. Subsequently, junior mycologists are required to mentor high school students and undergraduates
regarding careers paths in mycological research.
One component of my outreach activities includes educating Peralta Elementary School Children in Oakland, California. I inform
these young children about fungal ecology, mushroom cultivation, and fungal biodegradation. Currently, these students are
creating art projects about mycology and they are collaborating with the Amazon Mycorenewal Project (AMP) to produce
mycological graphic art comic books. These comic books depict a fungal life cycle, including the absorptive nutritional mode of
saprotrophic fungi that may be capable of biodegrading petroleum hydrocarbons in the Ecuadorian Amazon and beyond. These
graphic art comic books are intended to be used by AMP during our summer service learning course, by AMP‟s interns, and as an
outreach tool to educate non-english speaking people about the role of fungi in ecosystem function.
As a result of my fundraising efforts, AMP initiated Ecuador‟s first mycological society: Sociedad Kallambas Ecuador (SKE.) In my
2011 Myco-Action Plan: I will submit the Ecuadorian directory of mycologists and connect SKE to the Asociación Latinoamericana de
Micología. Since 2008, SKE6 and AMP 7 have launched websites and collaborated on fungal biology projects, Myco-Tours, and
Service Learning courses offered for college credit for students from UC Santa Cruz, NYU, Johns Hopkins University, and Bard
College.
Education 2011 MycoAction Plan
• January Host a training about AMP for potential interns at the Occidental Arts and Ecology Center
• April Begin a grant-writing internship for AMP interns to research and apply for grants for future funding
• May Create the syllabus and facilitate the 2011 Service Learning Course in Ecuador with an emphasis on microscopy,
culturing, depositing specimens in the herbaria, and molecular extractions from fungi
• June Further develop our molecular capabilities with Dr. Rosario Briones, the largest curator of mushroom collections in
Ecuador, in the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador in Quito and the Regional Representative for Ecuador to the Latin
American Association of Mycology (Asociación Latinoamericana de Micología)
• October Apply for the NSF GK-12 Grant through UC Irvine to teach about my research in Orange County, CA schools
Research 2011 MycoAction Plan
• June Identify petro-tolerant fungal taxa that are growing out of a contaminated matrix
• July Document and describe fungal, microbial, and botanical taxa within a petroleum pollution gradient
• July Identify the most appropriate substrate for growing saprotrophic fungi in the region (e.g., agricultural byproducts,
debris fields, renewable resources)
• December Purchase land in Ecuador that will be set up as a fungal ecology plot and a long term ecological research site
Action 2011 MycoAction Plan
• July Provide local leaders with the materials, mentors, and skill sets for implement „low-tech‟ mushroom cultivation,
ecological restoration, and biodegradation technologies within their communities
• August Promote medicinal mushroom research in the Ecuadorian Amazon with an intern from Johns Hopkins University
• July Document the Jardin Mycologica with Sr. Paul Gamboa at Universidad Central del Ecuador.
“Mycoaction plan” Ester Gaya
First of all I would like to mention that, as an undergrad and graduate student at the University of
Barcelona I had the luck of attending Mycology classes, totally apart from the Botany classes. We had a
long history of teaching mycology there, and one of my supervisors was the Professor Xavier Llimona,
the „father‟ of the Mycology in Spain. Xavier‟s mentorship was really inspiring and he was the one that
made me want to teach mycology and form new students. He taught me all his tricks and ways of making
mycology classes exciting and engaging for my students. Since then I have always tried to improve my
teaching skills.
My dream would be to teach mycology and lichenology in a broad sense with an interdisciplinary
approach, including systematics, evolutionary biology, ecology, conservation biology, and biodiversity in
general. As my field of expertise is lichenology, I would focus on it as an example. First, I would like to
perform an initial training on the existing biodiversity. We can‟t pose further questions if our students do
not have an in depth knowledge of the species diversity of the group of fungi they are working on. This
first stage would include a great deal of field exploration, learning microscopy and a brief introduction
into taxonomy. Then, I could introduce them into the molecular techniques and culturing. This would
allow them to start developing more evolutionary questions. With the field experience, they should be
able to learn a bit of geology and substrate preferences, as in the case of lichens the substrate is
determinant of the type of communities you can find. Conservation biology could be taught through the
introduction of lichens as bioindicators. The students could select specific areas and construct their own
maps and indexes if bioindication. This is a perfect tool as it forces them to have a thorough knowledge of
the area, including species richness, types of substrates, land use, air pollution, etc.
Additionally, I have several outreaching activities in mind. As part of my participation of an NSF
granted project (Systematics program) on a group of lichens (Teloschistales), I plan to develop a home
page with a digital database of macro- and microphotographs of representatives of Teloschistales and
identification keys. This group of lichens is easy to spot in the field, as they are mostly orange. Many
amateurs often come to me with fresh specimens. I hope this web page will give them a first tool to
identify the material on their own.
During my collection field trips to South America, I contacted several undergraduate and
graduate students, some of them not involved in mycology yet, which helped me with the fieldwork. After
this experience, I have engaged them to continue pursuing studies on the local diversity. We have
established long distance collaborations. I help them with species identifications, publication writing, they
present posters at local meetings, and keep collecting material. I plan to continue and enlarge this small
network of collaboration with young students. So far I maintain the contact with a master student in
Mexico (Ricardo Miranda, UNAM), a undergraduate student in Peru (Daniel Ramos, Arequipa), and a
graduate student in Chile (Reinaldo Vargas, Universidad de Concepción and Universidad de Santiago).
From all my collections, I always leave duplicates that are properly deposited and labeled in the local
herbaria (e.g., UNAM, SANT), and write reports for local institutions like CONAF in Chile. Actually, I
committed myself to send preliminary species lists of what I collected to the CONAF guards in Pan de
Azucar NP, Llanos del Challe NP, and Fray Jorge NP (Chile).
In 2008, I participated in a Tropical Lichen Course (organized by Robert Lücking (FMNH) and
Maria de los Ángeles Herrera Campos (UNAM)). I would like to follow this initiative and continue
participating and organizing this type of workshops.
Also, I would like to organize initiatives to train Primary and High School teachers. In 2001, I
collaborated in the course „Introduction to lichens. Methods and applications‟(Direcció General
d‟Ordenació i Innovació Educativa, Catalan Government) that gave interesting results.
Additionally, with my former supervisor, Xavier Llimona, we plan to keep translating to Spanish
and Catalan essential mycological books, as he did with his „Hongos de España y Europa‟ and „Líquenes,
musgos y hepáticas‟ (Omega ed.), as well as booklets for undergrads in Spain, summarizing the main
findings currently published in mycology, funded by the Ministry of Education in Spain.-
Personal MycoAction Plan --- Matthew J. Foltz --- University of Wisconsin-La Crosse
Promotion:
Write a mycology-related article for the local newspaper (The La Crosse Tribune) to make people in my
community more aware of the fungal diversity in the driftless region of Wisconsin.
Prepare fungal diversity fact pamphlets to hand out at the local morel-buying stands.
Start up a local mushroom-hunting club in western Wisconsin (where there isn‟t one).
Search for sponsors for the proposed mushroom-hunting club --- the local Co-op grocery might be willing to
sponsor the club or a specific event because they have sponsored other outdoor educational activities for the
community in the past.
I try to integrate fungi into any subject I teach. I‟ve found useful ways to incorporate fungi into the biology
labs
I‟ve taught. Yeast, for example are great tools for demonstrating concepts of cellular respiration. Fungi can be
taught at any grade level and I‟ve found that many students are curious to know more about them.
Prepare fungi fact pamphlets for the local nature centers (Myrick Park nature center) and parks in my area
(Perrot
State Park). These pamphlets could have information on symbioses, edible & poisonous mushrooms, etc.
Design flyers to advertise the proposed mushroom-hunting club and post them around town. Local coffee
shops
and the Co-op grocery have bulletin boards in visible locations that would be perfect for this purpose.
Design a website for the mushroom hunting club. Websites can provide an easy way for people to learn
more
about the club and they help to organize information in a way that is accessible to most people.
Education:
Continue studying mycology by applying for Ph.D. programs after completing my masters degree.
Donate educational fungi posters to schools and colleges in my area (I‟ve already created one on Nobel
Prize
winning fungi, presented at the annual MSA meeting in 2008).
Prepare mushroom identification workshops for the mushroom club I want to start. These would be helpful to
teach basic methods of comparing different fungal structures and learning terms commonly used in field
guides.
Give educational presentations to the local mushroom club to provide them with a more thorough
understanding
of mycology. These could include a presentation I‟ve designed on fungal nutrition and symbiosis.
Collaborate with the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse to use their microscopes for my workshops.
Volunteer to lead educational forays for children through the local nature center (Myrick Park) to spark their
interest at an early age to ensure future generations of mycologists.
Give fungi-related talks whenever possible to academic and non-academic audiences.
Communicate with other scientists (botanists, microbiologists, ecologists, etc.) to provide them with a better
understanding of the challenges mycologists face so that we can work together to promote mycology.
Conservation:
Publish the results of my systematic research on cryptic chanterelles in a fungal journal such as Mycologia.
Deposit type collections and voucher specimens in a respected herbarium such as the Farlow Herbarium.
Make genetic information available to the largest audience possible by posting my sequences to GenBank.
Document all suspected undescribed fungi that I find and send collections to researchers able to process
these
samples for further analysis. In La Crosse, for example, we find what appears to be undescribed fungi each
year.
Contact conservation groups and parks services to try to get more interest in conserving fungi in the
Midwest.
Give talks at land conservancy conferences. This April I spoke at such a conference in northern Wisconsin
and the
presentation was well received. The promoters of the event informed me that there is a lot of interest in
such talks.
 Christopher M. Sthultz
Myco-action plan
My current personal myco-action plan includes focuses in areas I feel are necessary in educating myself,
students, other scientists, and the general public about the importance fungi have in our world.
RESEARCH:
As a community and ecosystem ecologist I feel that fungi being used as model systems in the field are
greatly underrepresented. Many of the theories and practices of the field focus on the macro organisms of
the ecosystem, and when microbes are included it is often focused on bacteria. So to help further increase
the exposure of the importance of fungi in ecology I aim to do the following through my continued
research.
Continue to do research focusing on the interaction between plants and fungi, importance of fungi in
ecosystem function, and global change influences on fungal ecology and evolution.
Strive to include one collaborator from a different university/organization and from a different field of
expertise in each research project.
Attend and Present research findings at the annual meeting of Mycological Society of America and/or
Ecological Society of America
Attend and Present research findings at one international meeting at least once every 3 years. This
increases the chance for cross-continental collaborations.
Give research presentations focused on fungi at two outside universities per year.
Publish at least 1 paper in a non-mycology focused journal each year, exposing the importance of fungi
to a broader audience.
OUTREACH/EDUCATION:
One problem mycology has is a crisis of perception, where the public‟s exposure to fungi is often limited
to mushrooms. They are unaware that fungi exist all around us, in every shovel full of soil, in and on
almost all the tissues of plants, and even are important in the production of much of their food. I aim to
do the following to increase knowledge and exposure of the wonder of the fungi.
Sponsor, host, and guide at least four “fungal walk” events for the communities I am living and working in
each year. Exposing the community to the fungi which exist all around them.
Teach a workshop on mushroom cultivation for local gardeners each year.
Work with Anne Pringle to distribute a “Fungal Bingo” game which uses beautiful images of fungi,
including lichens to expose local elementary school children to the startling diversity of color and form in
their local mycota.
Schedule at least 3 talks a year to middle school and high school age kids about the importance of fungi.
Give one research related talk to a non-scientist audience each year.
TEACHING:
Although not able to teach while completing my post-doc at Harvard, the ideal position that I would take
for the next step of my career would allow me to do the following.
Teach a course on mycology, or biology or ecology of the fungi.
Included basic mycology based information in the curriculum of lower level introductory biology classes.
This type of exposure is almost never included at the introductory level.
Find and implement fungal examples in the teachings of basic ecology classes I would teach. For example
the role of fungi as decomposers in explaining global carbon cycles.
Take on and mentor at least one undergraduate or graduate student each year to complete a research project
on fungal ecology
Mycoaction Plan for Merlin White
Background: In truth, I had not heard of a Mycoaction Plan until I read of this opportunity to attend the FESIN workshop and noted
the additional challenge of trying to come up with one for this application. As such, please kindly consider this to be the first draft of
my Mycoaction plan but one that I will hold close at heart and will be eager to improve upon during the meeting and for the rest of
my mycological journey.
Teaching, Collaboration and Outreach: Whereas I have only mentioned Mycology thus far (in my cover letter) I also teach Symbiosis
and Diversity of Life (specifically, the Non-Animal half of our Intro. Biology Course). In the letter two courses, there is a strong
mycological undertone that is natural for me both from a personal perspective and also from a desire to try to get the mycological
message out there whenever the opportunity presents itself. In my mycology class I also attempt to collaborate with mycologists
and colleagues locally by involving them with my Mycology Course -- for example 1) each year I have Dr. Roger Rosentreter
(mycologist and lichenologist working at BLM in Boise) lead a lecture and field trip on soil crusts which are which are so significant to
the success and longevity of the sagebrush steppe habitat all around and 2) I have had Bob Chehey and Genille Steiner (members of
the Southern Idaho Mycological Association or SIMA, associated with NAMA) join us and help lead local field trips for my mycology
class to demonstrate and discuss the finer points of mushroom collecting --- it is a great help for the students as they later pursue
their own Macrofungi for their semester long class collection/project. Field trips are a major component of my class as I feel it is so
important for the students to know where these organisms live what they do and how they feel and what they smell like etc.
Amongst the activities typically planned for a semester are a trip to the local microbrewery as part of the industrial mycology portion
of class and an all-day Saturday field trip to the Rocky Mountains Foothills just north of here where they can search for macrofungi
for their collections. Both of these are consistently noted that highlights of the class and a real pleasure to take part in for me
personally.
Occasionally I will have opportunities and occasions to share with kindergarten students that come through the University -- dried
macrofungi -- you know, the impressive stuff(!) but then also small boxes of things like Myxcomycetes that are nice to pull off the
shelf as well. I've written a couple pieces (Inoculum last year) or at least been mentioned in a couple newsletters and campus paper
stories but I know that this venue needs to be better pursued. One of my grad students (Emma Wilson) just heard yesterday that her
recent outreach activity with high school students, collecting aquatic insects and telling them about the gut fungi that live inside
them (something I prompted her to do for our current NSF grant), will be listed in this week's “Update” volume, which is out of Boise
State's marketing department. So I think we are doing some things “the right way” but I also know that my webpage needs to be
rebuilt and updated and so on to catch all of such outreach opportunities.
Integration of Teaching and Research: None of the students that have taken mycology have not also sat in my own research lab
chairs and used my research equipment to try and dissect their own gut fungi from the digestive tracts of aquatic insects that we
collect in the Boise River behind the science building on campus. The main point here is that during all that I do with my teaching
and research I try to establish a sense of curiosity for nature, appreciation for what it has to offer and an enhanced awareness of
what is out there -- both in general terms but also around the theme of fungi, whenever possible, of course. Thus I suspect that
some of what I do pretty raw and admittedly unbridled but certainly delivered with passion. Nothing has surprised me more,
perhaps, than how rewarding I find it to be to take my students with me to mycological meetings and share with them the network
of folks working on fungi. I feel grateful and fortunate to be doing this for the third year in a row.
From what I can ascertain, my Mycoaction plan lacks a bit of organization, but at its core the idea of it is one that I think can
be molded and is one that I will be happy and eager to carry forward as I do so.
 Andy Hart
The formation of a local mycology club will facilitate the promotion of mycology in the community, education,
conservation, and allow me to collaborate with junior and professional mycologists alike. To promote knowledge of
mycology, the club will be open to junior mycologists from the community. The club will serve as an appropriate forum to
invite professional mycology speakers and allow me to give presentations on identification techniques, safety, ecology, and
conservation. The club will help with ongoing diversity studies through forays I organize. Through the club I will promote
MSA membership.
In addition to the formation of a mycology club, I will be doing other things to promote mycology, collaborate, take
part in conservation, and educate. I will also be speaking for my hometown Boy Scout Troop 247 and high school biology class
on mushrooms, their edibility, toxicity, and diversity. I will be presenting a poster on mycotoxins at the AMA meeting this year.
I will keep my presentation up to date with current mycology discoveries and paradigms. I look forward to making my
contribution to the field professionally and introducing the general population to what they consider to be the largely mysterious
field of mycology. To see a more complete outline of my plans to promote, collaborate, conserve, and educate, please
refer to the following pages. Thank you for your consideration.
Promotion I plan to give a talk or poster presentation to my hometown high school science class on mushrooms, their edibility,
toxins, and ecology.
Even though there is a strong community of amateur mycologists in La Crosse, there is no formal mycology club. I plan to
found an amateur mycology club to promote forays and public awareness of their local fungal diversity. Through this club
I will promote a safe situation for amateur mycologists to learn mushrooms identification and fungi in general.
Mycology club membership will be open to the public in order to promote mycology awareness in the community.
If, in the future there are issues regarding fungi in the news, I will write a letter to the editor to promote mycology and thank
them for their interest as well.
Lastly, I will set aside time on a weekly basis to refine my presentations in order to incorporate current topics.

Education
I will be presenting a poster at the AMA meeting called ―Toxins in my food? An educational poster on Mycotoxins.‖
As part of starting a mycology club, I will lead forays with my knowledge from past diversity study experience in the
drifteless region of surrounding La Crosse.
The club will serve as good forum to invite guest speakers Taylor Lockwood, Todd Omundson and others. I will also give
a presentation on fungal diversity in the driftless region and basic identification skills they will need to know.
My Boy Scout Troop 247 has invited me to give an information talk on fungi in the near future. Depending upon their
response to the presentation I will look into how to go about creating a new merit badge regarding survival mushroom
foraging or something along those lines. I also have ideas to incorporate a fungal section to the existing Environmental
Studies and Wilderness Survival merit badges.
I will be a teacher assistant for the Medical Mycology and Introductory Mycology lab courses here in La Crosse.

Conservation
Dr. Tom Volk has already started a long term fungal diversity study of the driftless region in which I have been contributing
to for the last year. I will continue to contribute to this study for as long as I am in the area and use sequence information to
identify specimens that appear to be new species or variations.
As part of the diversity study, I consult http://mushroomobserver.org for identification and observation critiques. If a
collector indicates a need for herbarium specimens I will collect and deliver them if they are found in my region.
Collaboration
I will join the MSA this year.
I am presenting an educational poster at this year‘s meeting: Toxins in my food? An educational poster on Mycotoxins.
My interesting in attending mushroom forays will allow me to meet and work with mycologists wherever I might
travel.
The aforementioned mycology club will be started in collaboration with fellow mycologist Jonathan Carver, other
members of the Volk lab, and mycologists from the area.
Personal Mycoaction Plan Austin Booth
My interest in fungi may seem a bit unusual, as I am trained as a philosopher. Certainly
many of the philosophers I interact with think so. In any case, my exposure to the biology of
the fungi has had an important role in my own thinking about the nature of living things. It
is my belief that I can play a role in bringing fungi to the attention of a group of people who
don’t normally consider them. I can achieve this through public speaking, publishing, and
teaching.
I tend to interact with students and researchers with quite diverse interests. Philosophers
are fans of unusual cases that challenge intuitive ways of thinking. Those philosophers who
spend their time thinking about and studying the science of living things are especially fond
of real-world cases that put pressure on our standard ways of categorizing organisms. Fungi
are a particularly good example of organisms that break all the rules; they’re renegades. As
such, they’re very interesting organisms to think about. Fungi are rarely discussed in
philosophical contexts, however. As my dissertation research progresses, fungal biology is
coming to play a bigger and bigger role. I have presented some of my ideas to a group of
undergraduate philosophers and biologists at Harvard University. My hope is to soon
publish an article on the intricacies of fungal population biology in a philosophy journal.
Eventually, I would like to teach a course featuring various aspects of fungal biology, in
particular their relevance to evolutionary thinking. Philosophers of biology are particularly
interested in foundational issues surrounding the theory of natural selection. So there is no
doubt that I’ll continue to be involved in the education of these issues in the future. Taking
fungal biology seriously changes the way we must think about evolving populations and the
individuals that comprise them. Thus any course concerning selection theory will, for me at
any rate, be an opportunity to discuss various aspects of fungal biology.
FESIN TRAVEL AWARD APPLICATION – Romina O. Gazis
As a doctorate student soon to graduate, this coming FESIN 2011 workshop presents me with the opportunity to acquire
many of the tools to start my professional life. More importantly will give me the chance to learn from the teaching
experiences and strategies used by well established mycologists. During my graduate studies, I have been a teaching
assistant for mycology courses directed mainly to undergraduate level students. During these experiences I noticed that
students start the semester with a genuinely interest in learning about Fungi; however, they soon lose their enthusiasm
when they are overload with theoretical information. Mycology is a vast field which requires the acquisition of a great
amount of knowledge just to grasp an understanding of their diversity in processes, function, and ecological roles.
Consequently, this task might discourage young students into future perusing a career in mycology. Nonetheless, I
believe that the field and their members can strongly benefit from the recruitment of students in their early years of
college. New generations can bring novel ideas and insightful questions to the research arena. To achieve this goal, I
consider that both, early career mycologists and the ones that are already established should take “hands into action”
by promoting the study of Fungi within their audience. Within this context I would like to propose a more interactive
way of teaching mycology, with methods that can be modified depending on the interests of the students and the
current problems that society face (i.e. invasive species, dissemination of fungal diseases into important crops, the
search for biocontrol agents etc). My graduate research has involved a great amount of field work, having to collaborate
with foreigner institutions in order to collect the necessary data for my project. During that time, I have had the
opportunity of hiring young local students interested in mycology as field assistants. I have experienced their enthusiasm
and curiosity on the fungal world and, at the same time, I have witnessed their concerns on their ability to gain and
retain the information they were given in their mycology classes. One of their main concerns is the process of learning
Fungi taxonomy. The important of taxonomy cannot be denied and should be an essential component of any syllabi;
however, I believe it should be introduced to the student in a more appealing way. Nowadays with the inevitable and
increasing changes in our environment, students are more concern on answering ecological questions than in learning
classification and nomenclature. Fortunately, the advances in genomics, phylogenetics, and computer sciences can offer
them the essential tools to help them build their projects around those contemporary questions. We, as scientists that
believe in the importance of the study of Fungi, need to be aware of the changes in student’s motivations and should be
prepared to provide them with the support necessary to encourage them in the pursue of their goals. As future
researcher and potential mycology teacher I would like to propose more hypothesis and question driven projects within
the classroom environment. Opportunities to take field courses that involve local and foreign students as well as
amateur mycologists will benefit the learning process and increase the involvement and investment of the students. In
cases were field work is not a possible scenario internet resources and available published data (i.e. sequences
databases attached to environmental data) can be utilize to answer questions related to the ecology, evolution and
conservation of fungi. The fungal world is fascinating by itself; therefore, recruiting new members should not be a
difficult mission. We as a community should be able to design and proposed techniques that can bring inspiration to
young minds, satisfying their own curiosity. With this workshop, I hope to increase my knowledge on the available
resources not only teach young students but also to help me find ways of communicating the passion I have for Fungi.
“MYCOEDUCATION” PLAN Carrie Andrew
A. BACKGROUND
I have experience teaching mycology at two different universities, and look forward to teaching future mycology courses.
Additionally, I have experience in teaching ecology and general biology at the university level. I find that students lack a
general knowledge about fungi, which hinders my ability to incorporate mycology into other courses. I am very
interested in hearing about experiences and/or advice from other, more established, mycology teachers. I also am
interested in learning how to incorporate mycology into other courses, such as ecology. Here I provide my mycological
teaching goals within the described areas of educational focus. These goals would be advanced by attending the 2011
FESIN workshop held at the Mycological Society of American annual meeting in Fairbanks, Alaska. Some of the goals
presented here are longer-term goals, to be implemented farther in the future, but are ideal to begin thinking about and
discussing within the mycological educational community now.
B. MYCOLOGICAL TEACHING FOCI
- University level mycology courses.
- Integrating mycology into university non-mycology courses, such as ecology.
- Branching out into the general public: participating in community outreach programs that provide
information sessions on fungi, at the adult and/or K through 12 levels.
C. MYCOLOGICAL TEACHING GOALS
- Adapt the current mycology course structure into a more generalized course that would span across multiple
student bodies, captivating the attention and interest of both biology and non-biology majors. Within this course, shift
from a taxonomic and phylogenetic hierarchical tour of fungi and fungal-like organisms to a more functional and/or
applied tour.
- Continual modification of the current mycology course structure in order to provide a strong, and
consistently up-to-date, mycological background for biology major students. Within this course, incorporate segments
devoted to fungal taxonomy, phylogeny, genetics, evolution, ecology, pathology, medical mycology, laboratory culture,
and more. This course will, ideally, be easily transferable between teaching institutions and taught at a higher level than a
non-majors course.
- In general, provide a framework of mycological education that will promote students’ knowledge of fungi and
fungal-like organisms. By having a mycological knowledge base, this can empower students (and instructors) to apply
mycology to other courses and subject areas of their interest (e.g., ecology, conservation biology, evolution, etc).
- Adapt teaching methods towards general public seminars and events, disseminating information at levels
reachable for adults and/or K through 12 grades.
- Integrate medical mycology more strongly into a university level general mycology course (even without
having a medical degree).
D. FESIN RESOURCES TO HELP ACHIEVE THE DESCRIBED GOALS
- People with experience, suggestions and perspectives.
- Syllabi and labs for comparisons and contrasts.
- Innovative methods for teaching at multiple levels (i.e., K through 12, university and general public).
Ryoko Oono—Mycoaction Plan

My plans to increase the profile of mycology in biology include current outreach practices as part of my
postdoctoral training as well as future courses during my teaching appointment at the College of
William and Mary.

Outreach to the local high school community will be an ongoing endeavor of the Lutzoni and Carbone labs. My
postdoctoral work will include mentoring academic-year and summer research interns from the
local high school in Durham, NC. The students will be exposed to all facets of the research, from fieldwork to
data analyses of endophytic fungal diversity. Furthermore, my postdoctoral research complements a larger
project investigating fungal endophyte biodiversity, which has resources to develop public toolkits for
curriculum development. Videos and manuals will be distributed online at EnDoBiodiversity.org. This web
portal is developed by my PIs as well as by Prof. Betsy Arnold and Prof. Georgiana May. I will be sharing the
methods and materials used in my research on this website.

At the College of William and Mary, I will be responsible for teaching a mid-level plant biology course and an
upper-level seminar. The title of the plant biology course does not currently include ‗fungi‘, but traditionally
includes a section for fungal biology. I will be developing the fungal chapters over time to justify including
‗fungi‘ in the title of the course in a year or two. I will be including fungal field sampling as part of the
laboratory exercise, emphasizing endophytes because they are a phylogenetically, morphologically, ecologically
diverse group with many fast-growing and culturable species. I will bring to the labs molecular and culture-
based identification methods, which have been well developed by my postdoctoral lab group and my PIs‘
collaborators. This will allow easy yet truly novel discovery-based research for undergraduate biology
courses. I will also be developing a seminar course that emphasizes discussing primary literature and writing
field reviews on topics concerning symbiotic interactions. We will focus on various relationships, ranging from
mutualism to parasitism. There will be ample representation of fungal symbionts in the form of endophytes,
pathogens, mycorrhizae and lichens in our topics. The Biology department at College of William & Mary is
research-oriented, involving more than 80% of their majors in laboratory research. I will mentor many
undergraduate students and support their creative endeavors in evolutionary biology, ecology, microbiology, but
also specifically mycology by encouraging field, greenhouse, and growth chamber experiments using plant-
associated fungal species. I am particularly interested in tripartite interactions, such as plant-fungal-bacterial
relationships, which will introduce undergraduate students to how fungi interact with the other major kingdoms
of life. I will also be a bridge to the wider mycology community by encouraging undergraduate students‘
attendance at national conferences, such as MSA.
Eric Walberg’s Personal MycoAction Plan
The following are those things which I do or plan to do to enhance mycological education.
(D) = already do, (W) = in the works, (P) = plan to do or daydream of doing.
Collaboration
(W) Learn Ruby so as to help with the Mushroom Observer website, with intent to better bridge the gap between
amateur mycologists and researchers.
(D) Offer help to lab-mates and others, so as to aid many types of research by many people. From helping with
menial tasks to advice and thoughts, anything that streamlines or advances the work of others is important.
(W) Throw ideas out for scrutiny whenever I think of them. Some will hopefully spark ideas in others, or be found
worthy in themselves. I wish to get other people to do the same, to develop the sort of stream of conscious discussion
known for bringing about new ideas and developments.
Promotion
(D) Bring to mycological study knowledge from a variety of fields, to accurately bring other fields to mycology, and
mycology to other fields. My knowledge of physics and chemistry allows me to do my Masters work.
(D) Preach the importance of mycology wherever I go, giving details to all willing to listen.
(D) Greet people with a familiar hand gesture while stating ―Live Long and Sporulate‖.
Education
(D) Help wherever needed with mycology courses or mycological material in other courses, even on an unofficial
basis. Always support students as they learn anything mycological.
(D) Speak at length to all interested bodies about mycology, imparting knowledge whenever possible. Use
interesting facts and interlinking information to bring in interested bodies.
(P) Get a PhD and teach mycologically relevant courses while doing fungal research.
(W) Find ways to accurately detail fungal facts so as to maximize students‟ understanding and minimize confusion.
For example, I try to clarify information as students study for exams and identify samples for class.
Conservation
(W) Be ever wary of differences from which distinctions might be made leading to the detection and thence
conservation of cryptic species. In other words, be a „contemplative observer‟ . For example, I currently question
the classification of Epicoccum as a genus containing one species, and mean to examine this in the future.
(W) Collect and identify lichens in Wisconsin, where there is a paucity of lichen collections, and submit them to the
Wisconsin State Herbarium in Madison, Wisconsin.
(P) Examine obscure, secluded habitats for previously unseen or undetected lichen biodiversity. I daydream of doing
this on pacific islands, long distances from mainland sources.

Cedar Hesse can‘t copy file