Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture

Sociologist named Leopold Center interim director

Back to Leopold Letter Spring 2010

An Iowa State University sociology professor has been named interim director for the Leopold Center following a nationwide search that ended without a candidate being selected.

Lois Wright Morton will begin her appointment on July 1, following the retirement of Jerry DeWitt after 38 years at ISU and the past five at the Leopold Center.

A rural sociologist, Morton has been a member of the ISU faculty for 11 years. She conducts research in areas such as farm decision-making; social connections of people and organizations; leadership development; and how people and communities work together to solve problems of natural resource management. She also has an extension appointment and teaches a sociology of environment course for undergraduate and graduate students.

She is part of a team of scientists working on a Leopold Center-funded prescriptive burn and grazing research project on lands used for cattle production and recreational purposes. The project applies patch-burn grazing experiments as a management practice for protecting prairie and grassland habitats against eastern red cedar, an invasive species. In turn, the practice may help increase forage availability.

The search had brought four candidates to campus last fall for interviews, and two had second campus visits. The search was closed March 31 when ISU President Gregory Geoffroy instructed Dean Wendy Wintersteen of the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences to name an interim to serve over the course of the next academic year until a new search is organized.

Back to Leopold Letter Spring 2010