Kaley Sullenger

While she completes her Master's degree in Biology, Miss Sullenger is increasing her professional work experiences as a keeper gaining venomous snake handling experience, continuing leadership training, and broadening professional relationships. After completing venomous snake handling and her degree, Miss Sullenger plans on moving to another institution to gain additional experience, including conservation research, eventually using her learned skills and experiences to take on a leadership goal at a research zoological facility. In a role such as curator, Miss Sullenger will be able to help her facility and others into an era of zoological conservation instead of entertainment.

Although interested in research, Miss Sullenger enjoys the daily work of caring for animals and educating the public and coworkers on their varied and interesting life histories. As a part of her focus on captive wildlife, Miss Sullenger moved into the Texas A&M graduate degree program and is currently writing her thesis on the roles of zoological facilities in the world. Captive wildlife has faced many changes since the first animals were kept by people of power in 2000 B.C, but most of those changes have been in how the animals are housed instead of why they are housed. Her thesis looks to explore what roles these facilities could or should be serving in the current environmental and political/social climate of the world.

Hobbies are an interesting thing, depending on how you do them they can be so much more. Through her involvements in organizations, Miss Sullenger has a hobby of fundraising. While that may not be a typical hobby she also enjoys rock climbing (New Hampshire in the fall is beautiful), playing board games (great co-worker and cousin bonding), and knitting (which she sometimes uses for that fundraising).