Amanda Lawrence

Amanda Lawrence is a 2020 Knauss Fellow with the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service in the National Wildlife Refuge System for the Coastal and Marine Program. She will be involved in supporting America’s coastal watersheds and their surrounding communities, as well as in coastal conservation and restoration projects and issues across our United States coastal habitats.

Amanda grew up in Maryland; right outside of Annapolis and a bike ride away from the Chesapeake Bay. She completed a dual degree program receiving B.S. degrees in both Environmental Marine Science and Biology from the University of Maryland Eastern Shore and Salisbury University, respectively. Currently she is completing an M.S. degree in the Marine Estuarine Environmental Sciences Graduate Program at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. Her thesis involves understanding the size at which the male Jonah crab, a commercially important species, reaches maturity. She does this by studying male sex hormones, and hopes this research can be used to support the fishery.

During her graduate school career, Amanda was awarded the National Institute of Standards and Technology Fellowship. She was also a NOAA-Living Marine Resources Cooperative Science Center Fellow, and received the opportunity to intern with NOAA’s Northwest Fisheries Science Center in Mukilteo, WA, studying the effects of ocean acidification on Dungeness crab larval development. She loves being near the water in any capacity, be it researching, kayaking or diving.