Scott Jackson

Primary Interests

As an Extension faculty member my responsibility is to develop and implement integrated research and extension projects in collaboration with other faculty and outside stakeholders. My research interests include: ecology and breeding biology of amphibians, vernal pool ecology, wetland assessment and monitoring, impacts of roads and highways on wildlife, landscape-based ecological assessment, and climate change adaptation to conserve wildlife and ecosystems. I have been involved in the use of underpass systems to facilitate wildlife movement across roads and development of methods for evaluating the effectiveness of animal passage structures. I participated in the development of standards for road-stream crossing structures, survey protocols for assessing crossing structures, and approaches for prioritizing bridges and culverts for replacement. As part of the Landscape Ecology Lab, I helped develop landscape-based modeling and assessment tools to evaluate ecological integrity and landscape connectivity to support conservation decision-making. I have been a long-term collaborator with the MA Department of Environmental Protection and the MA Association of Conservation Commissioners on wetlands science, education and policy. I am an affiliate of the Northeast Climate Science Center, UMass Transportation Center, and a Fellow of UMass Air (a program to develop and use unmanned aerial systems for research).