Delaware Sea Grant welcomes new Urban Watershed Specialist

Photo credit: Dr. Victor Perez

Growing up for Emily Maung-Douglass consisted of nature walks with her grandparents, time spent exploring the Chesapeake Bay and being the host of her imaginary nature documentary.

Maung-Douglass’ love for the planet started at a young age, and her passion only grew as her mom began taking her to the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, where Virginia Sea Grant would frequently host talks. Despite her growing love for the environment, and her current role as Delaware Sea Grant’s (DESG) Urban Watershed Specialist, she never saw it as a career option until later in life.

“It seems odd because I knew it was an option,” Maung-Douglass said. “But I didn’t think it was an option for me until I was already in college.”

When completing her undergraduate degree at Old Dominion University, Maung-Douglass majored in biology and minored in chemistry, with the plan of being pre-med. Halfway through her freshman year, she realized pre-med wasn’t the path for her, and considered switching to political science before turning to her chemistry professor for help.

“I remember that I was kind of in a crisis because I wanted to keep studying biology and chemistry, but I didn’t have a good sense of the other options out there besides pre-med,” Maung-Douglass said.

Her professor offered the opportunity to work in his lab and take on an environmental research project. Maung-Douglass fell in love with the lab, describing it as a lightbulb moment for her career path. She ended up working at that same lab for the rest of her time as an undergraduate student and even spent a summer as a Maryland Sea Grant REU intern.

After graduating, Maung-Douglass continued her education, earning her master’s at the University of Connecticut. There, she worked in a marine lab, looking at highly urbanized places where heavy levels of pollution went into the water and caused low levels of oxygen that killed off sea life.

Maung-Douglass rounded out her education at the University of Delaware, where she earned her Ph.D.. At Delaware, she researched everyday products such as hand soaps, medicines and yard supplies. The chemicals they contained contaminated the ecosystem and hurt waterways.

Maung-Douglass mentioned her gratitude for her Ph.D. advisor, Dr. Doug Miller, who encouraged her to take different opportunities to discuss her research.

However, it wasn’t until she was overseas for postdoctoral research that she realized what would be the most important part of her work – outreach.

Working at Xiamen University in China, Maung-Douglass studied the relationship between synthetic estrogen and low oxygen conditions for fish. While she learned new skills and gained useful experience, being overseas made her realize she wanted something different for her career.

“When I was overseas, I didn’t have the option to do any outreach because of the language barrier,” Maung Douglass said. “I realized how much that aspect meant to me when I was no longer able to do it.”

With that in mind, she came back to the United States and began working at Louisiana Sea Grant. During her eight and a half years there, she served as the Oil Spill Scientist Outreach Specialist, working as part of a regional Sea Grant team focused on oil spills.

Maung-Douglass’ love for outreach took her to her current position at DESG. As DESG’s first Urban Watershed Specialist, Maung-Douglass serves the communities in and around Wilmington, Delaware, which together make up the urban watershed of Delaware.

Maung-Douglass expressed the uniqueness of her role, as she is working in communities that are both urban and coastal.

“Like other coastal communities, this area is vulnerable to flooding due to reasons such as climate change,” Maung-Douglass said. “But this community also rests in an area that has a strong history of industry, so there’s contamination concerns and other common urban issues.”

Maung-Douglass emphasized her excitement to be working at her alma mater, and to be taking on a role specifically aimed towards serving the community.

“Every day is really just asking myself, ‘what can I do to support and serve these communities?’” Maung-Douglass said. “Whether it be by bridging the gaps in knowledge and understanding of various resources or getting groups of people together who care about the same issues that are affecting them. It’s important to interact and engage and hear everyone’s perspective on these issues, and I’m happy to be in a role where I get to do that.”

Story by Risha Inaganti