Faculty Profile: Daniella Swenton, Director of Teaching and Learning

Dr. Daniella Swenton is in her eleventh year as a teacher and Science Department Chair at Hebron. She grew up in Maine and studied Environmental Science, Biology, and History as an undergraduate at the University of Vermont. She earned a Ph.D. in Biology at the University of New Mexico. She then worked as a Postdoctoral Research Fellow and Visiting Assistant Professor of Genetics at Clark University. During a graduate fellowship as a 7th-grade teacher, she was inspired to create an innovative K-12 curriculum, which brought her to Hebron. Dr. Swenton has researched seals, insects, plants, and fishes in Alaska, Maine, the Rockies, the Arctic and the desert southwest. Her writing and artwork have been published in varied outlets. She conducts research on the life history evolution of fishes and plants in changing environments often with students in tow. 

Her favorite Hebron memories include all field adventures with her fearless and caring students including finding nudibranchs in tide pools, research at the Common Ground Fair, whitewater rafting, braving the high-height ropes course, growing food in student-designed cold frames, and surveying Maine lakes for threespine stickleback.