PART OF THE SOLUTION

Blooming irises announce springtime in Statesboro, Georgia, making it the ideal time of year for Lissa Leege, Ph.D., to introduce visitors to her backyard, where she’s restoring 12 acres of wetlands to serve the local ecosystem and community.

Most often, the biology professor’s visitors are her undergraduate research students from Georgia Southern University. They arrive early, meeting Leege on her back porch just as she finishes her morning coffee, and follow forested trails to collect data.

“There are endless research questions we can address in the wetlands!” Leege exclaimed. “It’s exciting to engage students to think critically and scientifically, and enable them to ask and answer new questions.”

When Leege bid on the wetlands, she never dreamed it would become a living laboratory. Restoring ecosystems has been one of her passions since she completed her undergraduate degree in biology. Taking a few gap years before applying for graduate school, she worked for the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, traveling around Utah to preserve its ecosystems.

She also discovered a vocation in teaching through a few positions as a naturalist and secondary education teacher in math and science. “I wanted to be able to have a career that allows me to teach people about the value of biodiversity and ecosystems on our planet,” she said. “For me, the real path to doing that was educating people and doing research on those ecosystems.”

One day, Leege was watching a video about invasive species with her students when it all clicked. Having spent her childhood summers on the shores of Lake Michigan, Leege knew sand dunes were the ecosystem she loved best. By focusing her dissertation topic on the invasive species threatening sand dunes, she could make a difference in the preservation of that ecosystem and fulfill her dream of becoming a professor.

Since completing her doctorate, Leege has researched threatened and endangered plants in Georgia, plant defense against herbivores and accomplished major sand dune restoration projects on Tybee Island, Georgia, all while teaching classes at Georgia Southern. Being immersed in ecological restoration and education inspires her to augment her efforts, making environmental sustainability a goal in every aspect of her life.

“The first class I taught at Georgia Southern was environmental biology in 1998,” she recalled. “So literally, since the day I set foot on this campus, I have been teaching and thinking about environmental science and biology. Seeing how [our global climate] has changed over the years compels me to not just teach about [sustainability], but to actually be part of the solution to our environmental problems and encourage my students to be part of the solution.”

Being part of the solution led to creating the Center for Sustainability at the University in 2008, which Leege directed until its redesignation in 2020. She’s taken on community projects, too, like helping a local church install solar panels and other environmentally conscious features. After decades of environmental projects and empowering her community to make a difference, restoring the wetlands in her backyard was a natural next step.

“Right from the start, it was a mess,” she recalled. “There were invasive species absolutely everywhere, thickets of Chinese privet and thousands of pounds of trash. Some people would have seen it as a lost cause, but to me, it was a big challenge.”

Wetlands tend to catch anything coming downstream, making them Statesboro’s incidental dumping grounds. By clearing the trash and acres of invasive species, the land is renewed for plants and animals to flourish and to help with flooding control for the entire city. Students have been inspired by the ebb and flow of invasive species and even the damage of Hurricane Helene for their research projects. Leege hopes that the hands-on experience will give students the chance to decide if they want to pursue careers in biology and, as she discovered during her gap years, where they want to specialize.

“It’s been so much fun to watch students get engaged and go on to present their research at scientific meetings, and then do further research and teaching in higher education,” Leege said. “It’s rewarding to watch that happen and do something to contribute to our natural resources on the planet.”

Eventually, Leege hopes to give the public access to the wetlands, installing trails and interpretive signage so everyone in the community can enjoy the beauty of the ecosystem that keeps their city afloat.

“Wetlands are often undervalued and looked down on, but they’re critical to our community,” Leege said. “Educating the general public is the ultimate goal. It’s important to empower them with the knowledge that there are positive solutions to environmental challenges and to give them the confidence to take those steps.” – Holly Sproule