Melissa Starking, Ph.D.

Walkability and urban foraging: Spatial modeling of wild food access in Detroit, Michigan

New paper just dropped: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti....

Reform coalitions can bridge the gap between community and academia - LSE Impact Universities as global institutions face a disconnect with their localities, can urban reform coalitions can play a key role in repairing this relationship.

👀ICYMI: "Universities have a choice: do they engage with these complexities and learn together with other urban residents – or stand back and risk defining their own irrelevance to the immediate communities around them?"

#CivicUniversities #AcademicSky

Rep Ted Lieu speaking at a congressional hearing

Ted Lieu: “Were there any underage girls at that party or any party that Trump attended with Epstein”

Pam Bondi: “There is no evidence that Trump has committed a crime”

Ted Lieu: “I believe you just lied under oath”

The SAVE Act would require Americans to show a passport or birth certificate in person just to register to vote.

Millions of Americans don’t have access to these documents. This is voter suppression, plain and simple.

Call your senators to urge them to vote no: (202) 224-3121

I'm skimming through mentions of Trump in the Trump-Epstein Files, and there's one thing that I'm thinking over and over:

All we had to do was believe the women.

There are dozens of stories in here that make me ill. Do you really believe these are all lies?

The red dot is a baby North Atlantic right whale trying to migrate up the east coast of the United states.

The blue streaks are fast moving shipping vessels entering and leaving New York City harbor.

One collision and the whale is dead.

We need *mandatory* speed limits for these vessels! 🧪🦑🌍

Screenshot of a new York times article with the headline: EPA to stop considering lives saved when setting rules on air pollution. Subtitle: In a reversal, the agency plans to calculate only the cost to industry when setting pollution limits, and not the monetary value of saving human lives, documents show. Opening image shows a nuclear power plant with smoke coming out of smokestacks.

The EPA plans to calculate only the cost to industry when setting air pollution limits, and not the monetary value of saving human lives, documents show. 🧪🌎
www.nytimes.com/2026/01/12/c...
#environment #health

Five years later, these 10 corporations still aren’t funding election deniers Five years ago today, on January 6, 2021, a violent mob stormed the Capitol building.

"on Jan 6, 2021, a violent mob [of Trump supporters] stormed the Capitol building"

After, over 100 major companies spoke up against it & promised to stop giving $ to those who condoned it

Unfortunately, most backtracked

Here are 10 who didn't; good info to have as you decide where to spend your $

That one person can drag us into a war without consulting or even notifying Congress, or our allies, or fully explaining to the American people why this is necessary, is absolutely bonkers.

Reminder that Congress has the power to stop all of this. Where the hell are they?

I am having them come to class w/ 3 points to talk about, 1 question with an answer & 1 question they couldn't answer. 2 papers/week. They will take turns leading discussion. Have one paper the do a full review, 2 they create graphical abstracts for. Recreate analysis in R to work through.

I like that!

What is your favorite way to get grad students to read and discuss papers in class? Tricks, tips, and "don't do that" please. I'll add mine in the comments too! #Ecology #Evolution #Conservation #AcademicSky

Ecology Lab and Advanced Ecology and Evolution for grad students. Should be a fun semester!

Tatter Family Entomology Graduate Fellowship Department of Entomology Michigan State University Entomology Research Fellowship APplications Closing Soon Apply by November 21, 2025. $35,000 annual salary benefits tuition $5000 in research & travel support

The application deadline is approaching for the Tatter Family Entomology Graduate Fellowship at MSU!

This fully funded opportunity supports M.S. and Ph.D. students with a stipend, tuition and research support.

Apply by Nov. 21, 2025: www.canr.msu.edu/ent/graduate... #Entomology #Ecology 🌎🧪🍁

Supreme Court rejects call to overturn its decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide The Supreme Court has rejected a call to overturn its landmark decision that legalized same-sex marriage nationwide.

BREAKING: The Supreme Court rejects a call to overturn its decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide.

The Durham cathedral

A male smoky rubyspot damselfly

Looking for a PhD opportunity? I'm hoping to recruit someone to my group at Durham University to work on a project combining fieldwork and labwork to study speciation in rubyspot damselflies: iapetus.ac.uk/studentships...

Get in touch if you want to chat!

Tonight was a very bad night.

Women in STEM: Perceptions Vs. Realities - Society of Women Engineers Women have steadily increased their representation in STEM and among leadership ranks across the corporate world in the past few decades, giving the

“Women are often hired and promoted based on past accomplishments, while men are hired and promoted based on future potential...” swe.org/magazine/wom...

Gray bird on large rock on the side of a river.

##BirdOfTheDay American dipper on #rocks

I’m just going to say it…

It’s pretty damn validating to hear Barack Obama say the same things we’ve been shouting for months, and longer.

It's November 1st, which means millions of Americans are logging onto healthcare.gov to get covered. But this year, they’re being hit with skyrocketing premiums all while SNAP benefits lapse because congressional Republicans refuse to act.

Trump continues to attack public education and our ideals of fairness and decency.

I've given my new Senator a lot of shit on here. But I don't think anyone with power has laid out the stakes of what we're facing as clearly as she does right here.

And if she's saying this, it's because she feels she must.

RFK Jr. Admits He Can’t Actually Tie Tylenol to Autism

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. admitted Wednesday that he doesn’t have “sufficient” evidence that pregnant people’s use of Tylenol can cause autism in their children.

Trump instructs Pentagon to start testing nuclear weapons ‘on an equal basis’ with Russia and China | CNN Politics President Donald Trump on Thursday vowed to begin testing US nuclear weapons “on an equal basis” with Russia and China, heralding a potentially major shift in decades of US policy at a time of growing...

Thoughts and prayers… but I doubt that is enough.

We must rise.
We must fight.
We must not give up.

This country, this world— needs us to provide checks and balances. We need to act.

www.cnn.com/2025/10/29/p...

Welch: "This has nothing to do with the shutdown. The law requires and the funds are available to continue SNAP right now without any interruption. So that is a decision the president is making on his own to allow people to go hungry."

Breaking on MSNBC:

Two federal prosecutors have been placed on leave at the direction of the White House after filing a sentencing memo seeking 27 months in prison for a pardoned Jan. 6 rioter who brought illegal guns and ammunition to President Obama's house in 2023.

President Reagan's Radio Address on Free and Fair Trade on April 25, 1987 YouTube video by Reagan Library

So they didn’t like the ad. Let’s just post Reagan’s 5 min speech against tariffs as it appears on YouTube.

Over and over. On all platforms (some of y’all are still on X).

*1981 Sherrilyn horrified by 2025 Sherrilyn saying “let’s post Reagan’s speech.”

youtu.be/5t5QK03KXPc

The U.S. has conducted 10 strikes on alleged drug-carrying boats, killing 43 people.

Remember: no judge or jury has found these boats were trafficking drugs. We're simply taking Trump's word for it.

He’s unilaterally acting as judge, jury, and executioner.

This is a danger to us all.

Admittedly as an autistic scientist, this is tough for me. I see piles of data & results & understand the meaning, translating it for others through story is arduous & feels like selling, an unwelcome feeling, reframing why I need to helps me storytell. Always working on this!