Jeff Munroe

Dr. Jeff Munroe is the Philip Battell Stewart and Sarah Frances Cowles Stewart Professor of Geology at Middlebury College. Raised in Massachusetts, he attended Bowdoin College where he developed a fascination with the evolution of mountain landscapes. For his M.S. research at the University of Wisconsin-Madison he studied the development of permafrost-affected soils on glacial deposits in the Brooks Range of northern Alaska. In 1996 he began a research collaboration with the U.S. Forest Service in northern Utah that continues to this day. Part of this work formed the basis of his Ph.D. dissertation, also at the University of Wisconsin, studying the glacial and post-glacial history of the Uinta Mountains. Since joining the faculty at Middlebury in 2001 he has expanded his work in Utah to include studies of soils, lake sediments, snow, caves, and dust, and has pursued research studying environmental change in northeastern Nevada. He had the privilege of serving as a Fulbright Visiting Professor of Natural Science at the University of Innsbruck in 2017. At Middlebury he teaches courses on geomorphology, Quaternary geology, environmental geology, paleolimnology, and the critical zone in mountain environments. He was elected a Fellow of the Geological Society of America in 2019.