Eastern Kentucky University faculty member Dr. Robert Frederick was recently awarded the 2015 Lauren E. Schaaf Memorial Award.
Frederick, chair of the Department of Biological Sciences, received the award from the Kentucky chapter of The Wildlife Society. The award recognizes a professional biologist in Kentucky who has made outstanding contributions to wildlife conservation and management.
It is named in honor of Lauren E. Schaaf, wildlife biologist and director of the Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources, who passed away in 1995. Like Frederick, Schaaf was a waterfowl biologist.
Frederick has conducted field-based research throughout the United States, focusing on the population and behavioral ecology of waterfowl and furbearers. He has studied wood ducks, geese, trumpeter swans, bobcats and red foxes. His research also includes quantitative approaches such as simulation modeling.
He has also contributed to wildlife management through his work as a teacher and academic leader. Frederick has mentored thousands of students, many of whom have also become wildlife professionals.
Frederick is a past president of The Wildlife Society. He has been a professor in EKU’s Department of Biological sciences since 1982 and the Department’s chair since 2007. He will retire at the end of this semester.