Sandy Carlson, Ph.D.

UC Davis
sjcarlson@ucdavis.edu

Dr. Sandra J. Carlson is a Professor in the Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences at the University of California, Davis, where she has been teaching and doing research for over 30 years. She received her B.S. degree in Earth Sciences at the University of California, Santa Cruz and her M.S. and Ph. D. in Geological Sciences (Paleontology) from the University of Michigan. Her research is focused on marine invertebrate animals, both extinct and extant. She seeks to determine their evolutionary history and patterns of phylogenetic relationships for over 500+ million years of Earth history. She is also the Faculty Director of the CalTeach/MAST (Mathematics and Science Teaching) program on the UC Davis campus, a UC system-wide program to encourage STEM undergraduate majors to consider careers in K-12 STEM teaching. She teaches and advises graduate students and over 400 undergraduates each year in paleobiology and evolutionary biology at the lower and upper division levels and is committed to identifying barriers to the success of underrepresented students in science and developing interventions to help students overcome these barriers.