Team
Tom Auer, Science Product Manager
Tom helps lead a team of data scientists and engineers responsible for eBird Status and Trends. His background encompasses ornithology, geographic information science, and recent experience in machine learning. Tom’s work is at the intersection of avian ecology and data science, where he collaboratively designs, scales, and deploys machine learning workflows to create usable data products for managing and conserving bird populations. Tom joined the team in 2015.
Andrew Whetten, Statistical Scientist
Andrew is an applied statistician responsible for method development and improving best practices in trend estimation from population monitoring programs. More broadly, Andrew’s research revolves around topics including causal machine learning, survival analysis, data integration, animal movement, and statistical methods for avian and ungulate population survey data. Andrew joined the team in 2024.
Lauren Oldham, Data Visualization Developer
Lauren is a software developer who creates interactive data visualizations for eBird Status and Trends products. With a background in geographic information systems, she specializes in dynamic web maps, allowing users to easily explore Status and Trends’ high resolution relative abundance data at fine scales. She creates internal decision-support tools, custom web applications, and public-facing data visualizations. Lauren joined the team in 2021.
Myles Stokowski, Data Engineer
Myles’s work focuses on scaling software to model global bird distributions, and managing underlying compute infrastructure. Drawing on a background in ecology and industry software engineering, Myles also collaborates with researchers and data scientists to create tools and visualizations that enhance data interpretation for bird conservation. Myles joined the team in 2024.
Wesley Hochachka, Senior Research Associate
Wesley became involved in eBird data analyses at the start of work that led to today’s eBird Status and Trends models. His formal training is in population and behavioral ecology of birds, with most of his research involving the use of large, pre-existing sets of data. Much of Wesley’s work with eBird today involves helping to explore how differences in the behavior of eBirders affects the information that they report, and also working with international partners to facilitate wide access to eBird’s data by researchers around the world. Wesley started working with eBird in 2004.
Andrew Stillman, Applied Quantitative Ecologist
Andrew conducts research which leverages eBird data and modeling workflows to answer applied questions for bird conservation and land management. Much of his work seeks to understand how bird populations are impacted by global change, wildfire, and habitat restoration. Through these research projects, Andrew partners with government agencies and other conservation groups to help translate science into conservation action while co-designing research to fill information needs. Andrew joined the team in 2021. Google Scholar profile.
Matt Strimas-Mackey, Ornithologist
Matt’s work on the eBird Status and Trends team is at the interface of research and production. He collaborates with researchers on the team to test and deploy new methods for estimating the distribution, abundance, and trends of bird species globally. Matt also develops tools and training materials to facilitate the effective use of the eBird Status and Trends Data Products by researchers and conservation practitioners. Matt joined the team in 2017.
Shawn Ligocki, Data Engineer
Shawn developed and scaled the production workflow for generating eBird Status products. He adapts research code to run on supercomputers and develops engineering processes to scale that across thousands of species, each with thousands of models. His background is in mathematics and software engineering. Shawn joined the team in 2019.
Kylee Dunham, Applied Quantitative Ecologist
Kylee’s research focuses on population ecology and natural resource decision-making, with special emphasis on developing effective monitoring programs. Leveraging eBird data, Kylee works with partner agencies to fill critical information needs about population dynamics and conservation strategies for at-risk species. Kylee joined the team in 2022.
Renata Diaz, Data Engineer, Started in 2024
Renata develops scalable analyses for eBird Status and Trends products and targeted research projects. Renata collaborates with researchers to design and test new analytical methods at small to medium scale, and bridges between newly developed methods and the production-scale Status and Trends infrastructure. Her background is in data-intensive community ecology, reproducible research, and scientific software development and training. Renata joined the team in 2024.
Courtney Davis, Applied Quantitative Ecologist
Courtney works at the interface of quantitative ecology and conservation science, with a focus on understanding how global changes can impact entire ecological communities. She co-leads efforts to develop and apply new methods that advance community-level inference using eBird and other large-scale ecological datasets. Courtney partners closely with government agencies, NGOs, and the private sector to co-design and sustain data-driven solutions for biodiversity conservation and sustainability worldwide. Courtney joined the team in 2023.
Cynthia Crowley, Data Science Developer
Cynthia supports Status and Trends model development and testing. Recently she has focused on accounting for eBird observer bias and variation in models of species distributions and population trends. Her background is in ecology, statistics, and machine learning. Cynthia has been watching and listening to birds for fun and intrigue since 2013. She joined the team in 2023.