Professor William “Breck” Bowden served as the inaugural Robert F. and Genevieve B. Patrick Endowed Chair in Watershed Science and Planning in ̽̽ (̽̽) for 20 years. Since 2020, Breck also served as the Interim Associate Dean for Faculty Development and Research in the School. Breck retired from ̽̽ in 2022.
During his tenure at ̽̽ and the Rubenstein School, Breck demonstrated a commitment to innovative leadership, student engagement, and prolific research.
“It is hard to imagine a faculty member having a greater impact on the Rubenstein School,” said Allan Strong, Interim Dean. “Breck’s work with the Rubenstein School’s federally funded programs, especially the Lake Champlain Sea Grant program, have truly catalyzed research in the School. On a more personal note, I have learned so much from Breck’s leadership around research, faculty mentorship, and graduate education.”
Breck leaves a legacy of research granting programs that are much enhanced by his leadership and that have contributed scientific findings to improve water and forest resources throughout the state of Vermont and the Northeast. Breck led the program, the Vermont Water Resources and Lake Studies Center, and the Vermont component of the .
“Breck Bowden has done great work securing and delivering federal support for important natural resource programs at ̽̽,” said U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy of Vermont. “With his leadership, the Lake Champlain Sea Grant program has achieved full institute status and the Northeastern States Research Cooperative has been renewed. Breck’s contributions to the Lake Champlain Basin Program have been invaluable, and he has helped to initiate several new federal opportunities. Breck is a good friend, and my staff and I have looked to him often, for many years, for advice and guidance on water resource and policy issues.”
Research, Teaching, and Leadership
“Throughout his career at ̽̽, Breck Bowden has been a keystone of the research enterprise, not only bringing in over $32.6 million in sponsored project awards, but directing three grant-awarding research programs,” said Kirk Dombrowski, ̽̽ Vice President for Research. “Through these programs, and the many students he has mentored as well as the faculty he has supported, he has shaped research through and with others. And he has done this on the pressing issues of our time as a champion of the university’s missions and values in the studies of sustainability, the environment, and water systems. We will miss most his leadership, even keel, sense of humor, and the tremendous impact he has driven.”
As a renowned scientist himself, especially recognized for his work in Arctic stream ecology and climate change, Breck maintained a productive personal research program that connected two distinct regions: the North Slope in Arctic Alaska and Vermont’s Lake Champlain basin. Throughout his career, Breck conducted research on interactions among land use, land cover, and water resources. He studied wetland, terrestrial, and aquatic ecosystems in temperate, tropical, and Arctic biomes. He authored or co-authored more than 130 peer-reviewed scientific publications and more than 50 technical reports related to his research.
“As a member of the faculty in the Rubenstein School at ̽̽, I have been challenged to consider and address how to ensure that research is responsive to—even driven by—the interests of those who need to make decisions about the crucial environmental issues that we face as a society,” said Breck. “I humbly thank my faculty colleagues and the staff and students at the Rubenstein School for opening my mind to new ideas nearly every day.”
Over his 20-year career at ̽̽, Breck has been responsible for securing nearly $33 million in federal funding for his own research and to support the federal programs he has directed. These programs supported dozens of faculty and hundreds of graduate students to engage in water- and forest-related research in the Lake Champlain basin of Vermont and New York, the state of Vermont, and the Northern Forest region of Vermont, New York, New Hampshire, and Maine.
“The highlight of my career at ̽̽ has been to establish the Lake Champlain Sea Grant Institute and to work with its incredibly dedicated staff to make this program the engine of reliable knowledge generation and dissemination that it is today,” said Breck. “I will be excited to follow how the Rubenstein School and Lake Champlain Sea Grant evolve in the future.”
In multiple advisory positions, Breck contributed substantially to regional, national, and international programs that seek to integrate science in resource management decision making. Programs included the National Science Foundation’s , , and (EPSCoR), the , , and .
An avid proponent of science communication, Breck advocated to create , a website and quarterly newsletter dedicated to translating and disseminating the latest findings in ecological research from across Vermont. From 2016 to 2022, this endeavor provided opportunities for several graduate students to write, edit, and post stories in this science news outlet.
In the Rubenstein School, Breck taught undergraduate and graduate courses in stream ecology, ecological risk assessment, ecological stoichiometry, stormwater management, stream modeling, and more. He advised more than 400 undergraduates and mentored a dozen undergraduate research theses and projects. He advised 12 master’s students, 9 PhD students, and 2 postdoctoral fellows.
Breck participated in strategic planning at universities and in government agencies. He founded the Water Resources Management undergraduate and graduate programs at the University of New Hampshire, where he helped to establish the Natural Resources MS and PhD programs. As lead project manager and team leader, he started the national Integrated Catchment Management Program at Landcare Research in New Zealand, where he provided science leadership for a national research program of 40 scientists and collaborators.
From 1986 until 2022, he was a member of the core research team for the based at the on the North Slope of Alaska. For many years, he coordinated the stream ecological research component of this large, long-term, collaborative research program. Breck’s research contributions included work on the effects of stream network structure on biogeochemical processing in stream ecosystems and on the use of next-generation, high-frequency sensors to explore whole watershed dynamics.
Breck received his bachelor’s degree in zoology and chemistry from the University of Georgia. He earned his master’s and PhD degrees from North Carolina State University while working with Dr. John Hobbie on microbes and biogeochemistry of nitrogen in aquatic ecosystems. He completed a post-doctoral research fellowship at Yale University with the late Dr. Herbert Bormann, working on effects of forest whole-tree harvesting on greenhouse gas emissions to the atmosphere.
As a dedicated steward of Vermont’s waterways, Breck looks forward to new and different opportunities to engage in science advocacy and community involvement in retirement. He and his wife Linda plan to spend time on their sailboat on Lake Champlain, hiking the trails of Vermont, and visiting with their Vermont- and Texas-based children and grandchildren.