Nicole Stanton-Wilson

Program Director and Preserve Manager

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Nicole was first bitten by the “prairie bug” while collecting prairie seed on remnant and restored prairies as a Missouri Master Naturalist volunteer.  Sunsets on the late summer prairie were so infectious that she changed career paths and returned to school to pursue a career in grassland ecology.  After completing her M.S. in Biology at K-State, she continued to conduct ecological sampling on Konza Prairie and the KU Field Station as a botanist for the National Ecological Observatory Network.  She has since managed and taught undergraduate biology lab courses at UMKC, where she exposed every student she could to the wonder of plants & prairies.  Nicole is beyond thrilled to bring her career full-circle by returning to the nonprofit field, and is excited to cultivate experiences that bring joy and inspire awe of the prairie.  When she has two free hands, she can be found gardening (i.e. weeding!) or baking, but is most frequently found wrangling her toddling son with her husband by her side.