Summer Burton Rupper portrait
  • Professor, Sch Of Environ,Society&Sustain
  • Associate Professor, Sch Of Environ,Society&Sustain
  • Associate Director, Global Change and Sustainability Center
801-585-9167

Professional Service

  • Frontiers in Earth Science. Associate Editor - Cryospheric Sciences Section. 10/01/2023 - present
  • AGU. Role: Session chair. Proposed and chaired conference session. 05/2023 - 12/2023
  • NSF. Role: co-convener. Sea Level Rise Workshop. 03/01/2023 - 06/28/2024
  • NASA. Organized and facilitated NASA science team meeting. Scholarly Service. 03/01/2022 - 09/09/2022. 01/03/2023 - 05/25/2023
  • AGU. Proposed and chaired conference session. Scholarly Service. 05/01/2022 - 12/16/2022
  • American Geophysical Union. Role: Member. Cryosphere Section Fellows Committee. 03/07/2022 - present
  • NASA. Organized and facilitated NASA science team meeting. 03/01/2022 - 09/09/2022
  • American Geophysical Union. Role: Member. Cryosphere Fellows Committee. 01/10/2022 - present
  • AGU. Proposed and chaired conference session. 07/2021 - 12/2021
  • NSF. Role: Organizing committee member and host. Ice Core Early Career Workshop. 07/01/2021 - 01/08/2022
  • NSF. US Ice Core Working Group, Member. 08/01/2020 - present
  • NASA. HiMAT Science team lead. 07/01/2020 - present
  • Frontiers of Earth Science. Associate Editor for special issue. 07/16/2018 - 11/02/2020
  • US-Pakistan USAID. Visiting Scholar Program, Research Mentor. 01/2018 - 05/2019
  • NASA. HiMAT Science Team, Member. 08/2016 - 08/2019
  • GLIMS. International Advisory Board. 08/2014 - 08/2016
  • NASA-CAS. Glacier Melt Tool Working Groups 1 and 2, Member. 05/2014 - 05/2016

Internal Service

  • Global Change and Sustainability Center Associate Director. 08/01/2023 - present. University service.
  • Director of Graduate Studies. 07/01/2023 - present. Department service.
  • Global Change and Sustainability Center Executive committee. Member, 07/01/2021 - present. College service.
  • Graduate Scholarship Committee. Member, 07/01/2018 - present. College service.
  • Director of Graduate Studies. 07/01/2018 - 07/01/2022. Department service.
  • GCSC Student Grant Review Committee. Member, 09/25/2017 - 10/10/2017. Other service.
  • Undergraduate Honors Representative. 08/01/2017 - present. University service.
  • Department Research Committee. Member, 08/01/2017 - 08/01/2018. Department service.
  • Department Colloquia Committee. Member, 07/01/2017 - 07/01/2019. Department service.
  • GCSC Strategic Planning Committee. member, 07/01/2017 - 03/05/2018. Other service.
  • Society, Water, and Climate Executive Committee. Member, 04/01/2017 - 04/01/2018. Department service.
  • Graduate Certificate in Hydrology Coordinating Committee. 01/03/2017 - present. Other service.
  • Society, Water, and Climate Cluster: Social Science search committee. member, 08/01/2016 - 04/01/2017. Other service.
  • Society, Water, Climate Cluster: Physical Science Search co-Chair. 08/01/2016 - 04/01/2017. Other service.
  • GCSC Seminar Committee. 04/18/2016 - 04/28/2017. Other service.
  • Graduate Certificate in Hydrology proposal committee. 03/30/2016 - 12/20/2016. Other service.
  • RPT Committee member. 07/01/2015 - present. Department service.

Community Partnership

  • Project Advisor for teachers in the Masters of Science for Secondary Science Teachers. 05/2020 - present
  • Climate change workshops for Utah Science Teachers Association. 12/13/2013 - present
  • CITES Associates Workshops: Improving teacher education and schooling through BYU-Public school partnership. 08/2012 - 06/2013
  • State Office of Education expert review committee member for the Utah Science Criterion Reference Tests. 04/2012 - 04/2017

Outreach

  • RISE Speaker, Skylikne High School. 09/08/2023 - present
  • Speaker, Meet a Scientist, Utah Science Teacher's Association . 02/17/2023 - present
  • Workshop on Climate for professional development for Alpine and Provo School District teachers . 10/10/2022 - present
  • Presentations for the Citizen's Climate Lobby. 10/22/2020 - 04/15/2021
  • Keynote Speaker for Lakeridge Jr High Earth Day Celebrations. 04/2019 - 04/2019
  • Keynote Speaker, Utah Science Teacher Association Awards Ceremony. 02/08/2019 - 02/08/2019
  • Climate change science and impacts presentations and action planning discussions with religious groups and leadership. 06/01/2016 - present
  • Science panelist for Salt Lake City Main Library Series: "Years of Living Dangerously". 01/07/2016 - 01/07/2016
  • Keynote speaker at Model UN at Lakeridge Jr High. 12/15/2015 - 03/15/2017
  • Media Interviews: NPR, BBC, CNN, Inside Climate NEws, PBS Nova, Australia NPR, Late-LAte EArly-EArly Show in London, BYU TV, The Appleseed, Antarctic Sun, AsianNewsNetwork, Our Amazing Planet, The Daily Universe, The Daily Herald, Salt Lake Tribune, Fox 13, Channel 2 News. 01/2011 - present
  • Antarctica blog for elementary and preschool classes. 10/2010 - 01/2011
  • Public school lectures/presentations (multiple per year). 07/2009 - present

Honors & Awards

  • Superior Research Award. CSBS, University of Utah, 03/2024
  • G.K. Gilbert Award for Excellence in Geomorphic Research. American Association of Geographers, 02/25/2022
  • Outstanding Utah Higher Education Science Teacher. Utah Science Teachers Association, 10/03/2021
  • Top Researcher Award, Celebrate U showcase of Extraordinary Faculty Achievements. University of Utah, 03/2017
  • CITES Fellow. BYU-Public School Partnership, 04/2013
  • Young Scholars Award. College of Physical and Mathematical Sciences, BYU, 03/2012
  • Kavli Frontiers of Science Fellow. National Academy of Sciences, 06/2011
  • Hamblin Faculty Research Award. Geology Department, BYU, 04/2011
  • Antarctic Service Medal. USAF, 08/2010
  • Ferrel Scholarship for outstanding graduate research. University of Washington, 05/2005
  • George Goodspeed Fellowship. University of Washington, 08/2004

In the Media

  • Expert opinion on published article highlights by other researchers (Lee et al., 2021) in the Wall Street Journal. 12/2021.
  • Media coverage from a range of outlets for work on the Chamoli flood (Shugar et al., 2021, Science). 03/2021.
  • Media coverage from a range of outlets for work on spy satellite observations of glacier change (Maurer et al., 2021, ScienceAdvances). 12/2019.
  • Interview with Derek Muller for science podcast. 03/2019.
  • NPR All Things Considered (local) interview. 07/2017.