Young Dawg Spotlight: Gretchen Hinger


Meet the latest Young Dawg part of the IRIS team: Gretchen Hinger.

The UGA Young Dawgs program is a high school internship program designed to prepare highschool juniors and seniors for college-level research.

Hinger joined the IRIS team from Clarke Central High School. During her time at UGA, she worked with Dr. Matt Bilskie, helping to study how natural infrastructure can help protect coastal resources, such as the Tyndall Airforce Base, from storms.

Hinger aided the research team in designing and testing several natural infrastructure solutions for Tyndall, in the form of barrier islands and dunes. Her research found that an offset island design performed best in helping to reduce water levels during a storm the size of Hurricane Matthew, which caused $5 billion worth of damage in 2016.

To read more, check out the powerpoint of her presentation, here.