Kristen Vale is the Texas Coastal Program Coordinator for American Bird Conservancy (ABC). Kristen has a BS in Wildlife & Fisheries Sciences from Texas A&M University and an MS in Environmental Sciences from the University of Houston-Clear Lake. She has been studying shorebird ecology on Galveston Island since 2012 and her thesis work focused on the distribution of Piping Plover on the Upper Texas Coast. At ABC Kristen helps coordinate protection, monitoring, and outreach of imperiled beach-nesting bird and nonbreeding bird species along the Texas coast.