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Michelle Markley likes to study mountains, specifically how they were formed. "I study how rocks get 'mushed,' " she says. "I look at rock deformation, at their folds and faults and how they get their texture or fabric." Her classes make full use of the region around Mount Holyoke, going out to see rock formations at the Quabbin Reservoir, on Skinner Mountain, and in Whately and Cummington. "This is a good area for field work at all levels," says Markley. 

Currently, Markley's primary research focus is the Grenville mountain belt. As a structural geologist interested in the nature and timing of fabric development in both metamorphic and igneous rocks, Markley has packed her trusty rock hammer for field work in the Canadian Grenville, the Appalachian and the Rocky Mountains, and overseas in the Southern Alps of New Zealand and the Western Alps of Switzerland. 

Markley teaches Geology of Groundwater and Fossil Fuels, History of Earth, Structural Geology and Orogenesis, Plate Tectonics, and Uranium and has published numerous scholarly articles.

The Intergroup Dialogue (IGD) Center Faculty Fellows program supports faculty efforts to infuse their courses and/or other professional activities on and off campus with dialogic-based pedagogical practices during the 2024-2025 academic year.

The goal of Michelle Markley’s project as IGD Fellow this year is to develop pedagogy that cultivates student interest and expertise in dialogue as a mode of scientific communication. Markley is Professor of Geology and Chair of the Department of Geology and Geography. She had been teaching geology courses at the college for two decades when she was inspired by the student activism that generated STEMPOC to start thinking and teaching outside her discipline. In 2020, Markley joined the “Being Human in STEM” initiative, and her experiences in that classroom broadened her understanding of how identity shapes the experiences of students and faculty in traditional science (STEM) majors. Distinct from either technical research presentations at scientific meetings or popular science communication that shares specialized research with general audiences, dialogue holds potential as a humble mode for science, one that seeks to place community needs and interests at the center of scientific research questions and activities.