Caring for Mono Lake: Alum Inspires Whitman’s Semester in the West Students

When Ryan Garrett ’18 visited Mono Lake in California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains with a chemistry club in high school, he was profoundly changed by the experience. 

“I’d never slept under the stars before, and I’d certainly never seen mountains that dramatic,” says Garrett, who grew up in the Central Valley. More than anything, he was bowled over by the lake itself—a 70-square-mile blue saline expanse with salt-encrusted towers and rich species of birds. “It was just mind-blowing, so otherworldly.” 

During the same visit, he heard about the lake’s history for the first time. In 1941, its tributary streams were diverted by the city of Los Angeles for drinking water, cutting off the lake’s water supply and sending it to the verge of environmental collapse. “Seeing this truly gorgeous and special place, I thought, ‘How could anyone want to destroy it?’” he says. “That experience guided the path I’ve been on ever since.”

Now, as Education Director of the Mono Lake Committee, an environmental nonprofit dedicated to the protection and restoration of the Mono Basin, Garrett is able to share that experience with Whitman College students visiting as part of Semester in the West, a unique immersive program that crosses disciplines to explore land conservation and rural life during a three-month, 8,000-mile field research trip. 

“I felt like they were really moved by this place, and by the sense of injustice going on,” he says. “My hope is that they left with a stronger sense of commitment to place and felt a need to come back and advocate.”

A Second Chance at Semester in the West

Garrett never had the opportunity to experience Semester in the West during his own time at Whitman. He transferred from community college as a junior in 2016, missing the window to apply to the then-biannual program. “I was always bummed out by that,” he says. “It always felt like this hole.” 

Nevertheless, he used his time at Whitman to further explore the ethical conundrums around Mono Lake and its water. He had transferred to Whitman specifically to work with environmental ethicist Patrick Frierson, the Paul Pigott and William M. Allen Professor of Ethics and Philosophy. “Not that many universities had a professor working in environmental ethics back then,” he says. “He totally inspired me.”

As a Philosophy major, Garrett wrote an honors thesis about the lake, examining the ethical considerations around the use of its water and the environmental hazards caused by its diversion. In it, he explored questions like: “How does nature have value? Is it intrinsic or only instrumental? What responsibilities do we have in balancing human needs and taking resources from the environment?”

After graduating, Garrett went to work with the Mono Lake Committee, helping to educate the public—both in the Sierras and in Los Angeles—about the lake’s unique ecosystem. But he never forgot about Semester in the West.

In 2024, during a visit to Walla Walla, where his parents now live, he reconnected with Frierson and Outdoor Program Assistant Director Stuart Chapin. He expressed his desire to become a Semester in the West host. 

This time, his timing couldn’t have been better. After 20 years, the program’s founder, Phil Brick, the Miles C. Moore Professor of Politics, was retiring, and Semester in the West was moving to an annual schedule led by a rotating group of faculty. Garrett pitched the idea to co-leader Stan Thayne, Senior Lecturer of Anthropology, Environmental Studies and Religion, who embraced the idea, and the first group of students visited Mono Lake in October 2024. 

“I was super-excited,” he says. “It felt like there was something more meaningful doing it for Whitman than for other college groups I work with.” 

A Powerful Weekend

Semester in the West returned to Mono Lake for the second time in October 2025, when Garrett spent a Saturday morning leading students on a natural history tour of the basin, showing them the different ecosystems—from sagebrush steppes to high alpine forest. The highlight was a hike up to the Rush Delta, more than 6,000 feet above sea level, where Garrett was able to see the magic of the lake take hold of students’ imaginations. 

“Sitting there for 10 minutes, with everyone oohing and aahing and gasping meant the world to me,” Garrett says. “It makes me feel like I am doing something for the place when the lake speaks for itself.”

That afternoon and evening, he started talking about lake ecology and the history of the diversion of the water, before taking students Sunday morning to tour the aqueduct that transports water from the area. There, Garrett says, he was impressed with the level of engagement from students, who flooded him with tough questions. 

“They were so sharp—they were asking questions reporters and land managers usually ask us.” Among them, he says, were queries about the impact of the 2025 Los Angeles fires, questions about the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s decision-making process and the effects on local Indigenous communities.

Students also anticipated one of the ethical conundrums about the lake’s conservation: Much of the restoration has been successfully pushed by anglers to preserve stocks of fish for recreational purposes. But many of those are non-native species introduced into the lake basin with consequences to some native species. 

Before Garrett could reveal that conflict, he says, students brought it up themselves and had a spirited discussion about the ethical and environmental implications. 

That night, Garrett’s heart was full as he and his partner cooked dinner for the students as well as members of the local environmental and scientific community. As the youngest director of the Mono Lake Committee staff, Garrett admits he sometimes worries about where the next generation of conservationists for the area will come from. But seeing the engagement of Whitman students and the way they seemed inspired by their experiences filled him with hope. 

“This is a group of students who care about the West, and it made me breathe a little easier,” Garrett says. “Whether it’s Mono Lake or other nooks and crannies they discover, it’s clear there will be people who will come and be stewards of places like this.”