Holly Hockertlotz, MS ’09

Resource Management and Conservation
Department of Environmental Studies

The Remediator to the Rescue

Holly Hockertlotz For Holly (Thrasher) Hockertlotz, it's hard to imagine more satisfying work in the environmental field than seeing pollution firsthand and working until the damage is fixed. "I like knowing that I'm protecting people and the environment," Holly says about her work at Environmental Compliances Services in Brattleboro, Vermont. "I enjoy taking homeowners from that horrible day when they realize that their furnace isn't working and there's oil everywhere to having their basement completely restored and they don't have to worry about it anymore."

Holly's rescue work goes well beyond family homes. She investigates and assesses leaks at gas stations, brownfields and Superfund sites, identifying petroleum, heavy metals, PCBs and the like. "Long ago, I knew that I wanted to do this," says this young woman who grew up in the tidy suburb of Silver Spring, Maryland. Ever since learning of the dioxins that polluted Vietnam from the use of Agent Orange, she was determined to work in remediation.

A 2003 graduate of Pace University in New York, Holly witnessed a human and environmental tragedy that would shape her life-the attack on the World Trade Center. She was five blocks away and saw the second plane hit the tower. "We were evacuated, and I could feel the stress, but I was actually very calm. Adrenaline is a wonderful thing," she says with a scientist's detachment.

A Witness to Tragedy

"After 9/11, the economy was dead," she says, and Holly returned to the Washington, DC, area, where she tried her hand at lobbying, which didn't suit her. She went to work in a retail store and set her sights on graduate school.

Holly was surprised at the breadth of Antioch University New England's graduate programs, and small-town life in Keene appealed to her. Her father had grown up on a farm, and Holly was drawn to the horses and cattle her grandparents raised. Without visiting New Hampshire, she packed up and moved to Keene.

"What surprised me most about AUNE was that it was really easy to fit in and make friends," she said, attributing the ease to "the people that Antioch tends to attract-engaged, curious and hardworking. At the same time, it's a very accepting place. You can approach things from a very different direction and it's not a problem."

Getting Hands-on Experience

She credits AUNE for giving her the tools she needed to figure out where she wanted to take her career and the steps needed to get there. "AUNE helped me to ask the right questions and figure things out for myself-with just the right help. I did a couple of practicum projects that made me see what I didn't want to do and what excited me." And that hands-on experience made all the difference for her. "It was a great growth experience-classes were never boring; homework was always challenging, in a good way. It never felt like busy-work."

"At the same time, it's a very accepting place. You can approach things from a very different direction and it's not a problem."

One look at Holly's life proves that she hates wasting time. Four months after graduating from AUNE, she married Vermonter Ryan Hockertlotz, a staff sergeant in the Air Force Reserves who has been deployed four times. Despite his absences, they have settled in Townsend, Vermont, where they care for a menagerie of animals-two donkeys, twelve goats, two peacocks, forty-two chickens, four rabbits and an undetermined number of cats. "We affectionately call it a 'petting zoo,'" she said. No dogs? "If you know anywhere I can find a cute little Great Dane that gets along with lots of other animals, let me know."

Holly was thrilled to get to work immediately after graduating. "As soon as I could describe to [faculty member] Michael Simpson what I wanted to do, he described the certifications I'd need, the job title, and then offered to introduce me to people who did remediation work. He helped me secure interviews with a couple of the largest environmental consulting firms in New England," she said. But Holly's determination, knowledge, work ethic and skills got her the job. "Even though I didn't know what it was called, it's the job I knew I wanted to do."

Last Updated: 2/22/12