Kelly has a B.S in Molecular Environmental Biology from UC Berkeley. She completed her Ph.D. in Entomology in Dr. Dennis vanEngelsdorp’s Bee Lab at the University of Maryland. During her Ph.D. she worked with the Bee Informed Partnership to study beekeeping management practices, colony health and survival. She joined the WSU Bee Program as a postdoctoral researcher in 2020 and recently began a new role as Assistant Professor of Pollinator Research and Extension. She plans to build a program based on regular communication with stakeholders, and to address needs such as locally specific best practices for bee management and crop pollination, and extension programs that will put the latest research into the hands of stakeholders.