Election Candidates 2016

Jake Rash is the Coldwater Research Coordinator for the NC Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC), where he assists with the coordination of applied research and management of the State’s trout resources.  He received his B.S. in Zoology from NC State University (2000) and M.S. in Fisheries and Wildlife Sciences from Virginia Tech (2003).  After graduate school, he worked with freshwater mussels as a Research Specialist at Virginia Tech until he joined the NCWRC. Throughout the years he has been fortunate enough to participate in the North Carolina, Virginia Tech, and Virginia chapters of AFS, and in 2012, he served as Chair of the SDAFS Trout Committee.

Although he spends his days at work thinking about fish, he enjoys spending his free time trying to find fish with monofilament and fly lines.  In addition, he truly loves spending time with his family, and for reasons he struggles to understand, he continues to follow NC State athletics with an unhealthy passion.

Corey Oakley is the Piedmont Fisheries Research Coordinator with the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission (NCWRC) and has been with NCWRC since 2003.  His current work focuses on understanding Morone fisheries in Piedmont reservoirs.  Recently, he has been working to establish a hybrid Striped Bass fishery in Lake Norman including a tag reward program to understand the exploitation rate by anglers.

Corey is a native of New Bern, North Carolina.  Corey received his B.S. degree in Fisheries and Wildlife Science from North Carolina State University in 2000 and a M.S. degree in Fisheries Science from North Carolina State University in 2003 while studying habitat suitability for endangered sturgeon in coastal North Carolina rivers.  He has been a member of NCAFS and AFS since 1999. He is currently the committee chair of the Striped Bass Technical Committee for the Southern Division of AFS and is a certified fisheries professional. In his free time, Corey enjoys spending time with his family, fishing, and hunting.