The Honorable Jane Lubchenco, Ph.D.

Former Deputy Director for Climate and Environment, White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; and Wayne and Gladys Valley Professor of Marine Biology and University Distinguished Professor, Oregon State University



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About the Lectures Lecture I: Science in the White House: Integrating Solutions to the Triple Crises of Climate Change, Loss of Biodiversity, and Inequality/Inequity Wednesday, March 12, 2025, 4:10 PM Chevron Auditorium, International House, 2299 Piedmont Avenue, Berkeley, CA Three … Continued

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About the Lectures

Lecture I: Science in the White House: Integrating Solutions to the Triple Crises of Climate Change, Loss of Biodiversity, and Inequality/Inequity

Wednesday, March 12, 2025, 4:10 PM

Chevron Auditorium, International House, 2299 Piedmont Avenue, Berkeley, CA

Three major global challenges – climate change, loss of biodiversity and its benefits, and inequality and inequity among people – are typically tackled within three separate silos.  However, scientific knowledge tells us that the three are inextricably linked.  If the problems are not considered together, solutions to one may undermine solutions to the others. Moreover, more holistic, integrated solutions can deliver multiple co-benefits. Success requires integrated solutions. The talk will focus on the historically ambitious, innovative policies implemented by the Biden-Harris Administration to achieve this integration. 

Lecture II: Seas the Day: A New Narrative for the Ocean

Thursday, March 13, 2025, 4:10 PM

Chevron Auditorium, International House, 2299 Piedmont Avenue, Berkeley, CA

It’s time for a new narrative for the ocean, one that reflects current scientific knowledge and acknowledges innovative new partnerships and solutions that center the ocean in our future.  The two current dominant narratives for the ocean are anchored in the past.  The older one considers the ocean to be so vast, bountiful, and resilient that it is simply too big to fail. This first narrative drives pollution and overexploitation of resources.   A second, more recent narrative is that the ocean is now so depleted, polluted, and disrupted, and the drivers of those outcomes are so powerful and complex, that the ocean is simply too big to fix.   A third, new narrative is emerging, based on scientific findings, existing solutions, and innovative partnerships and policies.  This new narrative acknowledges that the ocean is central to a safe, clean, healthy, just, and prosperous future.  This new narrative tells us that the ocean is neither too big to fail, nor is it too big to fix.  But it is too important and too central to our future to ignore.   

About The Honorable Jane Lubchenco, Ph.D.

Jane Lubchenco is the Valley Professor of Marine Biology and University Distinguished Professor of Integrative Biology at Oregon State University.  She is a marine ecologist with expertise in the ocean, climate change, and interactions between the environment and human well-being.  

From 2021-2025, she served as Deputy Director for Climate and Environment in the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.  She served as the U.S. Under Secretary of Commerce for Oceans and Atmosphere and Administrator of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and inaugural member of President Barack Obama’s Science Team from 2009-2013. From 2014-2016, she was the first U.S. State Department Science Envoy for the Ocean, serving as a science diplomat to China, Indonesia, South Africa, Mauritius and the Seychelles.  She is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences, the American Philosophical Society, The American Academy of Arts and Sciences, The Royal Society, The World Academy of Sciences, and the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, among others.

She has received numerous awards recognizing contributions to science and society.  These include 24 honorary doctorates (most recently from Oxford University), a MacArthur Fellowship, and the highest honors given by the National Academy of Sciences (the Public Welfare Medal), the National Science Foundation (the Vannevar Bush Award), and the Department of Commerce (Gold Medal Award), and the highest honor given to a civilian by the U.S. Coast Guard (Distinguished Public Service Award). Dr. Lubchenco served as President of the Ecological Society of America, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the International Council for Science (ICSU). 

She co-founded three organizations that train scientists to be better communicators and engage effectively with the public, policy makers, the media, and industry: the Leopold Leadership Program (later Earth Leadership Program), COMPASS, and Climate Central.  She co-founded a research-policy network of university researchers, the Partnership for Interdisciplinary Studies of Coastal Oceans (PISCO); she co-founded the National Ocean Protection Coalition that unifies U.S. organizations working for effective ocean protection; and she co-founded a science-industry partnership, SeaBOS, Seafood Businesses for Ocean Stewardship. Dr. Lubchenco received a B.A. in biology from Colorado College, a M.S. in zoology from the University of Washington, and a Ph.D. in ecology from Harvard University. She has held faculty appointments at Harvard University, Stanford University, and Oregon State University.

            

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