Myriad human-generated global environmental stresses have precipitated what is being called “the multi-crisis,” as the climate crisis, toxins crisis, extinction crisis, plastics crisis, water crisis, and more converge and worsen. The planet’s critical state demands action to blunt and reverse these crises and help ensure a habitable planet for human societies and life on Earth as we’ve known it.

Stony Brook now seeks to significantly amplify such work by our faculty, staff, and students, and to engage external partners, policymakers, and the public who are passionate about these challenges through an important and exciting new faculty-driven initiative, the Collaborative for the Earth. The Collaborative concept is a multi-disciplinary “action-tank,” supported by the Office of the Provost, that seeks to develop solutions in response to the harmful effects of climate change and in the abatement of existential risks to the living world’s interconnected life-supporting systems, with attention to human dignity and justice and the preservation of civilizations.

The Collaborative for the Earth builds upon Stony Brook’s robust academic tradition and strengths, including the university’s historic role in banning DDT, its MacArthur-winning biological conservationists, its Pew-winning ecologists, its leaders in developing clean energy technologies, and its Nobel-winning climate scientists. Now spurred by our selection as the anchor institution for the New York Climate Exchange, we are in a position to lead in developing solutions to existential global threats and leverage Stony Brook’s unique opportunity to effect change.

Initial aims of the Collaborative for the Earth include hosting an international forum series on Earth system challenges designed to place Stony Brook at the forefront of thought and action; developing interdisciplinary graduate, professional, and continuing education programs; and guiding campus-wide conversations on how to maximize our potential in defining and implementing solutions to global environmental challenges. 

In building on the initial work of this faculty-driven group, we are now launching an internal search for the inaugural faculty director of this Collaborative. The director will play a key role in developing the Collaborative and its initial activities, including broad collaboration across the university. If you are a tenured faculty member at SBU interested in applying for the position of director of the Collaborative, please use this link.

If you are interested in learning more about the Collaborative, including how to get involved as a member, please send an email to provost@stonybrook.edu.

Sincerely,
Carl

Carl Lejuez
Provost and Executive Vice President