American Forests, the oldest nonprofit conservation organization in the country, chose University of Idaho alumnus Robert Keane to serve on its newly created Science Advisory Board.
Keane will join nine other Earth and social scientists on the board created by American Forests CEO Scott Steen.
Keane received his doctorate in forest ecology from UI and is currently a research ecologist who works with the USDA Forest Service Rocky Mountain Research Station. Keane said he believes his education at UI was important in the choice to put him on the advisory board for American Forests.
“When I went to the University of Idaho, I picked it because a professor was working with Whitebark Pine,” Keane said.
Keane said American Forests is helping by making a big effort to restore the Whitebark Pine species, which is in danger of extinction, and needed scientific advisers to do so.
“We had been talking about doing a number of campaigns in the country with the threatened and high elevation forests,” said Gerry Gray, senior vice president of conservation programs. “We’ll be working with Bob to look at ways to understand the threats to those forests and find species (of trees) that will not be killed by those threat.”
Gray said Keane was also chosen because of his fire ecology experience.
“Strategically, we’ve reached out to Bob about issues on fire ecology in the Northern Rockies,” Gray said. “We would have him make sure that our information on the ecology system, including the threats on the systems, restoring it and the air quality benefits are correct.”
There have recently been some leadership changes within American Forests, Gray said.
“We’ve come up with a new strategic vision along with a logo and mission statement,” Gray said. “Much of our emphasis will be on strengthening our communications and outreach to build on issues related with forests.”
Gray said initially American Forests was unsure how the board would work because most scientists are already busy with other projects, but everyone he talked to seemed to like the idea.
“We’re talking about an annual meeting of the scientists to help with an interdisciplinary approach,” Gray said.
Gray said he hopes the board will grow to more than 20 within the next year.