Council Members

Christopher Tucker

Chairman

Dr. Christopher Tucker manages Yale House Ventures, a portfolio of social ventures and technology companies that span the worlds of energy, geospatial, sensor, cyber-security, open source, and social media technologies, across the domains of defense/intelligence, international affairs, civilian government, commercial industry, NGOs, and academe. He is also the Chairman and CEO of The MapStory Foundation and President of the foreign policy advocacy group, Friends of the Arc.

Dr. Tucker was previously Senior VP for the Americas/National Programs at ERDAS and President/CEO of IONIC, a leader in interoperable web-mapping, location based services, imagery management and distributed geoprocessing. He has served on a variety of Boards such as the US Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, the Open Geospatial Consortium, Open Plans, OpenGeo, the Secretary of Interior’s National Geospatial Advisory Committee, and the Defense Science Board Intelligence Task Force, the DNI’s Intelligence Community Strategic Studies Group, and serves as an Independent Advisor to the Director of the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency (NGA). Dr. Tucker served on the National Academy of Science’s Committee on NGA’s GEOINT Research Priorities.

Dr. Tucker was Chief Strategic Officer of In-Q-Tel, the CIA’s venture capital fund. He was responsible for managing the technical portfolio, issues of organizational design, and relations with the intelligence community, industry and media.
As Special Advisor to the Executive Vice Provost of Columbia University, Dr. Tucker was responsible for a range of issues having to do with strategic institutional development, R&D portfolio management, federal science and technology policy, and the organization of interdisciplinary research. At Columbia, he co-founded the Center for Science, Policy, and Outcomes and has taught courses at the Columbia School of International and Public Affairs. Dr. Tucker earned his B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. at Columbia University in the City of New York.

John Gould

Chairman Emeritus & Treasurer

Mr. Gould is the Executive Vice President and General Counsel of CH Energy Group, Inc.; Former Partner and Member of Executive Committee, Thompson Hine LLP; Chairman, New Choral Society of Central Westchester; Former Vice President, Harvard Club of New York; Former Director, Harvard Law School Association of New York; Past President, Fordham College Alumni Association; Past President, Scarsdale Golf Club.

Marie Price

President

Dr. Price is a Professor of Geography and International Affairs at the George Washington University where she has taught since 1990. A Latin American and migration specialist, her studies have explored human migration, natural resource use, environmental conservation, and regional development. She is a non-resident fellow of the Migration Policy Institute, a non-partisan think tank that focuses on immigration issues based in Washington, DC. Her publications include the co-authored book Migrants’ Inclusion in Cities: Innovative Urban Policies and Practices (2013, United Nations) that was a collaborative project with staff from UNESCO and UN-Habitat, a co-edited book Migrants to the Metropolis: The Rise of Immigrant Gateway Cities (2008, Syracuse University Press), and the co-authored textbooks Diversity Amid Globalization: World Regions, Environment and Development, 5th edition (2011, Pearson) and Globalization and Diversity: Geography of a Changing World, 4th edition (2013, Pearson). She has also published some 40 refereed articles and book chapters.

Jerome Dobson

President Emeritus

Jerome E. “Jerry” Dobson is an innovator and popular writer and speaker in the fields of geography and geographic information science. He is happiest at the ends of the earth, the cutting edge of technology, and the forefront of science. He has been called a pioneer of the geographic information revolution and holds two lifetime achievement awards from professional societies in that booming field. He was president of the University Consortium for Geographic Information Science and has been AGS president since 2002. He is a professor of geography at the University of Kansas and a Jefferson Science Fellow with the National Academies and U. S. Department of State. He previously served as a distinguished research and development staff member at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and later as senior scientist in the Office of the Geographer and Global Issues at the U.S. Department of State. Jerry has published more than 200 professional articles, editorials, and reports on geographic information systems (GIS), continental drift, coastal change analysis, and human evolution.

William Doyle

President Emeritus

Retired Vice President, Texaco Inc. and past President, Texaco’s Middle East/Far East Division; formerly Vice President of Exploration and Producing for Texaco Latin America/West Africa, Vice President of Exploration and Producing for Texaco Europe, and Managing Director of Texaco Limited for Exploration and Producing.

Alexander Murphy

Senior Vice President

Dr. Murphy is a Professor, Department of Geography, University of Oregon; degrees in archaeology (Yale), law (Columbia), and geography (University of Chicago); editorial board, the Geographical Review; chair, Advanced Placement Geography Committee; Past President, Association of American Geographers; National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award, 1991-1996; extensive publications on the political, cultural, and environmental geography of Europe.

Deborah Popper

Vice President

Dr. Popper is a Professor of Geography at the College of Staten Island and Graduate Center of the City University of New York and, with her husband Frank Popper, at Princeton University. Her work has focused on how large regions and urban areas adjust to environmental pressures and population loss. With her husband, Frank Popper of Rutgers University, she developed the concept of the Buffalo Commons, a metaphor that has served as a guide for a future based on ecological restoration. She is currently working on developing comparable alternatives for other American regions. In addition to serving on the governing board of the American Geographical Society, she is also on the National Center for Frontier Communities board. Dr. Popper is a Paul P. Vouras Medalist.

John Konarski

Chief Executive Officer

Dr. John Konarski is the Chief Executive Officer of the American Geographical Society (AGS). Before joining AGS in 2013, Dr. Konarski spent a decade as a strategic advisor in Brazil for companies developing and executing American-style retail concepts in the Brazilian market, helping them to transform their product/service lines and better position themselves in a highly competitive marketplace. Prior to working in Brazil, Dr. Konarski was the Senior Vice President of the International Council of Shopping Centers (ICSC) and Executive Director of the ICSC Educational Foundation. As Senior Vice President, Dr. Konarski was responsible for all government, research, education, and media relations for the shopping center industry, and worked closely with the institutional finance community regarding retail real estate issues in different geographies across the globe. He also served as the primary spokesperson for the shopping center and retail industry in North America. Dr. Konarski has served on numerous boards of trustees and advisory boards, including serving as a Councilor of the AGS. Dr. Konarski holds a Bachelor’s Degree from Le Moyne College, a Master’s degree from the University of Dayton, and a Doctoral Degree (PhD) from Syracuse University. Dr. Konarski lives in White Plains, New York with his family.

J. Dinsmore Adams

Secretary

Mr. Adams is a retired New York City Lawyer. Adams is a former trustee or director of: Harvard Club of NYC (President); African Medical & Research Foundation; Adirondack Museum; Clark Art Institute; American University in Cairo (Secretary); Concern for Dying; Friends of Harvard Tennis & Squash; Riverdale Yacht Club. Former Partner, Webster & Sheffield; Curtis, Mallet-Prevost, Colt & Mosle. Member of Bedford Golf & Tennis Club, Harvard Club of NYC, Mountain Lake Club and Riverdale Yacht Club. Adams holds an L.L.B. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School and a B.A. from Harvard University.

John Noble Wilford

Council Member

Mr. Wilford is the Senior science correspondent of the New York Times; author: The Mapmakers (1981), The Mysterious History of Columbus (1991), and numerous other books and articles; winner: two Pulitzer Prizes for National Reporting, many other awards and honorary degrees; assignments throughout U.S. and to Europe, former Soviet Union, China, Mongolia, Canada’s Northwest Territories, Mexico, the Amazon, the Caribbean, among others; co-chairman, Mercator Society.

Joshua Campell

Council Member

Dr. Joshua S. Campbell is the CEO of Sand Hill Geographic. Dr. Campbell has over 15 years of experience working with geographic information science and technology, including a range of both open source and proprietary GIS software. His background encompasses a spectrum of geospatial topics including data collection, spatial analysis, remote sensing, geostatistics, visualization, web mapping, and data sharing. He has built and deployed enterprise scale geographic computing infrastructures at the U.S. Department of State and the University of Kansas. These infrastructures harness two major trends: the transition of GIS from a desktop to a web environment, and the increasing power of crowdsourcing. While at the State Department’s Humanitarian Information Unit, Dr. Campbell created MapGive, a crowdsource mapping initiative designed to catalyze open geographic data production to support the humanitarian, development, and disaster risk reduction communities. He currently consults with the World Bank and other U.S. government clients, and has worked previously on geospatial software development, wind power, electrical transmission, archaeology, ecology, climate change, and journalism topics. Dr. Campbell holds a Ph.D. in Geography, a M.A. in Geography, and Bachelors in Anthropology, each from the University of Kansas.

Robert Chen

Council Member

Dr. Chen is director of the Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), a part of the Earth Institute at Columbia University in New York. He also manages the NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC), a unique source of interdisciplinary, open access geospatial data and information focused on human-environment interactions. He recently served on the United Nations Independent Expert Advisory Group on the Data Revolution for Sustainable Development, and helped to develop the innovative immersive exhibit, Connected Worlds, at the New York Hall of Science. He received his PhD in Geography from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and holds Masters degrees in Technology and Policy and in Meteorology and Physical Oceanography from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. His undergraduate degree was in Earth and Planetary Sciences at MIT.

Andrea D'Amato

Council Member

Andrea d’Amato, is a certified planner, project manager and business manager with
over 25 years of experience in transportation program management and land use
planning. She received her Masters’ degrees in both Geography and Urban Planning
from the University of Wisconsin. Andrea has held several executive management
positions in both the public and private sectors.

She currently serves as Assistant Secretary for Operational Excellence at MassDOT,
primarily focused on improving operational performance among and between the
Highway, Transit and Registry departments for the Commonwealth. Notable projects
include: streamlining design procurement at the MBTA; creating an integrated transit
and highway construction coordination program “Plan Ahead’ to effectively plan,
manage and mitigate multi-agency construction to minimize disruptions to the traveling
public; streamlining the suspension hearing process at the Registry; and most recently,
developing and implementing a coordinated advanced notification program for the
Chelsea Street Bridge for maritime and roadway users.

On behalf of the National Academies of Science – Transportation Research Board
(TRB) Andrea chairs the Strategic Management, is an Executive Committee member for
Transportation Issues in Major Cities, and co-chairs TRB’s Equity in Transportation
Joint Subcommittee.

Prior to MassDOT, Andrea held executive positions as Chief Planner and Project
Manager for HNTB’s multimodal projects, and Vice President and Northeast
Transportation Manager for Kleinfelder. She was the longest serving Transportation
Commissioner and Chief of Environmental Services in Boston’s history between 1998
and 2004 for the City of Boston. While Commissioner, Andrea served as the former
President of NACTO and co-chair for the European affiliate IMPACTS focused at the
executive levels of municipal government on exchanging data, technology and
operational best practices among large cities.

Adrianne Kadzinski

Council Member

Ms. Adrianne Dicker Kadzinski is Director and Member of Credit Suisse’s Leveraged Lending Governance Committee and also advises many tech startups focused on business services, financial technology, and network management. Ms. Kadzinski loves to build, fix and scale enterprises.
She previously led a reorganization analysis and advised on future needs technology for a US Department of Defense Command and was Senior Executive Management Advisor to the US Department of State. During the 2007-2008 financial crisis, she was Executive Director/COO of Morgan Stanley Prime Brokerage Risk Management.
She served as an officer in the US Army Reserve for 24 years where she managed US military programs, created customary operating procedures, trained teams and drafted policies for a variety of US military organizations. She deployed to Afghanistan for Operation Enduring Freedom.
She serves as Officer and Audit Committee Member of the Priory in the USA of the Order of St John, Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society and advisor to other not-for-profits. She holds a B.A. in Slavic Languages and Literature from Harvard University.

Al di Leonardo

Council Member

Al Di Leonardo is an experienced intelligence and special operations officer who utilized his military training to successfully found and sell two geospatial tech companies in the private and public marketplaces.

Al is more widely recognized as a subject matter expert in analytical tradecraft, and as entrepreneur with expertise, vision, and leadership at the intersection of big data, analytics, and geography. Before starting new businesses, he also served as a U.S. Army officer who earned the Bronze Star Medal from U.S. Special Operations Command for his work in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Post sale of the two companies, he has been supporting industry-focused nonprofits in data analytics, geography, and special operations.

He currently is helping found The Boundary Group, a private equity firm , and a new technical services company known as Black Cape.

Amy Glasmeier

Council Member

Dr. Amy Glasmeier is a professor of Economic Geography and Regional Planning. She runs LRISA, the Lab on Regional Innovation and Spatial Analysis, in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning, MIT. Glasmeier is a founding editor of the Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society. Her research focuses economic opportunities for communities and individuals. She investigates the role of geographic access and the effect of locational accident, on human development. She is writing a book “Good Bye American Dream” that traces the ideology of opportunity that undergirds America’s relationship to the poor. Through analysis of census data, popular media, and personal narratives Professor Glasmeier is exploring the contradictions in this most sacred of constructs by demonstrating the ephemeral nature of economic opportunity encumbered by locational accident, institutional inertia and the unintended consequences of public policy. The work builds off of her long running Living Wage Calculator, www.livingwagecalculator@mit.edu, which analyzes the minimum level of income required for individuals and families to pay for basic living expenses. Professor Glasmeier holds a professional Masters and PhD in Regional from UC Berkeley. A second field of expertise, Glasmeier investigates and teaches about the role of energy in human development. She is a co-PI on a four year NSF-CRISP project studying resilience and the case of catastrophic failures.

David Kaplan

Council Member

Dr. Kaplan is a Professor of Geography at Kent State University where he has taught since 1995. He has written some 50 peer-reviewed articles and chapters, and has also published Segregation in Cities, Nested Identities, Boundaries and Place, Human Geography, Urban Geography, Landscapes of the Ethnic Economy, Perthes World Atlas, and the four volume Nations and Nationalism: A Global Historical Overview. Dr. Kaplan’s research interests include nationalism, borderlands, ethnic and racial segregation, urban and regional development, housing finance, and sustainable transportation. Dr. Kaplan has directly supervised about 40 graduate students and teaches courses on many different aspects of human geography.

Parag Khanna

Council Member

Dr. Khanna is a leading global strategist and best-selling author. He is a CNN Global Contributor and Senior Research Fellow in the Centre on Asia and Globalization at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. He is co-author of Hybrid Reality: Thriving in the Emerging Human-Technology Civilization (2012) and author of How to Run the World: Charting a Course to the Next Renaissance (2011) and The Second World: Empires and Influence in the New Global Order (2008). He holds a PhD from the London School of Economics, and Bachelors and Masters degrees from the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. He is a Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum (WEF).

Keith Masbeck

Council Member

Mr. Masback is the CEO of the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF), a nonprofit foundation supporting training, education, professional development, and innovation for the geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) community. USGIF has over 235 corporate and institutional member organizations, and currently accredits 12 colleges and universities to grant academic GEOINT Certificates. Prior to this position, he spent over twenty years combined as an officer in the U.S. Army and as a senior executive civilian in both the Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community. In addition to his position as a Councilor of the American Geographical Society, he serves as a member of the Department of Commerce, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Advisory Committee on Commercial Remote Sensing (ACCRES) and the Department of Interior’s National Geospatial Advisory Committee (NGAC).

Jared Novick

Council Member

Jared E. Novick is an entrepreneur, maker, and technology enthusiast active within the geospatial and cyber industries. As Principal of Continuum Ventures, he manages a portfolio of business and social ventures. Jared has supported the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense (OSD), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), U.S. Intelligence Agencies as well as the Naval Postgraduate School (NPS). Jared serves on the council for the American Geographical Society and on the advisory board for Texas A&M University’s Center for Geospatial Sciences, Applications and Technology (GeoSAT). Curved Skies, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Continuum Ventures, is a boutique aerospace company which demonstrates high altitude geospatial technologies, transitions systems to space applications, and performs sensor risk reduction studies for commercial and government clients.

Kate O'Reilly

Council Member

Ms. Kate O’Reilly is the owner/executive of an agricultural enterprise in Kansas and a large commercial building in Manhattan. Her interests lie in geography, conservation, and environmental sciences. Kate has extensive teaching experience and taught full- or part-time in Putney, Vermont.

James Pickle

Council Member

Eddie Pickle is Senior Director, Insight Solutions & Geospatial Systems at Maxar Technologies, where he leads company efforts that combine automation, data science, AI/ML, and advanced open source software development to create cloud-based geospatial capabilities. Before coming to Maxar, Eddie was the founding CEO of Boundless (formerly OpenGeo), leading the company in its spinoff from its non-profit parent. A population geographer by training, Mr. Pickle has worked in the geospatial industry for more than 30 years, and has been a senior executive at both well-known software (Ionic Software, RadiantBlue Technologies) and data (Claritas/Nielsen, IXI) leaders. He has worked with commercial, government, and NGO organizations worldwide, is a Councilor of the American Geographical Society, and founded both the FedGeoDay and FOSS4G North America open geospatial tech/ecosystem conference series.

Previously, Eddie was one of the founders of OGC web services pioneer Ionic Software, and served as its Chief Operating Officer until its purchase by ERDAS in 2007. Prior to that, Eddie was a senior executive leading sales, data development and data solutions at Claritas and IXI Corporation (now part of Equifax). Eddie holds a Masters degree in Geography from UCLA with a specialization in demography, and a BA in Geography from the University of Tennessee.

Anthony Quartararo

Council Member

Mr. Quartararo is the President & CEO of Spatial Networks, Inc. in St. Petersburg, Florida. He has more than 20 years of experience in the geospatial industry, ranging from program and project management of multi-year international map production projects, business and competitive intelligence analysis, human capital management, field data collection operations, data procurement and human geography data acquisition and visualization. Mr. Quartararo founded Spatial Networks in 2000 and has been involved in business activities in Central & South Asia, North Africa, Near East, Latin America and East Asia. Mr. Quartararo holds a BA in Geography/GIS from Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania and spent 3 years working on an MA in Geography/GIS at Portland State University in Portland, Oregon.

Wesley Reisser

Council Member

Wesley J. Reisser is a member of the State Department’s civil service, where he has spent the past eleven years working mostly on Middle Eastern issues and the United Nations, including work on Israel-Palestinian negotiations, Syria, and Iran, as well as working on developing foreign policy to address the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people around the world. Dr. Reisser holds a Bachelors Degree, Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa, in International Affairs and History from The George Washington University, and a Masters Degree in Geography from the same institution that focuses on borders and peace settlements. In 2010, he completed a Ph.D. in Geography from UCLA with a dissertation on American border proposals and peacemaking efforts following World War I. Dr. Reisser teaches geography at the George Washington University, including courses on political geography and energy resources. He is a regular lecturer on Middle East Geography, Multilateral Diplomacy, and Middle East Peace at the State Department’s Foreign Service Institute. His first book, “The Black Book: Woodrow Wilson’s Secret Plan for Peace” was published in April, 2012. Besides his professional work, in 2011 Dr. Reisser founded an Eastern European dance group in Washington, DC called the Carpathia Folk Dance Ensemble, and is the 2007 National Geography Bowl Champion.

Mark Safran

Council Member

At BAE Systems, Mr. Mark Safran is responsible for producing and maintaining geospatial data and cartographic products for use by government agencies. Under Mr. Safran’s guidance, BAE Systems has grown to be an important center of mapping programs that provide customers with accurate location data and cartography catered to customers’ needs. Mr. Safran first joined AGS as an AGS Fellow to bridge his interests in geography, mapping, and remote sensing with broader communities that focus on efforts such as renewable energy, climate change and sustainable development. As a Councilor at AGS, he hopes to weave these initiatives together by pursuing an interdisciplinary dialogue between science, business, education and government and placing geography at the center of it.

Lee Schwartz

Council Member

Dr. Lee Schwartz is the Geographer of the United States and Director of the Office of the Geographer and Global Issues, where he directs research and analysis on global issues primarily related to complex humanitarian emergencies and environmental sustainability. Dr. Schwartz is the State Department’s 8th Geographer, a position that was established in 1921 and bears the statutory responsibility for providing guidance to all federal agencies on questions of international boundaries and sovereignty claims. He also oversees the Humanitarian Information Unit – a U.S. government interagency organization focused on unclassified data coordination for emergency preparedness, response, and mitigation. He has designed and coordinated fieldwork and applied geography projects in the many of the world’s most conflicted countries. His work encompasses ethnic conflict, refugee flows, peacekeeping operations, food and water security, human and wildlife trafficking, and strategic warning – with an emphasis on Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Participatory Mapping, and Remote Sensing information coordination. Among other honors, Dr. Schwartz is a recipient of a 2018 Presidential Rank Award, the Association of American Geographers’ Anderson Medal of Honor in Applied Geography, the State Department’s Warren Christopher Award for Outstanding Achievement in Global Affairs, and the James Cullum Medal from the American Geographical Society. He has a Ph.D. in geography from Columbia University.

Michael Steinberg

Council Member

As a professor of geography and environmental studies, Dr. Michael Steinberg has taught at Prescott College, the University of Alabama, the University of Hawaii, and the University of Southern Maine. Dr. Steinberg currently directs the Natural Resources Conservation Lab in the Department of Geography at the University of Alabama. He works with students and other academics to research human-wildlife interactions with the goal to develop pivotal conservation strategies. Michael Steinberg is a well published author on topics of wildlife and natural landscapes and has been published in Geographical Review and FOCUS on Geography. Dr. Steinberg is currently an editor of FOCUS on Geography and provides the publication with a wide range of conservation insights.

Antoinette WinklerPrins

Council Member

Dr. WinklerPrins is a permanent Program Director of the Geography and Spatial Sciences Program at the (US) National Science Foundation. She is also an Adjunct Professor in the Environmental Sciences and Policy Program in the Johns Hopkins University Krieger School of Arts and Sciences Advanced Academic Programs. She was on the faculty of the Department of Geography at Michigan State University for 13 years. Originally from the Netherlands, Dr. WinklerPrins has lived and worked in numerous places around the world. Trained as a people-environment geographer, her research focus has been on agricultural livelihoods and soils, environmental knowledge, and urban agriculture, especially in tropical locations. She has published in a wide variety of outlets and continues to conduct research with projects in Mexico and the Brazilian Amazon.

Dean Wise

Council Member

Mr. Wise formed Dean Wise LLC in February 2017 to provide strategic advisory services to the transportation, logistics and infrastructure sector, with an emphasis on transformational technologies. Previously, Mr. Wise was Vice President of Network Strategy at BNSF Railway. BNSF Railway is one of North America’s leading freight transportation companies operating on 32,500 route miles of track in 28 states and three Canadian provinces, integral to the global supply chains of mining, energy, utility, agricultural, industrial, and consumer products industries. Joining BNSF in February 2010, coincident with Berkshire Hathaway’s acquisition of the company, Dean oversaw BNSF’s strategy process, transformational technology initiative, regional franchise development, shortline network (200 rail feeder lines), public-private partnerships (PPP), rail line sales and dispositions, and development of right-of-way for non-freight rail uses including fiber optics, cell towers, and electric transmission lines.

Prior to his 7 years at BNSF, Dean had 32 years of consulting and industry experience. From 1995 to 2010, he served as president and managing partner at Norbridge, Inc., a management consulting firm focusing on the freight transport and logistics industry, based in Concord, MA. Before joining Norbridge, he was a vice president at Mercer Management Consulting (now Oliver Wyman) in Lexington, MA, (1983-1995). Dean’s prior experience also includes management positions at Conrail Corporation and Southern Pacific Transportation Company.

Robin Leichenko

Council Member

Dr. Robin Leichenko is a Professor and Chair of the Department of Geography at Rutgers University. She is also the Co-Director of the Rutgers Climate Institute. Dr. Leichenko works at the intersection of economic geography and the social dimensions of climate change. Her recent projects explore economic and social vulnerability to climate change in coastal cities and regions and the equity implications of climate change adaptation and resilience efforts. Leichenko has authored three books and authored or co-authored more than 70 refereed journal articles and book chapters. Her co-authored book with Karen O’Brien, Environmental Change and Globalization: Double Exposures received the 2008 Meridian Book Award. Her latest book, Climate and Society: Transforming the Future, also co-authored with Karen O’Brien, shows that climate change is both a critical challenge for society and also an opening for transformation to a more sustainable and thriving world.

Craig Colten

Council Delegate

Professor Colten is the Carl O. Sauer Professor of Geography at LSU and the Director of Human Dimensions at the Water Institute of the Gulf. He has extensive experience in both the public and private sector, having spent a decade with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources along with managing the Washington, DC office of PHR Environmental Consultants in the 1990s. His research has focused on the historical geography of hazards, water resources, and most recently community resilience. He is the author of the award winning Unnatural Metropolis (2005) in addition to numerous book chapters and articles. From 2007 to 2012 he was the editor of the Geographical Review.

Lawson Brigham

Council Delegate

Dr. Lawson W. Brigham is a Global Fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington DC and a researcher at the International Arctic Research Center, University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF). Current member of the National Academies Polar Research Board and member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Career U.S. Coast Guard officer commanding four ships including the icebreaker Polar Sea on Arctic & Antarctic expeditions. Served as a Marine Policy Fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution; on the faculty of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy, Naval Postgraduate School, and UAF (Distinguished Professor of Geography & Arctic Policy); Alaska Director of the U.S. Arctic Research Commission; and, Chair of the Arctic Council's Arctic Marine Shipping Assessment. Cambridge University (PhD). Research on the Russian maritime Arctic, environmental change, polar marine transportation, Arctic security, and polar geopolitics. 2008 signer of the AGS Fliers' and Explorers' Globe as captain during Polar Sea's 1994 voyages ~ the first ship to reach the extreme ends of the global ocean. Elected to the Norwegian Scientific Academy for Polar Research (2013) and awarded the American Polar Society's Polar Medal (2015). A central peak in Victoria Land, Antarctica was named Mount Brigham in January 2008 by the Board of Geographic Names.

Douglas Sherman

Council Delegate

Dr. Sherman is a geomorphologist interested in fundamental earth surface processes, especially those involving sand transport by wind and waves. His current research projects include the long-term measurement of levee erosion in the Sacramento River delta, wave setup behind a detached breakwater in Italy, wave transformation over a rock platform in NW Portugal, aeolian saltation processes, detection and estimation of shoreline change along the coast of Texas, and sedimentation behind dams and debris basins in southern California. Dr. Sherman also has a general interest in the histories, methodologies, and philosophies of geomorphology.

Joseph Wood

Council Delegate

Joseph S. Wood is a geographer whose academic work focuses on the North American cultural landscape. He’s taught at the University of Nebraska at Omaha; George Mason University, where he chaired the Department of Geography and Earth Systems Science and served as Vice Provost for Academic Affairs; and the University of Southern Maine as Provost and Interim President. He served as Provost at the University of Baltimore from 2009 to 2016. Wood’s publications in cultural geography explore a variety of topics from the New England village as invented tradition to contemporary Vietnamese place-making in American suburbs and much more. At UB, Joe teaches about how Americans have shaped their cities, and in 2015 he developed the community forum-based Divided Baltimore course to address how the geography of Baltimore entrenches structural racism. He’s an AGS Travel Program lecturer in Cambodia and Vietnam, across Canada by train, and, most recently, by ship from Newfoundland into the Great Lakes. He holds Geography degrees in all levels of education; a BA from Middlebury College, an MA from the University of Vermont and a Ph.D. from The Pennsylvania State University.