The Climate and Nature Emergency Cohort (formerly the PWIAS Catalyst Program) supports inter- and trans-disciplinary collaborations that address the urgency, scale and complexity of the climate crisis, climate justice and biodiversity loss. By connecting scholars, students, artists, disciplines, sectors and communities we hope to expand the ways of knowing and acting in this challenging socio-ecological moment.
The Peter Wall Institute for Advanced Studies and the UBC Emeritus College have assembled a cohort of Emeriti to participate in the 2022-23 PWIAS Catalyst Program focusing on the Climate and Nature Emergency.
The objectives of the Cohort are:
- To bear witness to the life-time commitment of UBC’s Emeriti to a societal problem of the utmost urgency
- To enhance the visibility of, and intellectual exchange, between PWIAS and the UBC Emeritus College
- To demonstrate both the progress in understanding of the Climate and Nature Emergency that have been achieved at local, regional and national scales, and our collective failure to protect our landscapes, seascapes and urbanscapes at global scale from unnecessary harm during this time of rapid climate change
The cohort meet monthly to share research experience and engage with guest lecturers on the topic of the Climate and Nature Emergency.
2024-2025 Climate and Nature Emergency Cohort Members
Jo-ann Archibald, Emeritus Professor of Educational Studies, is an Indigenous scholar and pioneer in the advancement of Indigenous education, from early learning to graduate education. Her research and educational practice have addressed Indigenous knowledge systems, particularly oral traditions and stories, Elders’ and Indigenous community-based perspectives and ways of knowing, Indigenous methodologies and theories, decolonization of research and education, and reconciliation within educational systems.
John Millar, Clinical Professor Emeritus of Population and Public Health, currently focuses on the Polycrisis: global warming (phase out fossil fuel extraction and consumption with a just transition), ecological overshoot ( reduce consumption and waste, circular economy), reverse the growing social and economic inequities which immiserate millions (leading to unemployment ,poverty, homelessness, despair, addictions (alcohol/drugs), suicides, overdoses, violence and more broadly the erosion of trust in public institutions and democracy.
William Rees, Professor Emeritus of the School of Community and Regional Planning is a long-term member of the Global Ecological Integrity Group, a Fellow of the Post Carbon Institute, a founding member and Past President of the Canadian Society for Ecological Economics, and Founding Director, of the OneEarth Initiative. He was the inventor of the “ecological footprint” concept that has influenced a number of European countries’ economic budgets and gave rise to the concept of “overshoot”.
Olav Slaymaker, Professor Emeritus of Geography, is an authority on changing landscapes at local, regional and global scales, and a consultant to UNESCO’s World Heritage Site selection criteria. He is a former Governor of the International Development Research Centre (1994–2002), and President of the International Association of Geomorphologists (1997–2001). He co-authored Canada’s Changing Cold Climates (with Hugh French) 2012 and The Cryosphere and Global Environmental Change (with Richard Kelly) 2007, and is currently focused on protected areas in Canada, with recent chapters on protected areas of western (2017) and eastern Canada (2020).
Douw Steyn, Professor Emeritus of Earth, Ocean and Atmospheric Science, is active in the fields of air pollution meteorology, boundary layer meteorology, mesoscale meteorology, environmental science, and interdisciplinary science. He is an authority on ozone pollution in the Lower Fraser Valley and applied meteorology in complex terrain.
Frank Tester, Professor Emeritus of Social Work and Family Studies, is an advocate, researcher and consultant on environmental issues, especially in Canada’s Arctic. He focusses on the social and environmental history of the eastern Arctic. He has expertise in Canadian environmental issues, aboriginal global trade issues, and the Nunaunt and Inuit of the Eastern Arctic.
Robert Woollard, Emeritus Professor of Family Practice has extensive national and international experience in the fields of medical education, social accountability of medical schools, ecosystem approaches to health, poverty reduction and sustainable development. In this he has or is holding leadership roles in the CFPC, CMA, AFMC, AMEE, and The Network TUFH. He is actively involved in Nepal with a national medical school, school of public health and a nursing school founded on the principles of social accountability established through his initial feasibility study. He currently chairs the International Advisory Board (composed of senior academics from universities around the world) working with Nepali policy makers and academics towards the establishment of the University of Nepal—a new public liberal arts university. His work in East Africa and Asia is centered on matters of social accountability, primary care, rural health and accreditation systems.
Graeme Wynn, Professor Emeritus of Historical Geography, is an authority on environmentalism in North America and New Zealand. Forestry, agriculture and sustainability have been his main interests. He was the President of the American Society for Environmental History and recently authored a paper in Environmental History entitled “Framing an Ecology of Hope” (2020), which is of high relevance to the Emeritus cohort. In 2019, he co-edited The Nature of Canada, which includes 18 invited essays on the transformation of Canada’s environments.