Yale Bulletin and Calendar

March 30, 2001

Volume 29, Number 24

Noted alumni to advise School of
Forestry & Environmental Studies

Yale alumni Edward P. Bass '67 and Frances Beinecke '71 will cochair a newly formed organization called the Leadership Council that will provide strategic advice and counsel to the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies (F&ES), announced the school's dean, James Gustave Speth.

The council includes Yale alumni and distinguished scholars and environmental leaders from around the world. Its purpose is to support the University's efforts in maintaining the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies as the preeminent worldwide institution in environmental education, management and public policy.

"No other institution, here in the United States or elsewhere, has the richness of academic talent, the breadth of program excellence or the century-long record of achievement and leadership that the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies has," says Bass, an investor and venture capitalist. "We have an opportunity to accomplish something extraordinary here at Yale, and together we will do exactly that."

Beinecke, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council and a Yale trustee, says "In launching this initiative, we recognize the value of building and sustaining long-term partnerships with accomplished, well-informed individuals who can provide ongoing advice, ideas, responses to proposed plans and strategies, and support."

The council's inaugural meeting was held Feb. 15 and 16 and was attended by 45 Leadership Council members, as well as President Richard C. Levin and Provost Alison F. Richard. They participated in discussions on the school's educational and research priorities and how the school, and Yale generally, must prepare itself to provide practical solutions to increasingly challenging environmental problems at the regional, national and global levels.

Speth noted at the meeting that three things are essential to meeting the challenges of sustaining the global environment: a new generation of environmental leaders broadly trained in the natural, social and policy sciences relevant to environmental management; new knowledge about, and new approaches to, large-scale environmental problems of unprecedented complexity; and a broad, holistic approach to the environment, emphasizing the integration of environmental, economic and developmental factors.

According to Speth, the Leadership Council is designed to engage with the F&ES, its faculty, dean and the University in a "spirited, two-way discussion on issues of major consequence."

"One of my most important responsibilities is to lend strong institutional support to program areas where the University has a major opportunity to provide global leadership in the 21st century," says President Richard C. Levin. "One such area is the environment, in which Yale has a history of accomplishment going back to the beginning of the 20th century and where our current strengths are formidable."

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