Liz Chamberlin, PhD
Director of Innovation
As Director of Innovation, I develop strategy, oversee institutional funding and relationships, and focus on policy and government affairs engagement to help Point Blue maximize our impact. I lead an Innovation Group in close collaboration with our CEO that focuses on policy engagement, institutional fundraising, community science, and identifying areas for innovation for the organization. I collaborate closely with my colleagues across Point Blue to explore and develop opportunities to increase the impact, effectiveness, and success of programs through collaboration on science, strategic development, business development, and science communications.
I received both my Ph.D. in Integrative Ecology and an MA in English from the University of California Davis, where I studied the impacts of urbanization on nectar-feeding bat foraging behavior related to its influence on bat-mediated emerging infectious diseases in the Australasian Pacific Rim. Before coming to Point Blue, I taught biology, ecology, conservation and writing at community colleges and in the CSU system for over a decade. I was also a life sciences expert for the university publishing industry, and worked as a dune ecologist and restoration practitioner with California State Parks in the Monterey Bay area.
In addition to the writing I currently do to support Point Blue’s scientific programs, I am a fiction writer and have been nominated to Best New American Voices. I love to read, travel, fly paragliders, surf, ski and backpack with my family and have a weakness for watching late night sci fi TV with my 3 kids.