About the speakers

Dr. Suzanne Simard has earned a reputation for research on tree connectivity and communication. Her work explores how forests are social, cooperative beings with communal lives not that different from our own. She is a Professor of Forest Ecology at the University of British Columbia, where she currently leads The Mother Tree Project and co-directs the Belowground Ecosystem Group. Her work has been published widely, with over 170 scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals, including Nature, Ecology, and Global Biology, and she has co-authored the book Climate Change and Variability. Her research has been communicated broadly through three TED Talks, TED Experiences, as well as articles and interviews in The New Yorker, National Geographic, The Globe and Mail, NPR, CNN, CBC, and many more. She lives with her two adventurous daughters and their wild and crazy extended family in the mountains around Nelson, British Columbia. You can purchase her book, Finding the Mother Tree, here.

Dr. Shelley Luce has worked in leadership roles for nonprofits in Los Angeles for 15 years, most recently as the president of Heal the Bay. She is currently Sierra Club BC’s Director of Campaigns and Programs. Her focus so far has been water and forest protection, with an emphasis on community resilience and environmental justice. She is deeply committed to the vision laid out in SCBC’s strategic plan Growing Into Balance and honoured to join the SCBC team as we embark on a transformation to better center Indigenous voices and communities of color. Shelley is excited to lead the SCBC team to develop collaborative, innovative strategic actions with measurable goals and publicly reported outcomes. Shelley holds a Doctorate in Environmental Science and Engineering from UCLA and a BS in Biology from McGill.