Network Innovation Grants - Recent Recipients
Following is a selection of recent Switzer Network Innovation grants. These grants are awarded to organizations working with two or more Fellows taking a leadership role in advancing progress on a critical environmental issue, whether it is convening a group of experts to address a policy or technical challenge, undertaking policy-relevant research that will be moved to action quickly, or designing or launching a pilot project with specific policy or management implications.
$40,000.00 awarded to Earthworks in 2012
Switzer Fellows will collaborate with Earthworks to research the life cycle and regional impacts of hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking," in the Marcellus Shale of the northeastern U.S. While fracking has occurred for decades in less populated areas of the western U.S., including Wyoming...Read more >
$5,000.00 awarded to Society for Conservation Biology in 2012
Switzer Fellows Kristy Deiner and Matt Hamilton developed a workshop for the 2012 Society for Conservation Biology annual meeting of the North America section, held in Oakland, CA. The workshop focused on educating conservation practitioners on ways to effectively communicate science and...Read more >
$5,000.00 awarded to Los Angeles Sustainability Collaborative in 2012
Switzer Fellows are members of a Technical Advisory Committee to the Soak It Up! project involving several California-based NGOs, including the Los Angeles Sustainability Collaborative. The Collaborative produced a briefing paper entitled, "Soak It Up!: Strategies for Sustainable Recreational...Read more >
$17,920.00 awarded to Council for Watershed Health in 2012
Three Switzer Fellows are collaborating on the technical, policy and economic dimensions of a proposed shift in EPA protocols for water quality monitoring of beaches and waterways. This project was formed in response to the threat of severely reduced federal funding for local water quality...Read more >
40,000 awarded to World Resources Institute in 2012
This Collaborative Initiatives Fund project is led by Todd Gartner of World Resources Institute in Washington, DC, and Josh Donlan of Advanced Conservation Strategies in Midway, Utah. They are working on an innovative approach to endangered species conservation which they hope will inform national...Read more >
$5,000 for 12 months awarded to in 2009
Drs. Nithya Ramanathan and Scott Fruin worked under this Collaborative Initiatives Fund grant to develop cell phone technology that can accurately capture and measure noise levels. This collaboration addressed the problem of environmental noise as an underappreciated hazard. Environmental noise has...Read more >
$40,000 for 12 months awarded to in 2008
Switzer Fellows Dr. Kate Smith, Assistant Professor at Brown University and Senior Research Scientist at the Consortium for Conservation Medicine, and Dr. Myra Finkelstein, Research Associate at UC Santa Cruz in Microbiology and Environmental Toxicology, received funding under the Collaborative...Read more >
$5,000.00 for 12 months awarded to in 2009
This was a seed grant under the Collaborative Initiatives Fund to support Jennifer Osha (2000 Fellow), representing the West Virginia-based advocacy organization, Aurora Lights , and Evan Hansen (1996 Fellow), President of Downstream Strategies . Jen and Evan collaborated on producing portions of a...Read more >
Spotlight on Leadership
Switzer Fellow Amanda Martinez is a journalist, an intern at NPR and a science writing masters student at MIT. When she was offered the chance to join a team of scientists in the Gulf of Mexico, she...Read more >
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