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2024 Candidate Shannon LaDeau

2024 candidate for Secretary Shannon LaDeauShannon LaDeau
Senior Scientist
Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies

Candidate for: ESA Secretary

I discovered ecology during a summer undergraduate research experience during my junior year at Mount Holyoke College. I was a first-generation student, and I knew nothing about academic research or graduate school. A mentor’s guidance and a year of teaching elementary school math after college hardened my resolve to pursue a PhD in ecology. I received an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship and a place in the Duke University PhD program, where I studied community and ecosystem ecology. Upon graduation, I secured three years of postdoctoral research support to explore the (at the time) rapidly growing field of disease ecology, co-sponsored by the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, NSF, and The Ohio State University’s Department of Statistics. I joined the core scientific staff at Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in 2008, where I am now a Senior Scientist and G. Evelyn Hutchinson Chair in Ecology. I collaborate in research that explores complex socioecological systems, spans community and ecosystem scales, and broadly seeks strategies for predicting and mitigating ecosystem dysfunction, including disease risk. Providing equity in opportunities for education and research has been an important part of my career. I have mentored early career researchers from a range of programs and backgrounds, was co-PI for Cary Institute’s REU program, and co-organized a summer course in ecological forecasting at Boston University for four years. Collaboration, open data, and accessible communication of science are important threads in my own research trajectory, and I have sought service opportunities that support these goals. I have been a co-organizer of two NSF RCNs, a recent Gordon Research Conference on Predictive Ecology, and have been an Associate Editor-in-Chief for ESA’s online publication, Ecosphere, in the Disease Ecology track since its inception. I am currently a member of the NEON Science, Technology & Education Advisory Committee.

What interests, experiences or skills would you bring to this position?

I have had many opportunities to work with advisory committees and serve on boards both within and outside academia, and each has helped me hone the necessary skills to navigate agendas, recall Bylaws, and document meetings. Over the past decade, I have collaborated with leadership, peers, and Trustees on two Strategic Plans for Cary Institute. I find great satisfaction in identifying shared goals and optimizing group strategies. I believe that my ability to observe, identify common threads among different perspectives, and consider group priorities separately from personal ego will be an asset to this position with the ESA leadership team. I value teamwork and effective team communication in both scientific and service-oriented contexts. I am dedicated to continually improving my own listening and communication skills and strive to be open-minded and patient.

How would you support ESA’s mission? How would you plan to promote DEIJ in ESA membership and activities if elected?

I am honored to be part of an ESA that has demonstrated such capacity for evolving governance to meet the needs of a growing, diversifying membership, and grave ecological challenges. If elected, I would support the ongoing process of review, trial, and adaptation to ensure that ESA and its members are always prepared to advance the science and practice of ecology. The Society’s move to empower more groups and individual voices in governance through the ESA Council is heartening and the Secretary can play a unique role to ensure that all voices are represented across Executive, Governing Board, and Council audiences. While the ESA has done considerable work to understand and mitigate the challenges that different groups face in ecological careers, we are still in the early stages of understanding what equity, inclusion and justice for all means. Diversifying membership and participation are just the critical first steps. I am heartened that ESA has developed a clear and strategic plan for moving forward and look forward to seeing that advanced in whatever role I can play. I will strive to uphold equity, inclusivity, and justice as the expectation and an evaluative filter for each of my actions and opportunities.