Speaker Bios
Cynthia Rosenzwig
Dr. Cynthia Rosenzweig is a Senior Research Scientist at the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and the Columbia University Climate School’s Center for Climate Systems Research. At NASA GISS, she co-leads the Impacts Group, whose mission is to investigate the interactions of climate (both variability and change) on systems and sectors important to human well-being. Dr. Rosenzweig is the co-founder and member of the Executive Committee of the Agricultural Model Intercomparison and Improvement Project (AgMIP), a globally integrated transdisciplinary study of climate change and the food system at regional, national and global scales. AgMIP includes the participation of over 1200 leading researchers from developed and developing nations. In 2019, Dr. Rosenzweig was Coordinating Lead Author of the Food Security Chapter for the IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land. She is the 2022 recipient of the World Food Prize, considered as the “Nobel Prize for Food and Agriculture.”
Dunbar Birnie
Dunbar Birnie is a Professor in Rutgers University’s School of Engineering. Dr. Birnie’s group concentrates on solar power technology and battery storage for enhancing renewable energy adoption. Recent work has emphasized the combination of photovoltaic arrays with large-scale agricultural production and land-use issues. This area of “Agrivoltaics” is of increasing importance as NJ aims to meet it’s Energy Master Plan goals.
Mary Halbleib
Mary Halbleib is a Professor of Practice in the Department of Crop and Soil Science at Oregon State University (OSU), where she facilitates outcome-based educational partnerships between OSU Extension Service faculty and stakeholder communities. Alongside co-principal investigator Maud Powell (OSU Extension Service), she co-leads Climate Stress and Grief: Building Resilience with Farmers and Ranchers. This initiative integrates the emotional and lived experiences of agricultural producers, operating on the premise that effective climate adaptation requires both technical literacy and psychological resilience. As of spring 2026, over 2,000 producers, conservationists, and service providers across 10 states have participated in this psychoeducation programming. Furthermore, their newer train-the-trainer program has equipped 120 educators nationwide to navigate the psychological dimensions of climate grief with confidence and care.
Building upon this foundational work, Halbleib and Powell also co-lead the Climate Emotions in Agriculture, Fisheries, and Forestry Project. This transdisciplinary team has adapted the psychoeducation intervention for fisheries and forestry communities to address parallel socio-ecological vulnerabilities. Concurrently, the team is launching a research agenda to investigate the behavioral motivations and structural barriers to processing climate grief, ultimately seeking to clarify how differing emotional pathways influence the adoption of climate adaptation strategies on farms and ranches.
Related Scholarship
Farmers and Ranchers: The Stress and Anxiety Fueled by Climate Change, and Interventions that Could Help (2026, Health Affairs)
Weathering the Storm: Building Resilience in Rural Farming Communities Amidst Climate Change (2025, Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development)
Understanding and Living with Climate Grief and Climate Stress for Farmers and Ranchers (2024, Pacific Northwest Extension Publication)
Rachel Schattman
Rachel Schattman is an Associate Professor of Sustainable Agriculture at the University of Maine. She leads the Agroecology Lab, a research group focused on working with the agricultural community to improve climate adaptation and mitigation management, conservation outcomes, and farm sustainability. The group works across disciplines, incorporating field-based research with rigorous social science investigations. Recent work has focused on water use and management in temperate agroecosystems, the effects of a changing climate on heritage agriculture industries (wild blueberries in Maine), and cross cultural ecosystem management. Dr. Schattman earned her Ph.D. in plant and soil science from the University of Vermont, her M.S. in environmental thought and culture from the University of Vermont, and a B.A. of liberal arts from Sarah Lawrence College. She owned and managed a diversified vegetable farm in Monkton Vermont for 11 years prior to joining the University of Maine, an experience that greatly informs her current work. In addition to her current position, she is a Fellow with both the Gund Institute for the Environment and the George J. Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions, and she is an associated faculty member with the University of Maine Climate Change Institute.