Leadership
Director, Senator George J. Mitchell Center
David Hart is the Director of the Senator George J. Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions. He is also a professor with the School of Biology & Ecology at UMaine.
Leadership Council
We are incredibly fortunate to benefit from the expertise, experience, passion, and determination of eight faculty who work on a wide range of sustainability challenges and serve on our Leadership Council. Their expertise spans the natural sciences, social sciences, engineering and humanities, and they represent eight different UMaine departments and schools as well as three different colleges. Individually and collectively, they are an invaluable source of ideas and energy as we work to strengthen the Mitchell Center’s diverse partnerships and support our faculty and students.
Mitchell Center Advisory Board
The Mitchell Center has established an Advisory Board to help increase the impact of its programs and partnerships. Advisory Board members play important roles that increase the success of the Mitchell Center’s work.
Presidential Professor of Sustainability Science, UMaine
Robert Kates
January 31, 1929 – April 21, 2018
We were very sorry to lose Bob Kates, Presidential Professor of Sustainability Science, who died on April 29, 2018 at the age of 89. We were incredibly fortunate that he agreed to chair our Science Advisory Board during the 5-year, $20 million Sustainability Solutions Initiative grant that led to the creation of the Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions.
If you didn’t have the pleasure of getting to know Bob, here are a few links that will help you learn a bit more about his remarkable story:
- A tribute to Bob by Mitchell Center Director David Hart
- A favorite short biography, written by Kim Ridley
- A wonderful interview by Bridie McGreavy in Maine Policy Review
- A fascinating episode of Maine Public’s “Sustainable Maine” series about a Sustainability Solutions Initiative project focused on culverts and climate change, which features interviews with Bob and Shaleen Jain
- Bob’s personal website
An obituary for Bob can be found in the Bangor Daily News. We are grateful to his family for setting up the Robert W. Kates Fund for Creative Graduate Studies to benefit the Mitchell Center for Sustainability Solutions at the University of Maine. This fund will foster continuing work regarding Bob’s quest, “What is, and ought to be, the human use of the earth?”