The Whale Museum welcomes new executive director

||| FROM CONOR AGNEW for THE WHALE MUSEUM |||

Mike and Jeanne Kuperberg

The Whale Museum is pleased to welcome Dr. Mike Kuperberg as our new executive director. Dr. Kuperberg will be bringing his decades of scientific and administrative expertise to lead The Whale Museum into an exciting new chapter.

A lifelong biologist and ecologist, Dr. Kuperberg is joining The Whale Museum after more than twenty years of experience at the US Department of Energy’s Office of Science, Office of Biological and Environmental Research. For the past 10 years, he was detailed from DOE to the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) where he served as the Executive Director of the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP). USGCRP’s goal is to “assist the Nation and the world to understand, assess, predict, and respond to human-induced and natural processes of global change.” To that end, Dr. Kuperberg coordinated the research needs and investments of 15 Federal agencies representing more than $4 billion annually.

A highlight of USGCRP is the quadrennial National Climate Assessment. During his time at OSTP, Dr. Kuperberg also served as the interim Director of the Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee, and was a member of the U.S. delegations to the Arctic
Council’s Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for the fifth assessment cycle (AR5).

After years of dedicated public service, Dr. Kuperberg is excited to be closer to family in the Pacific Northwest (his 98 year old mother, Yvonne lives on Vashon Island). As avid boaters, Dr. Kuperberg and his wife Jeanne look forward to engaging with our local and regional Salish Sea communities and experiencing the marine environment that we cherish.

“I’m looking forward to getting back to my scientific roots,” said Dr. Kuperberg. “I am an ecologist by training; I seek to understand systems, including the role of human beings. Whales are what we’re focused on, but we can’t save the whales without saving the system that they’re a part of.”

Before joining the federal government, Dr. Kuperberg spent 25 years working as a biologist at Florida State University at the Center for Aquatic Research and Resource Management and the Center for Biomedical and Toxicological Research. His research there included seagrass ecology and ecological surveys of estuarine and riverine systems; supporting environmental clean-up at the local, state, federal, and international scales; teaching classes in risk assessment and toxicology; and developing critical habitat assessments for multiple counties in North Florida.

Dr. Kuperberg will be bringing this diverse educational and research background to The Whale Museum.

“I am excited for this transition from informing policy at the national level, to making specific impacts at the local and regional level. The work The Whale Museum does to educate the public and conserve our wonderful marine mammals has environmental and societal benefits to the region.”

Dr. Kuperberg will officially take over as executive director on May 19, when he and Jeanne arrive in Friday Harbor. He is engaging now, part-time, from the East Coast to get up to speed on The Whale Museum and the Salish Sea. We look forward to welcoming Mike and Jeanne to our community in Friday Harbor and beyond.