Leading experts in the fields of climate science, environmental justice, and sustainable policy will be on campus this term to tackle the Montgomery Fellows Program's guiding question for fall: Climate Solutions: Wishful Thinking or Hopeful Planning?
Hydrologist and author Ryan Emanuel, longtime Vermont State Climatologist Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux, and former National Park Service Director Chuck Sams will share their expertise on climate adaptation and sustainability through classroom visits, public lectures, and even a paddle on the Connecticut River.
During their weeks on campus, the fellows also will also meet with the House Communities, Dartmouth Climate Collaborative, Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Department of Native American and Indigenous Studies, and the Environmental Studies Program.
"Climate change is not just a science problem—it's an everyone problem—and we need leaders across disciplines and professions to move the needle," says Meredith Kelly, the faculty director of the Dartmouth Climate Collaborative.
"The Montgomery Fellows this fall exemplify the critical type of climate leadership that brings together science, environmental justice, and sustainable policy."
Steve Swayne, director of the Montgomery Fellows Program, says he has been interested for several years in bringing fellows who are focused on climate issues to campus.
"It has been a privilege of ours to partner with Meredith and others in the Dartmouth Climate Collaborative on this term," Swayne says. "And I'm thrilled beyond belief that, in fostering this partnership, we also get to deepen our ties with our colleagues who work on Indigenous issues."
Melanie Taylor, chair of the Department of Native American and Indigenous Studies, says the "diverse line-up of Montgomery visitors, and their engagement with a wide range of students, faculty, staff, and researchers at Dartmouth, is a good reminder that Indigenous ecological knowledge is not exclusive or proprietary, but shared and applied widely across multiple borders."
Ryan Emanuel, Sept. 21 to Oct. 2
Emanuel, a citizen of the Lumbee Tribe of North Carolina who co-chairs the Community Engagement and Environmental Justice concentration at Duke University, where he is a professor of hydrology, will discuss his award-winning book, On the Swamp: Fighting for Indigenous Environmental Justice.
The book focuses on eastern North Carolina, Emanuel says, but he hopes its underlying concepts regarding "what it means to engage meaningfully and ethically with Indigenous peoples" are highly transferable to the Dartmouth region as well.
Emanuel's public talk is set for Sept. 30 from 4:30 to 6 p.m. The location will be posted in the coming week. While on campus, he also will attend the Artificial Intelligence and Indigenous Innovations Symposium Sept. 21 to 22, and host a paddling trip on the Connecticut River at noon on Sept. 23.
Visits with faculty members and students, including Climate Scholars, are also on the docket for Emanuel, who is especially keen to talk with students and early career professionals about community-based research and explore potential collaborations with Dartmouth scholars.
"When we think about what appropriate resilience and adaptation to climate change looks like, we can find answers in the longstanding practices of Indigenous communities," Emanuel says. "I'm interested in learning more about what those practices look like in your region," and exploring how strategies in North Carolina communities might translate to other places, "including New England."
As for the central question, wishful thinking or hopeful planning, he is optimistic.
"I think that as more people become aware of climate change through their own personal encounters with extreme weather—flooding, droughts, and so forth, more and more people will wake up," Emanuel says. "And we're more likely to try something different, once we know that the same old practices may not work for dealing with climate change."
Lesley-Ann Dupigny-Giroux, Oct. 5 to 16
An award-winning scientist and the longest serving state climatologist in the nation, Dupigny-Giroux is a climatology professor at the University of Vermont and former president of the American Association of State Climatologists.
Being on campus will be "a truly immersive experience," says Dupigny-Giroux, an expert in climate education at the kindergarten to undergraduate levels.
"There are so many innovative and creative programs in place across Dartmouth that I have only heard about from afar," she says. "I am especially excited to visit the Dartmouth Organic Farm, experience firsthand some of the cutting-edge solutions in the sustainability and net-zero spaces, and learn more about the energy innovations being deployed on campus."
Her most recent collaboration "involves walking alongside Abenaki elder and scholar Judy Dow," Dupigny-Giroux says. Their working relationship and friendship was forged on the Vermont Climate Council, where they helped co-author Climate and Climate Change in Vermont, a foundational chapter of the state's 2025 Climate Action Plan. Since then, as part of the Climate Resiliency Fellowship for K-12 teachers offered by Shelburne Farms in Vermont, they have been co-teaching, which includes their presentation, "Braiding: Learning From the Land to Adapt to a Changing Climate."
Dupigny-Giroux, who counts among her passions "the sharing of knowledge and understanding of climatology," says she looks forward to chatting with postdoctoral fellows and Dartmouth students "at all career stages."
"Mentoring and giving back to the community are two of my core values," says Dupigny-Giroux, who often incorporates service-learning collaborations with state and federal agencies into her courses.
Dupigny-Giroux's research interests include climate literacy and hydroclimatic natural hazards, such as heatwaves, floods, and drought, and climate services—scientific information and services used to help organizations and individuals adapt to climate variability and change. She will give a public lecture on the implications of droughts across Vermont's North Country on Oct. 14 from 4:30 to 6 p.m. The location will be announced later this term.
While on campus, she will also connect with colleagues in several departments and institutes "to explore synergies and new collaborations," Dupigny-Giroux says. "I am hoping that my visit is deeply symbiotic and co-creative in ways that will benefit all with whom I have the privilege of interacting."
Chuck Sams, Nov. 2 to 6
Sams splits his time between Connecticut—where he directs the Indigenous programs at Yale's Center for Environmental Justice and lectures at Yale's Environmental School—and his home in Oregon, where he serves in several leadership roles.
An enrolled member of the Cayuse and Walla Walla of the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, Sams served as the director of the National Park Service from 2021 to 2025. He is the Oregon Tribes Scholar in Residence and a senior fellow with the Native Environmental Sovereignty Project at the University of Oregon's Environmental and Natural Resources Law Center. Sams wrote the strategic plan for Oregon's climate resiliency executive order and now serves on the cabinet that oversees its implementation.
Like Dupigny-Giroux and Emanuel, he is looking forward to exchanging ideas about sustainability and climate mitigation strategies. That includes hearing about challenges and best management practices in the Eastern United States, information he can bring back to agencies in the West, says Sams, who represents Oregon on the Northwest Power and Conservation Council. And, he stresses the importance of Indigenous knowledge regarding climate solutions.
There have been three or four major global climate events over the past 30,000 years, and each time Indigenous people in the Americas adapted, mitigated the impact, and became more resilient, Sams says.
"We are only now scratching the surface" of that history, which includes forest management and other land use practices, he says. "We have an opportunity to work with Native people who still have that long memory of their stories."
Sams—whose professional experience spans Native American history, federal policy and policymaking, federal Indian law, international Indigenous law, and natural resource management—also welcomes the chance to interact with students.
"I'm happy to sit and visit with students about their experiences and opportunities for them as they progress through their education and figure out what they want to do with their careers," he says. "Because my career is definitely not linear."
Looking ahead, he hopes to continue working with Dartmouth faculty, staff, and students.
"I'm very fortunate to be asked to be a Montgomery Fellow and to begin this relationship with Dartmouth," Sams says. "If I can be of support, I want to be."
Sams's public talk is set for Nov. 5 from 4:30 to 6 p.m.
Later this year
The winter Montgomery Fellows Program series, Like a Good Neighbor, will bring together researchers to assess what it means for Dartmouth to be a good neighbor to those who live near campus, and how it could improve. Sociologist Manuel Pastor, historian Ira Harkavy, and community medicine physician Laura Gottlieb will join local leaders and academics and students and faculty from across the four schools for the conversation.
In the spring, two Mexican artists will lead an immersive exploration of making and displaying public art. Performance artist and actress Katia Tirado and artist and cultural activist Lorena Wolffer will work in partnership with the departments of Spanish and Portuguese and Studio Art and the Hood Museum of Art.