Melanie Lenart, Ph.D.
ROOTS
Melanie Lenart holds Ph.D. in Natural Resources and Global Change from the University of Arizona in Tucson, a master’s of science degree in Forestry from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana and a bachelor’s of arts degree from what was then the NIU Department of Journalism at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb.
Her scientific research has involved carbon cycling, the effect of high carbon dioxide levels on plants, tree-ring dating, perceptions of climate change among forestry professionals, tree uprooting dynamics, and western wildfires. She has worked in subtropical, temperate and tropical forests, exploring both physical phenomena and social questions.
From 1982 through 1996, she worked primarily as a newspaper reporter and editor. She was named Outstanding Northern Illinois University Journalism Student of the year for her work at the student-run newspaper, The Northern Star, as well as a Hearst award for Investigative Reporting.
During her years as a full-time journalist, she worked at several newspapers around her hometown of Chicago and at the Pulitzer-Prize-winning San Juan Star, Puerto Rico’s English-language daily newspaper. During her tenure at the Star, she wrote a weekly column on environmental issues called EcoLogic. Since then, she has continued to report on climate and its impacts for a variety of venues, including Landscape Architecture Magazine, High Country News and Nature Climate Change.
Upon completing her doctoral program, she joined the UA Climate Assessment for the Southwest (CLIMAS) in 2004. CLIMAS published her book compilation, Global Warming in the Southwest, In 2007. In 2010, the University of Arizona Press released her peer-reviewed book Life in the Hothouse: How a Living Planet Survives Climate Change.
After spending many years writing and giving presentations on climate change issues and mitigation, she shifted her focus to climate change solutions and adaptation. From 2009-2013, she taught an environmental journalism course called Translating Environmental Science at the University of Arizona and also worked on climate and forestry projects via the university’s Cooperative Extension Services and CLIMAS.
In 2012, she earned a certificate in Permaculture Design from the Sonoran Permaculture Guild. That same year, she helped found the Linking Edible Arizona Forests (LEAF) Network and soon co-led a related project at the University of Arizona, LEAF on the UA Campus. In 2014 and 2015, she served as the primary instructor for several semesters of a University of Arizona Water Harvesting course that featured hands-on projects.
She continued teaching water harvesting after transitioning to work at Tohono O’odham Community College as a full-time instructor from 2015-2020. Her position at the tribally controlled college included a partial appointment in the college’s Cooperative Extension program. Since then, she has worked for Native Science Report, an online publication highlighting science topics and programs relevant to Indigenous peoples.