Buck Lab for Climate and Environment
The Buck Lab for Climate and Environment at Colby College is a nexus for collaborations among Colby students, faculty, staff, and community partners to investigate and help solve pressing environmental challenges, in Maine and around the world. Through a series of grant programs, the Buck Lab supports research, internships, community engagement, professional networking, and other broad initiatives, with the goal of training the next generation of environmental leaders.
The Buck Lab was established in 2017 through a very generous gift from Alexander “Sandy” Buck and Sissy Buck.
Sandy Buck ’78 graduated from Colby College with a degree in American studies and serves as a trustee of the College. A longtime philanthropist and conservationist, Sandy directed the Horizon Foundation for many years, providing support for sustainable communities, conservation, the arts, education, history, and leadership development.
Sissy Buck is a printmaker and book artist, whose works have been exhibited widely and are part of the collections of numerous art museums, including the Colby Museum of Art. She earned a B.A. in art history from Wheaton College in Massachusetts. Sandy and Sissy live in Cumberland Foreside, Maine.
Gail Carlson is director of the Buck Lab and a faculty member in the Environmental Studies Department at Colby. Her courses include Pollution and Human Health; Climate Change, Justice and Health; Global Public Health; and Environmental Activism. She conducts research on the human health impacts of climate change, chemical pollution, and food insecurity. She is the author of the textbook Human Health and the Climate Crisis. Gail’s work is often highlighted in the media, and she frequently writes for the public and provides expert testimony in the Maine legislature on pollution, public health, safer chemicals policies, and climate change. Gail earned a Ph.D. in biochemistry at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.
The Buck Lab co-hosted the Maine College Climate Action Summit at Colby College in fall 2019. Colby students organized this day-long event with workshops and remarks by Rev. Lennox Yearwood of Hip Hop Caucus, writer and climate activist Bill McKibben, and Sandy Buck.
The Buck Lab helped support Colby students on a Jan Plan course “Wildlife and Conservation in Namibia” led by Environmental Studies Professor Philip Nyhus.
The Buck Lab supported Suzanne Singer ’20 (center), who did an internship focused on environmental health at the Environmental Defense Fund in Washington, D.C.
The Buck Lab supported Ian Peterson ’22J to participate in a writing and Western river conservation workshop led by Colby alumna Heather Hansman ’05.