The Rolex Awards for Enterprise: Young Laureates Programme Press Release:

GENEVA, September 30, 2009 – Ten leading international figures in science, the environment and exploration will select the first five winners of the recently launched Rolex Awards for Enterprise: Young Laureates Programme, Rolex announced today.

A geographically and professionally diverse group, the inaugural jury for the Young Laureates Programme will meet at Rolex headquarters in Geneva in early March 2010 to select the five budding pioneers between the ages of 18 and 30 who will be the first Young Laureates. The winners will be announced in April 2010.

Full Press Release

On September 18, 2008, Congress passed important “No Child Left Inside” legislation that will fund environmental education programs at a national level. As Vice President of the Ecological Society of America overseeing the portfolio of education and human resources, Dr. Lowman worked with the ESA policy staff to create this press release last year. It was based on an earlier editorial that Lowman wrote in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment in fall 2006.

ABC 7 News did a segment about Ricardo’s visit to Sarasota and the Earth Day festival in April 2008.  (Read more)

Each year The Explorers Club and Rolex USA host the Lowell Thomas Awards to honor extraordinary individuals who have made unique contributions to a particular field of exploration. This year, our focus is forest canopies and their rich biodiversity, which is essential to our existence.

Our Master of Ceremonies for the evening is the renowned conservationist and television star Jim Fowler, who also serves as Honorary President of the Explorers Club. The awards are named for Lowell Thomas, a renowned explorer/journalist, who served as President of the Club in the 1950s.

Past recipients include Isaac Asimov, Carl Sagan, Robert Ballard, Buzz Aldrin, Scott Carpenter, James Lovell, Kathryn Sullivan, Jean-Michel Cousteau, Sir Edmund Hillary (currently the Club’s Honorary Chairman), Wade Davis, Simon Winchester and Dr. Edward 0. Wilson, to name a few.

Dr. Margaret D. Lowman – “Canopy Meg” — Awarded $75,000 to Create Forest Canopy Exhibit

Sarasota, FL / 31 August, 2005 – Dr. Margaret D. Lowman, Director of Environmental Initiatives and Professor of Biology & Environmental Studies at the New College of Florida, was recently awarded a $75,000 grant from the National Science Foundation. The grant is for the creation of a traveling exhibit entitled “Out on a Limb – Forest Canopies,” which will provide public education about forest biodiversity, how treetops provide energy for all life, and the importance of forest conservation both locally and globally. The exhibit will also illustrate the difficulties scientists face when trying to access canopies for study.

Dr. Lowman’s exhibit will utilize a mix of media including a rain forest diorama, scaled models of scientists exploring the canopy, photographs, and activities for interactive learning and play. When complete, the “Out on a Limb – Forest Canopies” exhibit will be on display in various community venues throughout southwest Florida.

Canopy research provides a highly visual, fun and interesting, and exploratory approach to scientific inquiry that can be effectively communicated and easily comprehended by the general public and students. To learn more about inviting the exhibit into your community or school, please contact Dr. Lowman at lowman@ncf.edu.

Dr. Lowman is internationally recognized for her pioneering research in forest canopy ecology, and has explored all three major rain forests of the world — Africa, Australia/Asia, and the Neotropics (including the Amazon). She is the author of over 95 peer-reviewed publications and four books. Dr. Lowman’s recent autobiography, Life in the Treetops, received a cover review in the New York Times Sunday Book Review; she recently completed Forest Canopies – a definitive textbook for forest canopy ecology.

Known to many as “Canopy Meg,” Dr. Lowman has conducted global conservation work in Africa, Samoa, the Amazon basin, and Australia, and her education outreach has included distance learning via satellite to millions of children throughout the world. For more information about “Canopy Meg” and forest canopies, visit www.canopymeg.com