Alison Young

Alison is the Co-Director of Citizen Science at the California Academy of Sciences, where she builds communities of the public, scientists, and resource managers through learning about, discovering, and documenting biodiversity. Alison is co-lead of the annual City Nature Challenge, an international event that engages people around the world in a 4-day bioblitz to find and document the nature in their cities. She and her Co-Director also run Snapshot Cal Coast, a yearly campaign to mobilize the public to document species along the California coastline. In 2017, she and her co-director were awarded the Bay Nature Institute’s “Local Hero for Environmental Education” award. Alison sits on the Board of Directors for the Citizen Science Association. Alison’s background is in marine biology, she holds a Masters in Biology from Humboldt State University for research focused on the potential effects of climate change on rocky intertidal communities along the California coast.