“All of us would like to feel that we’re doing important work that makes a difference.”
This was what Lori Daniels, professor of forest ecology at the University of British Columbia (UBC), had to say while reflecting on being awarded the 2019 Canadian Forestry Scientific Achievement Award by the Canadian Institute of Forestry. This prestigious award recognizes individuals who have made outstanding contributions to forest conservation and management in Canada through forestry research.
The award celebrates Daniels’ contributions through her program at UBC, which looks at a wide range of disturbances including insects, fire, and more broadly climate change and human impacts. Her impact on students has been particularly impressive. In her time at UBC, she has mentored over 100 undergraduate and 25 postdoctoral/postgraduate students pursuing an education in forestry. She has also authored or co-authored 65 peer-reviewed papers, and she regularly appears in media interviews providing balanced views about wildfire management in Canada.
“Doing research, and especially applied research, is not an individual sport—it’s a team sport,” she said about her work.
Relationships with individuals within and outside of the University setting have played an important role in Daniels’ success. During the Canadian Institute of Forestry awards ceremony in Ottawa, she thanked the more than 125 students who have worked in her lab, the other academic collaborators she works with daily, and the people outside of the academic community who have interacted with her and her work. She specifically highlighted the importance of working with Indigenous communities and collaborating with forest managers to help bring research results into practice.
“Fostering and sustaining those relationships—we wouldn’t be able to achieve our work without this,” she said.
Research and Outreach with Landscapes in Motion
As the Fire Regime team lead for Landscapes in Motion, Daniels has collaborated with the entire research team to create a project that is greater than the sum of its parts. She has been integral to setting the direction of the project, determining how to merge the work of three different teams using different methods, and evaluating the results of their work. As Cameron Naficy’s post-doctoral supervisor, she has helped to guide the work of the Fire Regime Team, co-authoring three papers that are currently being prepared. Through rigorous field work and tree-ring analysis, they have discovered surprising resilience and complexity of lodgepole pine forests in Alberta’s Southern Rockies, and are currently exploring how fire severity responds to changes in fire frequency over time and space.
In the last three years, Daniels’ mentorship has extended to eight undergraduate and graduate students involved with Landscapes in Motion, giving them the opportunity to undertake independent science and get some field experience. There has also been an effort to include Indigenous youth in the project by employing a member of the Piikani Nation¹ in each year’s field crew, and by involving two groups of Indigenous youth from the Verna J. Kirkness Science and Engineering Education Program in the project.
An Important Personal Accomplishment
Being recognized at a national level for her work has been an honor for Daniels. It particularly reinforced to her the value of reaching out and sharing her science with the public in support of science-based decision-making, which is an effort she has undertaken because of the important implications of her research for society.
“I’ve gone out on a limb a bit to put the things I think have meaning into the public realm,” she said.
Daniels also noted she is only the fifth woman to have won this award in its 40-year history. Part of her choice to travel to Ottawa to receive the award was motivated by her desire to demonstrate the significant role that women have, and continue to play, in forest management research.
“I wanted to be visible in terms of promoting women in science,” she said about the decision.
Congratulations Lori!
Congratulations to Dr. Lori Daniels for winning this prestigious award and for having her hard work and outreach efforts recognized nationally.
¹Much of the research being conducted for Landscapes in Motion falls within the traditional territories of the Piikani and Kainai Nations.
Every member of our team sees the world a little bit differently, which is one of the strengths of this project. Each blog posted to the Landscapes in Motion website represents the personal experiences, perspectives, and opinions of the author(s) and not of the team, project, or Healthy Landscapes Program.
