Public Engagement

Science matters most when it is used to inform decision-making in the real world or to inspire new appreciation of the world around us. To do that, we need to communicate science beyond the specialized publications and conference talks in our narrow disciplines. That’s why Anne Jefferson and the Watershed Lab commit to public engagement – two-way conversations – about science in whatever ways they can.

Organizational Leadership

Anne serves as the director of Lake Champlain Sea Grant, which develops and shares science based knowledge to benefit the environment and economies of the Lake Champlain Basin. Lake Champlain Sea Grant’s talented and dedicated staff work with residents, students and teachers, community and business leaders, and agency staff in Vermont and New York. To learn more about the on-going work of Lake Champlain Sea Grant, visit or our web page or sign up for our newsletter.

Anne also serves as the director of the Vermont Water Resources and Lake Studies Center and the Northeastern States Research Cooperative. Along with Lake Champlain Sea Grant, these programs fund science research that serves the region. The three programs also produce ecoNEWS VT, an online portal to key findings from ecological research and monitoring being conducted in Vermont.

Other Activities

K-12 and informal education

  • Anne and Nurjahan Begum assisted with a microplastics field day with the 7th graders of Beekmantown, NY, in October 2025. This event organized by Lake Champlain Sea Grant included over 120 students at Plattsburgh City Beach.
  • Anne and Watershed Lab group members assisted with the Women in Science and Sailing Camp field and lab work on microplastics, July 2025. The camp is a joint program of the Community Sailing Center and Lake Champlain Sea Grant.
  • Watershed Lab members supported Lake Champlain Sea Grant education staff at a beach microplastics sampling event with over 200 7th graders from Edmunds Middle School in Burlington, in May 2025. 
  • Anne and Watershed Lab members participated in a lakefront cleanup with Lake Champlain Sea Grant and other local organizations on Earth Day, April 2025.
  • Anne led a 4-H Teen Science Cafe focused on beach microplastics in April 2024. 

Media featuring Watershed Lab research, 2012-present

Extended interviews and podcasts, 2007-present

Op-eds

Letters to the Editor

  • Call for new AAAS harassment policy. Science. 361(6406): 984. DOI: 10.1126/science.aav1680. (letter to the editor, September 2018 by Selin, N.E., Kenney, M., Jefferson, A.J., Dukes, J.S., Hill, T.M., Olabisi, L.M., and Duffy, M.A.)
  • Efforts large and small speed science reform. Science. 360(6385): 164. doi:10.1126/science.aat6341. (letter to the editor, April 2018 by Anne Jefferson and Melissa Kenney)

In 2016-2017, Anne was a member of the inaugural cohort of AAAS Leshner Leadeship Institute Public Engagement Fellows. Her 15 member cohort was focused on climate change science. As part of the fellowship, Anne went to DC for a week of intensive training and then returned to her institution with a mandate to find new creative and effective ways of public engagement and institutional transformation.

Note for journalists: Anne is happy to serve an expert source on the four areas below.

  1. Water in cities and urban areas, including stormwater, green infrastructure, combined sewer overflows, and urban flooding.
  2. Flooding, particularly as it relates to climate change, land use, and river management (dams/levees)
  3. Plastic pollution in rivers and lakes, especially macro-plastics in streams and rivers and macro and microplastics on beaches
  4. Career issues for women in science