NOVEMBER 2025

NEWS FROM THE SCHILLER INSTITUTE FOR INTEGRATED SCIENCE AND SOCIETY

WELCOME FROM LAURA J. STEINBERG

The annual United Nations Climate Change Conference kicked off this week and the Schiller Institute is once again leading BC’s delegation of faculty, students, and staff. COP30 is being held in Belém, Brazil. I encourage you to track the activity of our delegation by visiting our COP30 website, following our Instagram, and joining us the next two Thursdays for Broadcasts from Belém. The broadcasts will take place in the Schiller Institute Convening Space at 4 p.m., and will provide the opportunity to hear directly from your peers about their experiences in Belém.

We are also happy to announce the kickoff of our new Catalyst Speaker Series, which will feature faculty members from around the country sharing their scholarship in large and small group settings with the BC community. Our first speaker will be David Keiser, an economist from UMass Amherst, who will speak about water pollution.

The next few weeks will also bring the continuation of many great collaborations that began earlier this semester. The second panel in our ongoing Climate Is Every Story series is November 12 at noon. The panel features journalists Amber Williams (BC ’10, The New York Times) and Sabrina Shankman (The Boston Globe); and BC faculty members Catherine Hoar (Engineering), Yi Ming (Schiller Institute, Earth & Environmental Sciences), and Neil McCullagh (Joseph E. Corcoran Center for Real Estate and Urban Action). The following week we have the second speakers in the Casper Augustus Ferguson Seminar Series and Teaching to Inspire Changemakers Series.

Finally, as some of you may have heard, I will be stepping down as Executive Director at the Schiller Institute at the conclusion of this semester. As a relative newcomer to Boston, I will be taking a yearlong sabbatical to explore the academic/NGO/startup ecosystem in the region, followed by my return to BC as a full-time faculty member. It has been a tremendous honor and privilege to bring the vision for the Schiller Institute to fruition over these six years. I sincerely thank every faculty member, student, and staff member who has contributed to the growth of the Institute. The Institute has become an integral part of Boston College and that would not have been possible without the tremendous engagement we experienced from the campus community.

Professor Laura J. Steinberg

Seidner Family Executive Director, Schiller Institute for Integrated Science and Society

Schiller Catalyst Speaker Series »

David Keiser, professor in the Department of Resource Economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, will give a seminar titled “Gross External Damages of Water Pollution in the United States” on Dec. 1 at noon in the Schiller Institute Convening Space. Lunch will be provided. Keiser specializes in water resources and his talk will delve into his recent paper, which provides the first estimates of the GED of water pollution in the U.S. Please register.

Casper Augustus Ferguson Seminar Series »

On November 17, Dr. Lina Huerta-Saenz from Penn State Health will deliver a public talk titled “Diet, Autoimmunity and Inflammation Markers in Youth with and without Clinical Partial Remission of Type 1 Diabetes” at 12 p.m. Please register.

Broadcasts from Belém »

BC’s Week 1 COP30 delegation is on the ground in Belém! The student and faculty delegates will be sharing their experiences live from Brazil during events in the Schiller Convening Space this Thursday, November 13 and next Thursday, November 20. Please register. 

Teaching to Inspire Changemakers »

The second seminar in our collaboration with the Center for Teaching Excellence will feature Seidner Family Executive Director Laura J. Steinberg on November 19. Steinberg will speak about her Entrepreneurial Leadership course and the Institute’s Working For and With Communities program. Register here.

Hanqin Tian Receives Honor from AGU »

Institute Professor of Global Sustainability Hanqin Tian will receive the Bert Bolin Award and Lecture from the American Geophysical Union (AGU) at its annual meeting in December. The award recognizes his groundbreaking research and leadership in global environmental change. Read more.

Informal Lunch Discussion Series Encourages Interdepartmental Collaboration »

A new discussion series—organized by Schiller Core faculty member and Economics Associate Professor Edson Severnini—provides the Schiller community with opportunities to learn about the work of their colleagues over lunch. Read more.

“Climate Is Every Story” Series Links Research and Reporting to Bolster Climate Journalism »

Academics uncover key findings about climate change but lack the reach to share them, while journalists have a platform but often need hard data. As the climate crisis grows more urgent, the Schiller Institute and Journalism and Environmental Studies programs are helping to bridge this gap to strengthen storytelling through a new event series sponsored by the Institute for the Liberal Arts, “Climate Is Every Story.” Read more.

Schiller-Funded Grants Bring BC Research to Worldwide Problems

Each year, the Schiller Institute funds pilot-scale projects that give researchers a chance to prove out their ideas before proposing them to larger audiences. These innovative projects also engage students in ways that build on and enhance their education. Read more.

Bringing Together Journalists and Researchers—in Boston and Berlin—to Tell the Climate Story

A new Schiller initiative brings together scientists and reporters to encourage collaboration and improve science literacy. So does an annual “communication lab” at Berlin’s Humboldt University, which SchillerNow’s writer recently attended. Read more.

Yi Ming Awarded Faculty Fellowship

Institute Professor of Climate Science and Society Yi Ming has been awarded a Faculty Fellowship for the Spring 2026 semester. Dr. Ming will spend the semester at the National University of Singapore (NUS), initiating research projects and identifying areas of mutual alignment between BC and NUS.

Jier Huang Awarded a Department of Energy grant

Schiller Core faculty member Jier Huang was awarded a grant from the DOE for her research aimed at solar fuel conversion. The project will develop a unique generation of covalent organic framework (COF) photocatalysts that can serve as a platform for carbon dioxide reduction and clean energy production.

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