Dawn Wright has been Esri's Chief Scientist since 2011. She is also currently the U.S. State Department Science Envoy for Ocean Sustainability, working with the agency on its initiatives around the world. Previously, Dawn spent 17 years as a Professor of Geography and Oceanography at Oregon State University, where she remains on the faculty. 

Jeff Baranyi is lead solution engineer on Esri's Public Safety Team for Emergency Management and Disaster Response. He works closely with the community to discover, develop, and promote best practices in the use of ArcGIS to support the emergency management mission. 

Jessica Bello leads the Commercial Technology Consulting team in Esri's Professional Services Advanced Analytics department and has been with Esri since 2006. In her role, she empowers organizations and businesses through geospatial solution strategy, implementation, and consulting.

Jonathan Foley is an environmental scientist, sustainability expert, author, and public speaker. As executive director of Project Drawdown, his work focuses on understanding our changing planet and finding new solutions to sustain the climate, ecosystems, and natural resources we all depend on.

Este Geraghty is Esri's Chief Medical Officer. In her role, she applies the geographic approach to help address global health concerns ranging from public health preparedness and environmental health to strategic planning, access to care, and the pursuit of health equity.

Katharine Hayhoe is an atmospheric scientist whose research focuses on understanding the impacts of climate change on people and the planet. She is the Chief Scientist for The Nature Conservancy, where she leads and coordinates the organization's scientific efforts.

Lorien Innes is a senior business development manager at Esri where she provides strategic guidance to clients, partners, and regional organizations in Africa, with particular focus on agriculture and food security. She also manages the Africa GeoPortal, an Esri-hosted community GIS portal for anyone working in and on Africa.

Steve Kopp is a senior principal product engineer and science community liaison at Esri. He has over 30 years of experience designing and applying spatial data science and image analysis techniques and helping ArcGIS users solve challenging earth science problems.

Pauline Okeyo is a senior solution engineer at Esri who supports organizations in the Middle East, Africa, and Central Asia that are leveraging GIS solutions to achieve sustainable development across the region.

Erin Sanborn is Director of Sustainable Education and Associate Director of the Office Community Service Learning at the University of Redlands, where she oversees the campus farm, gardens, and community outreach related to sustainability and youth environmental programs. 

I really enjoyed the way the course was structured, from video explanations to practical exercises. That was so amazing and resourceful.

— David B.

The fact that [many] people enrolled to tackle climate change, and from the discussion are willing to make a difference at an individual level with the use of GIS as a tool...I'm convinced that we can manage climate change and probably reverse.

— Josephine N.

The exercises!! I loved [the] chance to explore the suite of products by Esri outside of ArcGIS Pro. The quizzes also were great at targeting specific information, but also learning the most important things to focus on and the different subtleties to watch out for. I especially loved Dr. Este Geraghty's video. My favorite part is that it was all things GIS and specifically tailored to climate change. 

— Keana O.

I haven't used GIS in a while, and this course really provided a number of real-world examples for how GIS can be quite useful when taking climate action. The sections on adaptation were for me the most interesting. My work deals a lot with climate mitigation, so the sections on reducing greenhouse gases were very interesting, but also more familiar to me. I got to stretch my understanding and learn new ways of analyzing climate-related risks and hazards.

— Ryan C.

I'm very happy about what I learned and the skills that I got, so I feel very thankful [toward course host] Dr. Dawn Wright, the MOOC team, and Esri. I really, really hope to use these tools, skills, and knowledge in my work and for work in solutions and projects that could help my region and my country, and mostly, to take action to mitigate climate change effects. Thank you very much again.

— Evelyn V.

I liked how section 6 brought the results of all lessons together into the creation of a StoryMap. I also enjoyed the lesson on dashboard creation, which I had been wanting to learn but could never find the time.

— Roger P.

I enjoyed completing the exercises. The instructions were clear enough to understand, and explanations helped to communicate a lot of the abstract ideas.

— Olufemi O.

I just loved how step by step everything was. For a first-time user, it was really useful.

— Steven T.

The progression from data recruitment, through data usage, and finally testing, and ta da! presentation to share with the MOOC community, ArcGIS users, and managers/planners in Africa. How great is that!

— John H.

It's not a common part of my current job as we are lucky so far in our area, but being able to get ahead of climate change with models for our area is definitely helpful. There were a few little tricks I learned in [ArcGIS] Pro that will help my daily workflows too! I am a GIS professional, my spouse is not; however, in her field as an urban planner she also works with and gains large benefit from GIS and is very interested in environmental impacts, so we were able to work through it together and learn a lot.

— Robert A.

As an engineer, [the course] is very interactive and fun. I also liked the practicability and the visuals.

— Adebayo A.

I loved how interactive the exercises were.

— Deborah E.

I appreciated the range of projects throughout the course.

— Anna H.

I feel that the course offered a very comprehensive overview of tools available to help tackle the climate emergency. The exercises provided were invaluable.

— Andrew G.

I enjoyed the exercises that I worked on, and the instruction was so clear on each step—this [helped] me complete all the exercises effectively.

— Bismillah R.