Christina Kennedy

Christina Kennedy is a Senior Scientist with The Nature Conservancy’s Development by Design program, where she focuses on understanding how patterns of land conversion and human development affect biodiversity and ecosystem services. Christina has spearheaded field research on impacts of agriculture, urbanization, and mining on bird communities in tropical forests, has modeled effects of fragmentation of the Atlantic Forest, and has conducted synthetic modeling of farming practices and landscape effects on pollinators globally to ensure delivery of pollination services in agricultural regions. She works with diverse stakeholders (corporations, NGOs, universities, local, state and federal agencies) to promote effective conservation strategies. Her work has been published in scientific journals such as Ecological Monographs, Ecology Letters, Ecology, Ecological Applications, Biological Conservation, Conservation Biology, and Science.

Prior to joining TNC, Christina served as a field biologist for various state and federal agencies in Hawaii, and investigated the status, habitat requirements, and recovery needs of endangered species. She also worked at the Environmental Law Institute in D.C., where she conducted research and outreach on federal, state, and local laws and policies related to land use, wetlands protection and biodiversity conservation. Most recently, she served as a Postdoctoral Associate on a National Science Foundation project to model the effects of landscape patterns on global (bee) pollinators with investigators at the Lincoln Park Zoo and University of California at Berkeley and Davis. Christina has held faculty appointments at the University of Maryland at College Park and the University of New Mexico. Christina earned her B.S. degree from Cornell University, master’s degree from Duke University’s Nicholas School of the Environment and Ph.D. degree from University of Maryland’s Biology, Ecology, Evolution and Systematics Program.