Heidi Kretser (Photo provided)

KEENE — Heidi Kretser has joined the board of directors of the Adirondack Land Trust, bringing local knowledge and expertise in how social sciences can improve conservation practices.

Kretser is a conservation social scientist with the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Global Conservation Program. She incorporates tools and perspectives from the social sciences into wildlife and wildlands work. She is widely published, and her work has been featured in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, National Public Radio and a variety of regional media. She serves as an adjunct associate professor at Cornell University’s Department of Natural Resources and is affiliated with the Cornell Center for Conservation Social Sciences.

Kretser completed her Ph.D. in Natural Resource Policy and Management at Cornell and her Master of Environmental Studies degree at the Yale School of Forestry. A graduate of Saranac Lake High School, she grew up in Vermontville and lives in Saranac Lake with her husband Andy Keal and their two fifth-generation-Adirondack children.

The mission of the Adirondack Land Trust is to forever conserve the forests, farmlands, waters and wild places that advance the quality of life of our communities and the ecological integrity of the Adirondacks. The land trust has protected 26,628 acres since its founding in 1984.