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Janet A Cushing

Janet Cushing is the Deputy Chief of the USGS National Climate Adaptation Science Center (NCASC), which manages the nine regional Climate Adaptation Science Centers (CASCs). 

Janet Cushing is the Deputy Chief of the USGS National Climate Adaptation Science Center (NCASC). Janet began working for the federal government in 1999 in the US Army Corps of Engineer’s Jacksonville District, in the Regulatory Division (Enforcement). She then went to the Planning Division, Environmental Branch, where she worked on Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan projects. In 2005, Janet moved to the DC area, and spent three and a half years working at the USGS, Biological Resources Discipline. There, she helped manage Fisheries Program research activities and coordinated science and data issues for the Governing Board of the National Fish Habitat Action Plan. Janet was also the designated Tribal Liaison for the Biological Resources Discipline.

In 2009, Janet returned to the Corps, at the Institute for Water Resources (IWR), where she was an enterprise Group Manager and Senior Environmental Planner. As an environmental planner, Janet worked on a number of issues, including ecosystem goods and services considerations in water resources planning; managing an ecosystem restoration planning class; investigating the implications of climate change effects on Corps programs; incorporating environmental justice analyses into the Corps Planning Process; and coastal resilience through the Systems Approach to Geomorphic Engineering program. 

Janet is a 2011 Fellow of the National Conservation Leadership Institute, which focuses on leadership development within the context of natural resources management. She holds a master’s degree in Geology and Geophysics from the University of Hawai'i, and an undergraduate degree in Geology from Colgate University in New York; she has also conducted graduate work in paleoecology/paleontology at the University of Chicago.

Education and Certifications

  • M.S. in Geology and Geophysics, University of Hawai'i

  • B.S. in Geology, Colgate University 

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