I am a lifelong Alaskan with a passion for environmental justice in the Arctic. In August 2020 I started as a Program Assistant at a Washington, D.C. policy think tank called the Wilson Center. Since joining the Wilson Center’s Polar Institute, I have coordinated more than a dozen high-level events and multiple publications related to Arctic and Antarctic policy.
Before joining the Wilson Center I lived and worked in Tromsø, Norway as a Hart Leadership Fellow and, later, as an Associate at the Arctic Council Indigenous Peoples’ Secretariat. I provided assistance to six Indigenous Peoples’ organizations in their international policy work and supported important events like the 6th Arctic Leaders’ Summit.
My environmental policy work is inspired by my childhood gratefully spent on the Russian River, Kenai River, Kenai Fjord and the Chugach Mountains, the traditional lands of Ahtna and Dena’ina peoples. I am a first generation college graduate who attended Duke University, graduated in the top 25% of my class, and achieved distinction in Environmental Science & Policy for my research on cruise ship taxation in Alaska and Iceland.
Outside of work hours, I am the author of a travel memoir about navigating social life in Tromsø, Norway (Romssa, Sápmi) as a Black, mixed-race girl from Alaska. My forthcoming book, Welp: Climate Change & Arctic Identities, will publish with New Degree Press in April 2021.
For more information, you can connect me at:
Email:Michaela.Stith@wilsoncenter.org
Twitter: @michaelastith
Instagram: @mickydeee
Webpages:
(1) https://www.wilsoncenter.org/person/michaela-stith
(2) https://www.newsecuritybeat.org/author/mstith/
Publications:
Ramanarayanan, Deekshita., Stith, Michaela., Maddox, Marisol., and Johnson, Bethany. (2020). “Interdisciplinary Solutions Will Improve Alaska Native Maternal Health (Part 2 of 2).” New Security Beat, November 18. https://www.newsecuritybeat.org/author/mstith/.
Women in the Arctic and Antarctic 