Deborah Neher

Raised in Quinter, Kansas, on a fourth-generation family farm, Deborah Neher earned a Bachelor of Science in Environmental Science at McPherson College, an MS in Plant Population Ecology at the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign, and a PhD in Plant Pathology at the University of California at Davis. She first encountered The Land Institute in the early 1980s. When her advisor informed her about the internship program, she attended a Prairie Festival and began reading the organization’s Land Reports cover to cover. Co-founder Wes Jackson’s vision of using “nature as measure” inspired Deborah’s career trajectory as a soil ecologist and her special interest in using nature as a model for making agriculture more sustainable. Deborah joined the board in 1999 and has served as the Science committee chair since 2000, a dream come true, coming full circle with The Land Institute from early to late career.

My most perennial trait is Curiosity—It’s reflected in my motto, “It is a good day when I learn something new.”

Read more about Deborah here.

See Deborah’s research here.