International Cheetah Researcher and Conservationist Dr. Laurie Marker Announces Dates for U.S. Fall 2016 Lecture Tour

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

International Cheetah Researcher and Conservationist Dr. Laurie Marker Announces Dates for U.S. Fall 2016 Lecture Tour

WASHINGTON, D.C. (Sept. 23, 2016) – Dr. Laurie Marker, Founder and Executive Director of Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) and one of the world’s leading experts on the species, today announced the dates for her upcoming, five-week speaking tour of the United States. Traveling from her CCF field headquarters in Namibia, Dr. Marker will embark on her U.S. tour Oct. 8 in California and conclude Nov. 12 in Florida. Dr. Marker’s visit to the U.S. follows her attendance to COP17, the meeting of the Convention for Trade in Endangered Animals (CITES) in South Africa, to support its efforts to stop the illegal trafficking of cheetahs. Dr. Marker’s U.S. tour is intended to generate more awareness for the plight of the cheetah, Africa’s most endangered big cat, and raise funds for continued conservation efforts.

Dr. Marker’s tour includes events in 13 cities across the country, including stops in Palo Alto, Santa Cruz, San Francisco, Sausalito, Santa Rosa, Saint Helena, Santa Barbara, and Moorpark, California; Portland, Oregon; Washington, District of Columbia; Powell, Ohio; New York, New York; Oklahoma City, Oklahoma; Little Rock, Arkansas; and Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Dr. Marker will begin her tour as a featured conservationist speaking at the Wildlife Conservation Network (WCN) Expo in San Francisco Oct. 8, an annual event that brings together wildlife supporters with conservationists from around the world. During her visit to the nation’s capital, Marker will present a public lecture sponsored by The Smithsonian Institution Oct. 18 at the Ripley Center. She will also speak at the 15th Annual Cheetah Conservation Fund Benefit Oct. 20 at the offices of Foley & Lardner, where she will be joined by members of CCF’s Board of Directors, donors and other national wildlife experts to celebrate CCF’s positive impact on the world’s cheetah population.

Dr. Marker is a zoologist, research scientist and conservation biologist who is considered to be one of the world’s leading experts on the cheetah and human-predator conflict mitigation. Earning her DPhil at Oxford University, she has spent more than 40 years in the field studying cheetah biology, genetics, ecology and socio-economic issues related to conservation. She is credited with successfully mitigating conflict between farmers and cheetahs in Namibia and saving the lives of hundreds of cheetahs and other large carnivores with innovative, non-lethal predator control strategies, including the use of livestock guarding dogs and the advancement of communal and commercial conservancies.

Dr. Marker is an Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large at Cornell University and has received many awards in recognition including the 2015 Ulysses S. Seal Award for Innovation in Conservation, a 2015 E.O. Wilson Biodiversity Technology Pioneer Award and a 2015 Eleanor Roosevelt Val-Kill Medal. Dr. Marker is also the recipient of the Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, the International Conservation Caucus Foundation’s Good Steward Award, the Tech Museum’s Intel Environmental Prize, and is a two-time finalist for the Indianapolis Prize, the top award in species conservation. She was named a “Hero for the Planet” by Time magazine and has been featured in Smithsonian magazine as well as The Tonight Show, Good Morning America and the Today Show.

Media are invited to cover CCF events and Dr. Marker is available for media interview. Please contact CCF Executive Assistant to Dr. Marker, Paula Martin, at (703) 615-8293 to schedule.

Cheetah Conservation Fund
Founded in Namibia, Africa, in 1990, Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF) is the global leader in research and conservation of cheetahs dedicated to saving cheetahs in the wild. Dr. Laurie Marker, CCF’s Founder and Executive Director, is an American zoologist considered to be one of the world’s foremost experts on cheetah biology, ecology and conservation. She developed CCF’s holistic conservation strategy, which considers the needs of people, wildlife and the land and is credited with increasing the wild cheetah population in Namibia by almost 50 percent. CCF’s long-term studies monitor and analyze the factors affecting cheetah survival in the wild, and the findings provide the basis for developing conservation policies and education programs that have reached more than 450,000 Namibian farmers and school learners. CCF is a registered non-profit foundation in Namibia, Canada, the UK and the U.S., where it is listed as a “Four Star Charity” by Charity Navigator, recognizing sound fiscal management and commitment to accountability and transparency.