No Backsliding: Environmental Justice, Science & the Role of Academia
Jalonne L. White-Newsome, PhD
CEO and Founder
Empowering A Green Environment and Economy, LLC
Feb. 14, 2025
12 P.M. - 1 P.M.
Virtual Only.
REGISTER
Jalonne L. White-Newsome, PhD is a nationally recognized visionary, problem solver and passionate leader who recently served in the Biden-Harris Administration. White-Newsome’s personal and professional experience spans across multiple sectors, disciplines, and geographies advancing environmental justice, equity and environmental health for the last 3 decades.
Throughout her career, Jalonne has been the first in multiple positions: she was the first Climate and Health post-doctoral fellow at the Union of Concerned Scientists; the first Director of Federal Policy at WE ACT for Environmental Justice; and, most recently, the first Federal Chief Environmental Justice Officer, appointed to serve at The White House Council on Environmental Quality, where she led the first Office of Environmental Justice in The White House, advancing the most ambitious environmental justice agenda the United States has ever seen.
White-Newsome recently relaunched her strategic consulting firm, Empowering a Green Environment and Economy, LLC, where she will expand the work she started before joining the Administration, providing people-centered solutions across the private, public and non-profit sectors, to ensure environmental justice, health and sustainability for communities, businesses and people-serving organizations.
A native of Detroit, Michigan, White-Newsome has tackled environmental challenges from a wide range of positions and perspectives, including in the grassroots environmental justice movement, environmental philanthropy, state government, private industry, and academia. White-Newsome earned a PhD in environmental health sciences from the University of Michigan School of Public Health, a master’s degree in environmental engineering from Southern Methodist University, a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from Northwestern University, and a certificate in Diversity and Inclusion from Cornell University. Affectionately known as Dr. J, she remains most thankful for her main job - being a wife and mother to her daughters, Arielle and Jeannelyn.