Kriebel receives sixth annual Earth Caretaker Award

by Sue Bodilly · March 25, 2015

caretaker-top-story The University of Wisconsin-Green Bay Environmental Management and Business Institute (EMBI) and the Alumni Association jointly awarded the 2015 Earth Caretaker Award to 1977 UW-Green Bay graduate David Kriebel on Monday, March 23. He was the sixth recipient of the award for his work on sustainability.

Professor Kriebel has been on the faculty of the Department of Work Environment at the University of Massachusetts Lowell since 1988, where he teaches introductory and advanced courses in epidemiology, risk assessment, and research synthesis.

As a researcher, Kriebel focuses on the epidemiology of occupational injuries, cancer, and non-malignant respiratory disease. He has served on several National Academy of Sciences committees on environmental health, along with writing and lecturing on the role of epidemiologic evidence in science policy decision making.

He also serves as the Director of the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production, which collaborates with industries, government agencies, unions, and community organizations on the redesign of systems of production to make them healthier and more environmentally sound.

Kriebel graduated summa cum laude from UW-Green Bay in 1977 with a Bachelor of Science degree in Human Biology. He completed a master’s degree in physiology and occupational health in 1983 and a doctorate in epidemiology in 1986 at the Harvard School of Public Health. Kriebel worked for famous environmentalist and author, Barry Commoner, for several years at Washington University in St. Louis.

Kriebel said he left his hometown of Philadelphia to study at UW-Green Bay because he was a “high school eco-freak, and determined to devote his life to improving the planet and reducing human suffering.” As a student, Kriebel was highly involved in the environmental movement helping to organize the Union of Young Environmentalists, a national student organization, as well as lobbying the state legislature for a special designation for UW-Green Bay as having an environmental mission.

Kriebel returned to UWGB to deliver the 2008 commencement address, in which he told graduates that “No matter what your career path, act as if you live on a small and very finite planet — think of her as you walk through life, choosing in 10,000 small ways the mark you will make and the legacy you will leave your children and their children.”

In the photo above, he is congratulated by, from left to right, City of Green Bay Mayor Jim Schmitt, UWGB Prof. John Katers, and Chancellor Gary Miller. The Earth Caretaker Award honors UW-Green Bay graduates who have distinguished themselves in their professional field and are widely recognized for their career accomplishments in the areas of sustainability, environmental management, environmental policy, or other closely related areas.

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