A National Profile

Kate Brauman’s career in water policy reflects her interdisciplinary interests, personal values, and openness to new opportunities. As Associate Director for Analysis and Communications at the University of Alabama’s Global Water Security Center (GWSC), she says her mission “is to get excellent water science into the hands of decision makers.”

Brauman, PhD ’10, has charted her path from academic to influencer since graduating from the Emmett Interdisciplinary Program in Environment and Resources, where she held the Graham Family and William C. and Jeanne M. Landreth Fellowships in her final year.

With an academic research portfolio that integrates hydrology and land use with economics and policy, she was a coordinating lead author on the Global Assessment of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services and testified to Congress on the findings. In 2020-21, she took a break from academia to work on climate and water resiliency issues as a Science and Technology Fellow at the U.S. Department of Defense.

Brauman sees her role at GWSC as a continuation of her path. “I have a ton of excitement about being in a more applied space,” she says. “I’m in a position to take all of this amazing research that’s happening in academia, interpreting it, translating it, and getting it out in the world.”