Jenifer Austin Foulkes

Ocean Manager, Google Earth and Maps

Presentation: Google Ocean Project, Applying Google's free mapping technology to enforcement and how NOAA successfully uses it to track fishing operations in Hawaii.

Biography:

Jenifer Austin Foulkes is the manager of the Google Ocean Program which includes the best consumer map of the ocean available in Google Earth and Google Maps and an Ocean Education Showcase with narrated stories by numerous contributors like Sylvia Earle’s Mission Blue Foundation, the Cousteau Society, MBARI and NOAA. She recently partnered with Catlin Seaview Survey to launch underwater Streetview in Google Maps. The Google Ocean Program was awarded the Wildaid Leadership Award on May 11, 2012 at Wildaid’s Annual Gala, the 2012 Blue Frontier Peter Benchley Excellence in Exploration award on June 1st at the California Academy of Sciences alongside President Tong of Kiribati and US Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, the 2009 Aquarium of the Pacific at Long Beach's Ocean Conservation Award, and the 2009 Heal the Bay "Walk the Talk" Award Bring Back the Beach Award. In 2007, she cofounded the Google Earth Outreach Program which supports nonprofit groups using Google’s geotools to change the world. Jenifer holds an undergraduate degree in biology, a Masters degree from Stanford University in Neuroscience and has done marine research at the Bermuda Institute of Ocean Sciences, the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Florida State and the University of Washington's Friday Harbor Labs. In addition to serving on the Mission Blue foundation board, she also is a member of the Blue Ocean Film Festival and UC Davis Bodega Marine Lab external advisory boards.