Special Achievement Award Recipients

Verena Gill grew up in the UK and had a fascination with birds from an early age due to her parents’ back garden haven for them. Despite studying American and Commonwealth Arts on a writer’s trajectory at the University of Exeter, she had an itch to conduct conservation work and explore the world. However, it wasn’t until she met John Piatt and…

Linda Elliott is the Founder, President and Center Director of the Hawaiʻi Wildlife Center. She is a graduate of Kalaheo High school on Oʻahu, attended the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa, and holds a degree in Wildlife Biology from Arizona State University. Linda’s dedication to wildlife began before she was ten years old. She will tell you that her earliest life-defining moment…

Dr. Shuihua Chen is the former leader of the restoration project for the critically endangered Chinese Crested Tern (Thalasseus bernsteini, CCT) in Zhejiang Province, China. Dr. Chen led the project during 2003-2019, when he was the Curator of Ornithology at the Zhejiang Museum of Natural History. Dr. Chen grew up in Zhejiang Province, eastern China. He received a B.S. degree in Zoology…

Simba was born and educated in Hong Kong and, after graduating from the Chinese University of Hong Kong, he worked as a Teaching Assistant in the Biology Department. He first began banding birds in 1985, and joined the World Wildlife Fund – Hong Kong to work as the Assistant Education Officer at Mai Po Marshes Nature Reserve in 1987. Since 1990 he…

Dr. Hsiao-Wei Yuan is a Professor in the School of Forestry and Resource Conservation at National Taiwan University (NTU). She earned her B.S. and M.S. degrees from the Department of Zoology at NTU and obtained her Ph.D. degree in Natural Resources from Cornell University, USA. As a pioneering scholar in the field of bird ecology, biodiversity, wildlife, and animal conservation in Taiwan,…

Shannon Fitzgerald is the leader of the NOAA Fisheries Alaska Fisheries Science Center’s Coordinated Seabird Studies Group. Shannon grew up in central western Minnesota in a conservation minded family. He received a B.S in Wildlife Management from the University of Minnesota where he worked on a study of the Ecology of the West Indian Manatee in Florida. After a season completing prescribed…

In recognition of his significant contributions to our knowledge about the ecology and conservation needs of the marbled murrelet, and his work to examine at-sea distribution of seabirds with respect to the Salish Sea and California Current ecosystems, the PSG honors Dr. Raphael with the 2017 Special Achievement Award.