About
Polly Endreny Holmberg is an expert in conservation biology with a focus on sustainable resource management and international education. She currently serves as the Associate Director of the Fulbright exchange Humphrey Fellowship Program at Cornell University, where she supports and connects global cohorts of professionals in the fields of natural resource management, agriculture, and rural development. In this role, she helps Fellows integrate into the Cornell and Ithaca communities and designs programs to advance their professional growth, networks, and influence. Additionally, as the training program coordinator for the Department of Global Development, she leads the World Food Prize New York Youth Institute, an initiative that engages high school students from across New York State on the major challenges facing people and the planet in the 21st century.
An early experience studying community-driven wildlife management sparked an enduring, career-guiding question: how do we create prosperous communities in harmony with thriving nature? Holding a B.Sc. in Biology from the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill and a M.Sc. in Marine Resource Management from Oregon State University, Polly brings several years of experience working on human-environment issues. She has worked with organizations such as The Nature Conservancy, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Peace Corps (served in Madagascar with her husband, 2010-12), and the Cheetah Conservation Fund. Prior to her current roles at Cornell, she helped establish and lead the Cornell Alliance for Science’s international training program on science communications and evidence-based advocacy, through which she and her team trained nearly 800 professionals from 48 countries on strategic organizing to combat global hunger.
Polly is passionate about innovative collaborations that prioritize environmental conservation, community empowerment, and cross-cultural engagement. She is a lifelong learner with a growing list of questions and remains optimistic in her pursuit of a more just and sustainable world. She loves being back in the Finger Lakes of New York, where she grew up, and currently lives with her husband, son, and precocious cats.
