University of Georgia Skidaway Institute of Oceanography Interim Executive Director Clark Alexander has been appointed to the board of trustees of the Ossabaw Island Foundation.

Clark Alexander

The Ossabaw Island Foundation is a nonprofit organization responsible for educational, scientific and cultural initiatives on Ossabaw Island, a 26,000-acre barrier island on the Georgia coast.

Alexander is a marine geologist who joined UGA Skidaway Institute as a postdoctoral scientist in 1989 and rose to the rank of full professor in 2003. He was appointed interim executive director in 2016. Alexander earned bachelor’s degrees in oceanography and geology from Humboldt State University in California. He went on to earn his master’s and doctoral degrees in marine geology from North Carolina State University.

As a researcher, Alexander has participated in 63 field programs from New Zealand to Siberia and has been the chief scientist on 29 oceanographic cruises with a total of more than two years at sea.  He has published 86 papers in scientific journals, and, in the past decade, has received more than $5 million in direct research funding. In addition, he is the director of the Georgia Southern University Applied Coastal Research Laboratory on Skidaway Island.

Alexander has been very active on state and regional advisory boards and works closely with the Georgia Department of Natural Resources to identify and address pressing coastal management needs. He served on the Georgia Coastal Marshlands Protection Committee and the Georgia Shore Protection Committee from 1998 to 2006. A few of the committees he currently serves on include the Grays Reef National Marine Sanctuary Science Advisory Group, the Sapelo Island National Estuarine Research Reserve Advisory Committee and the Habitat Protection and Ecosystem-Based Management Advisory Panel to the South Atlantic Fisheries Management Council.