Leah Stokes on Climate Issues Near and Far

Despite its identity as the birthplace of the environmental movement, Santa Barbara still has far to go before it can call itself a truly “green” city — so says Leah Stokes, assistant professor of political science at UCSB and this year’s recipient of the university’s Harold J. Plous Award, given for excellence in research, teaching, and service. With Election Day — and its implications for U.S. climate action — just around the corner, Stokes aims an expert’s eye on the response the climate crisis requires at national and local levels.

One would struggle to find a better local voice in this regard than Leah Stokes, who worked at the Parliament of Canada and with the nonprofit research institution Resources for the Future before earning her PhD in public policy from MIT in 2015. Since then, her work at UCSB has focused on energy and environmental politics, policy, and political behavior in the United States.

Stokes is much-loved by her students, as well, receiving 4.9 out of 5 stars on RateMyProfessors, a site where students anonymously review their teachers. “Every political science major knows that PS15 is the least favorite pre-req … but Professor Stokes creates a class that turns unappealing statistics into a dope subject,” wrote one student. Another said, “Every lecture is not only clear and informative but gut-bustingly hilarious.”