Ronan Donovan in Needville, TX on May 13
On May 13, wildlife biologist, photographer, and filmmaker Ronan Donovan will speak in Needville, TX as part of the Vital Impacts Student Speaker Series. The program’s goal: Collaborate with globally celebrated visual storytellers, like Donovan, to motivate the next generation of environmental stewards across North America.
Donovan’s own story illustrates how storytelling can help one person make a widespread impact. The award-winning photographer and filmmaker started his career as a biologist. He studied chimpanzees in Uganda, but dabbled into photography as a means to document the primates. Eventually, those outside the biology community began to notice his work.
In 2014, Donovan was invited to help photograph the gray wolves in Yellowstone. The project set his conservation career in motion, as he realized he could make a greater impact through visual storytelling. Numerous awards, grants, films, and projects later, this National Geographic Explorer’s hunch proved right—and the Vital Impacts Student Speaker Series is helping him amplify that reach even further.
Following Donovan’s January 2024 Vital Impacts Student Speaker Series presentation in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, the school principal shared inspiring feedback: “Three days later and the kids are still talking about Ronan. He made a strong impression and inspired some important, constructive conversations among kids and adults.”
That’s also the goal for this talk, where Donovan will help students see their own potential roles within the climate movement, as well as the interconnected relationship between humans and other social mammals. His work, which has taken him across seven continents, often embeds him for months in the field observing and photographing animals, such as wolves and mountain gorillas. His visual storytelling illustrates both the challenges and bonds we all share.
Bring Vital Impacts Student Speaker Series to Your School
If you’re interested in bringing a Vital Impacts Student Speaker Series to your school and students, please contact us via email. We have a limited number of scholarships available; you can apply for a full or partial event-hosting scholarship here. The events consist of a 45-minute presentation followed by 15 minutes of Q&A, and a brown-bag lunch with select teachers and staff, as well as study guides to help students prepare for the events.