North America Leadership
SETAC North America Board of Directors
President
Tisha King-Heiden, University of Wisconsin–La Crosse, USA
Vice President
Nile Kemble, Federal Government, USA
Immediate Past President
Lisa Ortego, Bayer Crop Science, USA
Treasurer
Teresa Norberg-King, Federal Government (retired), USA
Executive Committee Member-at-Large
Amila De Silva, Federal Government, Canada
Board Members
Guy Gilron, Borealis Environmental Consulting Inc., Canada
Miguel Betancourt-Lozano, CIDAC, Mexico
Katy Chung, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), USA
Katie Coady, Dow Chemical Company, USA
Austin Gray, Virginia Tech University, USA
Latonya Jackson, University of Cincinnati, USA
Mark Johnson, Federal Government, USA
Mark McMaster, Environment and Climate Change Canada, Canada
Martha Georgina Orozco-Medina, University of Guadalajara, Mexico
Shawn Sager, Arcadis, USA
Student Members
Megan Solan, Baylor University, USA
Adam Wronski, Baylor University, USA
SETAC North America Executive Director
Tamar Schlekat, ex officio
Executive Committee
Tisha King-Heiden
Tisha King-Heiden has been an active member of SETAC since graduate school in 2003, spending the majority of her efforts working with the SETAC North America Student Advocacy Committee. She is a Professor at the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse, a primarily undergraduate/comprehensive university. As a member of the board of directors, she is committed to seeing increased involvement of undergraduate students within SETAC North America, particularly those from historically underrepresented groups.
Lisa Ortego
Lisa Ortego is a Senior Principal Scientist in Bayer’s Environmental Toxicology and Risk Assessment Team in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. She received her B.S. from Louisiana State University in environmental health and her Ph.D. in pharmacology and toxicology from the University of Mississippi. Ortego has been a diplomat of the American Board of Toxicology since 2001. As a member of the board of directors, she is committed to a focus on scientific excellence and increasing governance transparency in an inclusive fashion.
Nile Kemble
Nile Kemble received a B.S. degree from the University of Nebraska-Kearney in biology with a wildlife emphasis and a M.S. from the University of Missouri in fisheries management. Kemble has worked with a variety of other organizations, both nationally and internationally, to develop sediment quality guidelines that can be used to predict the incidence of toxicity in sediments as well as working with ASTM and USEPA in developing standard methods for conducting toxicity tests with contaminated sediments. His current research is primarily focused in evaluating toxicity and effects of hazardous algal blooms on freshwater fish and invertebrates and working on developing a bait food for eradicating invasive carp. He has published 94 peer reviewed articles or final reports.
Teresa Norberg-King
Teresa Norberg-King is a self-employed subject matter expert in the development and application of effective methods for identifying significant stressors and effects in aquatic systems. She has a master’s degree from the University of Wyoming and has spent a large part of her career working for the USEPA Office of Research and Development. Norberg-King has a history of service to the society. She has served on the SETAC North America Board of Directors, the SETAC World Council, and was President of the Midwest Chapter. She was an annual meeting chair and has chaired and served on many other committees and interest groups including the finance committee. She is dedicated to fiscally-responsible management of the society’s resources.
Amila De Silva
Amila De Silva is a mid-career government scientist at Environment Canada where she studies the environmental chemistry of contaminants. She has been involved with SETAC since 2005 in several capacities. The strengths De Silva hopes to bring to the board are her long-term energetic experience within and outside of SETAC and ability to identify with all stages of SETAC involvement from newcomers to seasoned members.
Board Members
Miguel Betancourt-Lozano
Miguel Betancourt-Lozano is a marine biologist and received his B.Sc. from the Autonomous University of Baja California Sur and M.Sc. from the National Polytechnic Institute of Mexico, follwed by his Ph.D. from the University of Stirling in Scotland. He currently works at the laboratory of Ecotoxicology of the Research Center for Food and Development (CIAD). His research is focused on assessing the exposure and effects of contaminants on coastal and marine life. Recently, his group has also been involved in developing waste management technologies to promote circular economy initiatives in urban and rural landscapes. Betancourt-Lozano loves diving and always imagined himself studying the sea like Jacques Cousteau, but pollution got in his way. He has been involved in SETAC activities for almost 20 years, particularly at the beginning of the formation of the Mexico Chapter of SETAC North America.
Katy Chung
Katy Chung received her B.S. from University of South Carolina and her M.S. from the University of Charleston. She has more than 20 years of experience at NOAA, and her current research focuses on per- and polyfluorinated alkyl substances (PFAS) and PFAS-free fire-fighting foam compounds in estuarine organisms. Chung started as a SETAC student member in 1998 and has been an avid SETAC volunteer, serving on the Board of Directors for the Carolinas Chapter of SETAC (2004–2006) and as its secretary from 2006 to 2019.
Katherine (Katie) Coady
Katie Coady is an ecotoxicologist at Bayer Crop Sciences, with previous industry experience at Dow Chemical for more than 13 years. She received her Ph.D. from Michigan State University and began her career as a consultant followed shortly after as an assistant professor of biology and chemistry at a small college in Central Florida. Her areas of expertise include aquatic toxicology, ecological risk assessment, endocrine disruption, microplastics and bioaccumulation science. She first became involved in SETAC as a graduate student in the late '90s and has regularly participated in SETAC activities since on the regional level and in several geographies. Her goal as a board member is to give back to the scientific society that’s been so important to her, and she believes that SETAC should be moving toward greater inclusion and diversity and adopt innovative approaches to advancing science education and communication. In her free time, she is busy raising two teenagers in Midland, Michigan, and taking care of too many pets (two dogs, two cats, two rats, four lizards and two freshwater fish aquaria!)
Guy Gilron
Guy Gilron holds both a B.Sc. and an M.Sc. from the University of Guelph in Canada, and is a Registered Professional Biologist in British Columbia. He has held positions in both the consulting and industry sectors for over 30 years and is an accredited Board Director in Canada. His core experience is in ecotoxicology, water quality assessment, ecological and human health risk assessment, and marine ecology. Guy has been a SETAC member since 1992 and in addition to attending and presenting at many meetings and workshops, he has served in leadership for the Society, including: President of the Laurentian Chapter, Session Chair at SETAC meetings, and member of organizing committees. He is also a key contributor to the SETAC journals, serving as a Senior Editor, author, reviewer, and editorial board member.
Austin Gray
Austin Gray is an Assistant Professor at Virginia Tech University in Blacksburg where he does research in aquatic toxicology. He has been a member of SETAC since he was a sophomore in college. Most recently, he co-founded and co-chaired the Inclusive Diversity (ID) Committee. As a board member, he wants to bring more transparency to members of SETAC. He believes SETAC should focus on being more inclusive and recruit new environmental professionals with diversity in mind. He also hopes to work on the board to promote SETAC’s support of early and mid-career scientists that are transitioning to new positions.
Latonya Jackson
Latonya Jackson is an aquatic toxicologist at the University of Cincinnati. Her research focuses on endocrine disruption and adaptation in freshwater fish and invertebrates exposed to endocrine disrupting chemicals and mixed contaminants. She has been a member of SETAC since 2010, when she was a graduate student earning her Ph.D. from the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. She joined several different committees and focus groups at her first SETAC North America annual meeting in Portland, Oregon, and has been an active member since, taking an active role in many SETAC groups and committees. She has also been a mentor and speaker at SETAC annual meetings. As co-founder and co-chair of the Inclusive Diversity Committee, she is extremely passionate about diversity (racial, ethnic, sexual orientation, physical abilities, beliefs, etc.) and inclusion issues. This will remain a priority area for her until it is no longer an issue in SETAC.
Mark Johnson
Mark Johnson serves as the Director of Toxicology for the U.S. Army Public Health Center. He has held several leadership roles including as a past president of the American Board of Toxicology (ABT) and board member of the International Board of Environmental Risk Assessment (IBERA). He believes that the role of SETAC as a leader in environmental sciences is changing from one that has traditionally focused on understanding contaminants to one that has had to respond to increasingly complex emerging environmental issues that include human public health concerns. Johnson hopes to help SETAC encourage new ways to support multi-matrixed efforts to include One Health concepts in environmental risk assessment through focusing on emerging issues. He would also like to see SETAC bridge into recommending courses of action that will result in applied tools and solutions.
Mark McMaster
Mark McMaster has a Ph.D. from the University of Guelph and has been with Environment and Climate Change Canada for more than 26 years. His research experience focuses on monitoring programs and the effects of contaminants on the reproductive status of wild fish. He first joined SETAC in 1989 and has been to most annual North American meetings since. He is an avid and diligent SETAC committee member and volunteer. McMaster is a senior research scientist, who leads a research team, manages projects across sectors, and is responsible for a budget of roughly one million a year.
Martha Georgina Orozco-Medina
Martha Georgina Orozco-Median is the Director of the Institute for the Environment and Human Communities and is a Senior Research Professor at the University of Guadalajara. Orozco-Median coordinates research projects in the areas of environmental health, risks, pollution and health, pollution indicators, and environmental quality in vulnerable areas of environmental fragility. She is also the director of the scientific journal Sembrando Conciencia (Sowing Consciousness). She is a past president of Collegiate Biologists of Jalisco, which belongs to the Mexican Federation of Biology Colleges.
Shawn Sager
Shawn Sager is currently a Vice President and Principal Scientist at Arcadis with more than 35 years of consulting experience. Her expertise lies in human health risk assessment. She received a B.A. from the University of California, an M.S. and a Ph.D. in chemistry from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. Sager attended her first SETAC meeting in 1993 and has been active in SETAC for the last 15 years.
Student Members
Megan Solan
Megan Solan is a doctoral student at Baylor University. She has been an active SETAC member since she was an undergraduate, and she found her current advisor through the SETAC Career Center. She hopes to bring more opportunities to more undergraduate students by focusing on their involvement within the regional chapters. She believes that communication among the various SETAC entities is essential for understanding their needs and ensuring those needs can be met in a timely manner for the implementation of activities involving our organization.
Adam Wronski
Adam Wronski is a second-year graduate student at Baylor University, where he is pursing a Ph.D. in Environmental Science. His research has thus far focused primarily on the prevalence of pharmaceuticals, specifically antipsychotics, in wastewater influent, effluent discharges and surface waters globally. Wronski has governance experience as a member of the executive board of the Baylor University SETAC chapter. He hopes to work to increase student engagement, especially with local and regional SETAC chapters.