About Pathways
MISSION
Creating equitable pathways to climate resilience that respect nature and integrate science, engineering, and policy to adapt to today’s climate hazards and tomorrow’s uncertainties.
WHO WE ARE
Pathways Climate Institute was founded in 2016 as a certified woman-owned small business. Our founder, Dr. Kris May, left her job at a large, global engineering company so she could focus her work entirely on climate adaptation and resilience. Our global climate is changing rapidly. Our future will be shaped by increasing temperatures, more intense storm events, larger wildfires, and accelerating sea level rise. The impacts of climate change are already being felt around the world, with extreme events occurring now that we thought were still decades away. Maintaining viable and livable communities for the next generations requires achieving climate resilience, prioritizing nature-based solutions, accepting the changes that will come, planning for more than one potential future, and increasing our capacity to adapt.
​
WHAT WE DO
We listen, we translate, we act.
Kris assembled an amazing team of engineers, planners, scientists, geographers, data analysts, policy makers, and innovators that match her passion for affecting real world change. Many of our team members are nationally recognized experts in their respective fields. Our team understands the latest global and national climate science -- often before it hits the streets, and we translate the science to help decisions makers take action. We listen to our clients to understand the barriers, challenges, and data gaps that impede action, and we conduct cutting edge scientific research to fill those data gaps. Our company is mission driven to help all communities achieve greater climate resilience; therefore, we make our data products publicly and freely available for all to use. All communities deserve climate resilience.
HOW WE GIVE
We care, we give.
Pathways is not your average consulting firm. We are mission driven for the public good, and we reinvest our profits into the research and development of innovative tools that can better support our clients, better communicate climate risks to the public, or enhance decision-making processes when considering an uncertain future. Pathways provides a culture of technical excellence and creativity, and our research and development projects come from the imaginations of our amazing staff.
​
Pathways also reinvests its profits in the communities where we work through paid service days, such as beach cleanups and volunteering at local food banks. Pathways staff take turns selecting service day ideas, and Pathways pays its staff to participate during regular work hours. Pathways also pays staff to provide pro bono services that support our mission, such as serving on committees and boards, and participating on working and advisory groups focused on enhancing local, regional, or national climate resilience initiatives. Pathways staff self-select their pro bono activities based on their own personal passions and interests. As our climate continues to change at a rapid pace, there are more pro bono needs than we have the capacity to take on, but Pathways is committed to providing pro bono support where and when we can.