Sarah Whatmore is Warden of Keble College, in which role she chairs the College’s Governing Body and oversees Keble’s current activities and its plans for future development.
Sarah has been a Professorial Fellow at Keble since 2012, and is also Professor of Environment and Public Policy at the School of Geography.
Sarah is a geographer by training and a committed advocate of Geography’s insistence on the interdependence of human and environmental processes and trajectories. She has an established reputation for leading interdisciplinary research projects working at the interface of the social and natural sciences to better understand and manage environmental conflicts and risks. Her work is known for pioneering collaborative research methods which engage communities living with these conflicts and risks in the research process. Prior to her appointment in Oxford’s School of Geography and the Environment in 2004, her academic career has included positions at University College London, the University of Bristol and the Open University.
Whilst at Oxford, Sarah has served as the Head of her department and in a variety of senior university roles, including Head of the Social Sciences Division, Pro Vice Chancellor for Education and Academic Champion for Public Engagement with Research. She has also held a variety of government advisory appointments, including as a member of the Defra Science Advisory Council and Chair of its Social Science Expert Group. In 2014 she was elected a Fellow of the British Academy and in 2020 appointed DBE in recognition of her contributions to the study of environment and public policy.