We’re excited to share the Wright-Ingraham Institute’s latest Annual Report, Into The Field. It celebrates a big year of momentum, growth, and field-based work for land and water resilience in the American Southwest and beyond.
Inside, you’ll find updates on our 2026 Field Workshop, Dust-on-Snow Practitioners Network, StudyTank research, and the partners and supporters helping bring this work to life.
Download the annual report here – Annual Report FY25-26 Landscape (PDF)
Today, we are writing to announce an important leadership transition:
Anna J. L. Grady has been appointed President of the Wright-Ingraham Institute Board of Directors.
Anna brings tremendous vision and steady leadership to this role, serving on the board for the past decade, and leading the Institute’s grants program from 2012 to 2024.
Anna writes:
“I am honored to serve as the new President of the Wright-Ingraham Institute. My long-time involvement with the Institute extends as far back as the 1970’s working at the original field station. At that time, concepts such as integrative studies and cross-disciplinary systems thinking were way ahead of their time. Fast forward to 2026 and the challenges facing our globe are vast. Bringing diverse minds together to help solve thorny and complex environmental problems is needed now more than ever before.
With a topnotch staff, astute board, and skilled strategic advisor team, the WII is well positioned to ask the hard questions and seek solutions using innovative approaches. I couldn’t be more excited to be part of this amazing organization.”
During her tenure, Catherine helped reestablish WII as a meaningful contributor to integrative studies, and in particular, to applying interdisciplinary methods toward drought resilience strategies in the American Southwest. She also played a pivotal role in shaping StudyTank, which helped crystallize WII’s mission and sharpen our long-term vision. Catherine has overseen the hiring of the Institute’s first two Executive Directors and consistently emphasized the centrality of rigorous, cross-disciplinary inquiry at WII.
Catherine writes:
“It has been my great pleasure to serve the Institute – first as Treasurer-Secretary and then as Board President – since our initial decision to re-start and re-develop the Institute’s programs all these years ago. I, with the rest of the board’s members, all of whom had been part of the original Institute, have worked relentlessly over these years to grow, govern, finance, certify, and discover new ways of practicing integrative studies and place-based research.
Much of this work is now being made manifest in new ways by the Institute’s current Board of Directors, our new President, Anna Grady, and our Executive Director, Tal Beery. That, in my opinion, is more than enough for any Board President to be very happy about.”
All of us at the Institute are profoundly grateful for Catherine’s leadership, her dedication, and her service.
Most importantly, Catherine will remain a key part of the Institute’s leadership as a member of the Board of Directors, and as a Principal Investigator on StudyTank’s Colorado River Basin Project, alongside Frank Miller.
Looking ahead
We will be sharing more soon about the year ahead, including our Field Workshop, StudyTank work, and new partnership development. For now, we want to simply mark this moment: with deep gratitude for Catherine’s leadership, and genuine excitement for Anna’s new role as Board President.
Anna Grady during Working the Llano sin Agua 2025.
More about Anna Grady
Anna Grady is President of the Board of the Wright-Ingraham Institute and Vice President for Operations and Administration at the Vermont Community Foundation (VCF). VCF brings philanthropy and charitable goals together to serve Vermonters in every community. In her role, Anna oversees human resources, administration, and I.T. functions. She is an accomplished leader in Human Resources and Administration, specializing in organizational strategy and development, systems thinking, change management, employee relations, and strategic workforce planning. Anna’s broad experience and pragmatic approach to organizational development strengthens how WII approaches operational decision-making in alignment with our values and culture. Anna lives and works in Vermont.
More about Catherine Ingraham
Catherine Ingraham, Ph.D., is a Full Professor in the Graduate Program of Architecture at Pratt Institute, a program she chaired from 1999–2005. She has also been a Visiting Faculty member at Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design since 2016. Catherine earned her Ph.D. at Johns Hopkins University and was an editor (with Michael Hays and Alicia Kennedy) of the critical journal *Assemblage*. She has lectured internationally and published widely in journals and edited volumes. Her books include *Architecture, Animal, Human* (Routledge, 2006) and *Architecture and the Burdens of Linearity* (Yale University Press, 1998). She has received numerous fellowships and awards, including a Canadian Centre for Architecture Fellowship, Graham Foundation grants, and MacDowell residencies. Catherine co-directs the StudyTank program at WII.
How do new ideas emerge, and why do integrated approaches matter?
Innovation rarely appears in isolation; it takes shape through collaboration and at the intersections of disciplines, communities, and forms of knowledge.
These selected articles spotlight true innovation and highlight how integrative knowledge and cross-sector collaboration give birth to new ideas.
We are kicking off Giving Tuesday a day early. Our board has stepped up with a special match: from right now through December 14, every gift will be matched dollar for dollar, up to $5,000.
Your support will power our 2026 Field Workshop and help grow a new generation of environmental resilience leaders who can bridge disciplines and perspectives. This kind of leadership is needed now more than ever, and we truly cannot do it without you.
Applications are open for our 2026 Field Workshop, a three-week immersive program along the Rio Grande. The cohort follows the river from Colorado’s San Luis Valley to northern New Mexico’s Taos Plateau, learning directly from the people and landscapes that define this region.
If you’re considering applying, or know someone who should, join us on December 17 for a short virtual Info Session. We’ll walk through the program structure, curriculum, field sites, expectations, and answer your questions.
Today we are launching the Wright-Ingraham Institute’s Scholarship Campaign to support the 2026 Field Workshop, our flagship program training the next generation of environmental leaders.
We need to raise $30,000 by December 31 to ensure program costs aren’t a barrier for participants in this transformative three-week fellowship along the Rio Grande.
Field Workshop brings together early-career scientists, designers, artists, and community leaders to work directly with farmers, ranchers, and water managers in the San Luis Valley and northern New Mexico. Fellows learn to collaborate across disciplines, understand the pressures communities face, and co-design practical strategies rooted in place.
Throughout the campaign, we will be celebrating the impact our alumni have made on the landscapes that sustain us all. Because the impact is clear: this program changes lives… and it changes systems.
Alumni have gone on to:
Your contribution today helps make this possible.
Every gift of any size brings us closer to funding 16 fellows for 2026.