Caren Cooper

Caren Cooper was born on Long Island, NY and grew up mostly in Chapel Hill, NC. She was a research associate at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology for her early career. Since 2016, she has had a dual appointment as an associate professor at North Carolina State University and scientist at the North Carolina Museum of Natural Sciences. Her research lab is behind a glass wall so that all Museum visitors can watch Cooper and her students in daily science activities. She is part of an interdisciplinary team of faculty in the NC State Chancellor’s Faculty Excellence Program in Leadership in Public Science. Citizen Science: How Ordinary People Are Changing the Face of Discovery is her first book. She led the formation of an academic journal, Citizen Science: Theory and Practice and serves on its editorial board.