Brian Sharbono

Brian is the Associate Director for Programs at the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment. Prior he served as Research Analyst with the Economic and Regulatory Research Unit of the Washington State Department of Ecology.  At the Beldon Fund, a spend down philanthropy, Brian managed strategic grantmaking programs that invested $10M per year to improve environmental health, bolster the capacity and policy coordination of state-level environmental NGOs, and advance market-based strategies to improve ESG in the private sector. At Stanford, Brian co-founded and was Managing Director of the Rural Education Action Program, a collaboration of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, to prototype and rigorously evaluate program interventions.  REAP demonstrably enhanced the nutrition, health and educational attainment of children of poor households at scale in rural China by showing impact and leveraging provincial and national policy change.  Brian subsequently served as program evaluator for Stanford’s Biodesign Innovation Program. 

At the Woods Institute, Brian partners across the university and externally. He initiated the Forum for Undergraduate Environmental Leadership (FUEL) and the Environmental Policy Internships in California (EPIC internships), which open opportunities for Stanford students to learn about and contribute to the environmental management and policy work of city and state agencies and NGOs. Other programs support independent environmental projects and summer research by students.  Brian also initiated the Realizing Environmental Innovation Program, a funding opportunity and external advising channel for faculty research teams seeking to validate and accelerate innovation into solutions to climate and sustainability problems.  The program complements the Environmental Venture Projects, a funding program for faculty teams of earlier stage, cross-university environmental projects, which Brian also directs for the Woods Institute.