Date September 26, 2023
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Dedicated Brunonian leaves a legacy of environmental impact

Merging his love for Brown with his dedication to the environment, George Billings ’72 LHD’21 hon. made a gift through his estate that supports faculty and graduate students in the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society (IBES).

Climate change and other environmental concerns have created immense challenges, and Brown is tackling them in large part through the work of the Institute at Brown for Environment and Society (IBES). IBES unites scholars, students, alumni, and community partners to devise effective and equitable solutions to these complex dilemmas.

From examining the health effects of chemicals in local water supplies to mitigating the increased spread of tropical diseases in rapidly warming areas, IBES is bringing together the expertise, the interdisciplinary lens, and the innovative approaches required to implement change across a number of climate, environmental, and sustainability issues. 

The late George Billings ’72 LHD’21 hon., a longtime Brown supporter and proponent of the preservation of coastal environments, believed in the vast potential of this work. He brought these two passions together by leaving an estate gift to advance the institute’s research, teaching, and advocacy. His planned gift establishes a professorship, an accompanying research fund, and a separate graduate fellowship through endowed funds.

“Billings’s gift will be uniquely transformative for IBES,” says IBES Director Kim Cobb, an award-winning climate researcher who was recently named to President Joseph Biden’s Intelligence Advisory Board. 

The endowed professorship will allow Brown to recruit top talent in the field who will work in close partnership with leading researchers from other disciplines across campus—such as public health and engineering—to combat climate change. According to Cobb, “These partnerships are critical to our goal of fostering solutions-oriented interdisciplinary education and research.”

IBES’s five-year strategic plan also prioritizes educating tomorrow’s leaders to advance solutions to the full range of pressing environmental dilemmas of our time. The graduate fellowship will attract and support graduate students who represent the future of climate and sustainability solutions. “Armed with skills and expertise gleaned across several disciplines, they will define whole new fields of innovation to tackle urgent challenges,” says Cobb.

“ No one loved Brown more than George Billings. From the time he enrolled as a freshman in 1968 until his death, George always had Brown in the forefront of his mind. It was one of his number-one priorities. It is no surprise that he left a large part of his estate to Brown. We are following in his footsteps and have done the same. ”

Joan Wernig Sorensen ’72 LHD’19 hon., P’06 P’06

A lifelong love of Brown, a passion for the environment

Billings was a devoted ambassador for the University, serving as a trustee of the Brown Corporation, the University’s highest governing body. His service as secretary and president of the Brown Alumni Association, co-chairman of the Brown Entrepreneurship Initiative, a member of the Brown Annual Fund Executive Committee, and even as president of his graduating class garnered him the University’s highest alumni accolades, including the prestigious Brown Bear Award.

On the day of his death, Brown President Christina H. Paxson and classmate Joan Wernig Sorensen ’72 LHD’19 hon., P’06 P’06 visited his bedside, where Paxson conferred on him the honorary degree of Doctor of Humane Letters and presented him a doctoral hood.

“No one loved Brown more than George Billings,” says Sorensen. “From the time he enrolled as a freshman in 1968 until his death, George always had Brown in the forefront of his mind. It was one of his number-one priorities. It is no surprise that he left a large part of his estate to Brown. We are following in his footsteps and have done the same.” 

His commitment to Brown matched the level of his concern for the environment. Having spent significant time in both Cape Cod and Florida, he became deeply involved in conservation groups like the Quissett Harbor House Land Trust, the Marine Biological Laboratory in Woods Hole, the Salt Pond Area Bird Sanctuaries, and the Woodwell Climate Research Center—even taking a trip to the Amazon rainforest with staff from Woods Hole.

“George was committed to the creation of intersections between academia and the public and private sectors,” says his brother John Billings. “He strongly believed that the excellent environmental research and learning at Brown needed to find its way into the larger community.  The interdisciplinary approach of IBES was exactly what George had in mind when he made his gift to Brown.”   

This final gift leaves an enduring legacy at a place George Billings loved—a legacy that will allow his generosity to advance protection of the oceans, wildlife, and vulnerable communities far into the future.

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