Colleen Sullivan - Oceana USA

Colleen Sullivan

Illegal Fishing and Transparency Fellow

Oceana Staff

Colleen’s lifelong love of the ocean started with the mangroves and flats of the Florida Keys and motivated her to pursue a career in marine conservation.

She recently graduated from the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) in Bologna, Italy where she received her Master of Arts in International Affairs. For both her thesis and as a Fisheries and Nutrition Intern with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Colleen studied the implementation of FAO’s Voluntary Guidelines for Securing Sustainable Small-Scale Fisheries in the Context of Food Security and Poverty Eradication (SSF Guidelines) in Tanzania.

Prior to SAIS, Colleen worked for Heal the Bay in Santa Monica where she started as an education and outreach associate and eventually became the manager of public programs at HtB’s teaching aquarium. She has also interned at the Center for Coastal Studies in Provincetown as a marine educator, the Central Caribbean Marine Institute in Little Cayman as a marine conservation intern, the Environmental Protection Agency as an Office of Resource Conservation and Recovery intern, and Environmental Working Group as a communications intern. Colleen’s background in policy, education, advocacy, and research has given her an appreciation for holistic, interdisciplinary approaches and the importance of strengthening the science-policy interface. In particular, she values the need for effective communication to promote nature-based solutions at all levels from local to international.