Dr. Mick Smyer is the former Provost and a current Professor of Psychology at Bucknell University, a post he has held since 2008. A national expert, Smyer has written and lectured extensively on aging. In addition to holding leadership roles in national organizations on aging, Mick has also consulted with Fortune 500 companies, state and national legislative leaders, and higher education organizations on the impacts of aging.
Mick also has experience in translating issues of aging for larger audiences, including appearances on PBS, NPR, and other media outlets.
Mick Smyer is the founder of Graying Green: Climate Communication for an Aging World.
Graying Green links two global patterns: population aging and climate change. The Graying Green project works with climate communicators, climate scientists, community and business leaders to engage older adults in education and action about climate change. Thus far, climate scientists have not targeted older adults for systematic collaboration. However, older adults are important for developmental and political reasons.
Developmentally, older adults are naturally concerned with the well-being of successive generations. Politically, older adults can be potential thought leaders: in developed countries, they vote disproportionately more than other age groups; in traditional societies, they are often revered as sources of wisdom. In the United States, older adults' voting rates have increased over the last 40 years while younger voters' participation has decreased.
The Graying Green project leverages Mick’s experience in gerontology and in international consultation to collaborate on developing, implementing, and evaluating effective climate communication strategies for an aging world. For example, in the Graying Green workshop at the meetings of the American Society on Aging in Chicago, March 24, 2015, with Jim Gilmartin, principal at Coming of Age, Mick used the Midwest findings of the "Risky Business" report to assess effective strategies for marketing these findings to older adults.