Climate Resilient Fisheries Postdoctoral Research Associate (FishSCORE2030)

Description

Title: Climate Resilient Fisheries Postdoctoral Research Associate (FishSCORE2030)

Supervisors: Dr. Kathy Mills (GMRI), Dr. Jacob Eurich (EDF)

Starting Salary Range: $68,000-$72,000

Overview:

The Gulf of Maine Research Institute (GMRI) develops and delivers collaborative solutions to global ocean challenges. We are dedicated to the resilience of the Gulf of Maine ecosystem and the communities that depend on it. To learn more, visit gmri.org.

Position Description:

GMRI is seeking a full-time Postdoctoral Research Associate to lead and collaborate on research that helps marine fisheries move from planning for climate resilience into implementation. The position is associated with a new project co-led by GMRI and Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) under the FishSCORE2030 Ocean Decade program. The successful candidate will have strong interdisciplinary expertise and will contribute across three primary objectives: i) synthesizing climate resilience principles, ii) assessing how fisheries management systems are addressing climate change, and iii) developing a practical planning-to-implementation framework. The successful candidate will take a leading role in building the project’s comparative evidence base through interviews, workshops, and sustained engagement with fisheries managers, scientists, and rights holders.

The project works across diverse fishery management systems – from small-scale, co-managed fisheries to transboundary, quota-managed fisheries – drawing on the FishSCORE2030 Network. The successful candidate will design and carry out targeted interviews across these contexts, synthesize findings into a comparative evidence base, help convene a workshop, iteratively hone a set of climate resilience principles and characterize their role in implementation efforts, contribute to the design and testing of the planning-to-implementation framework, and support potential pilot application of the framework in specific fisheries. The role also offers scope to develop independent research within climate adaptation and resilience topics in marine fisheries.

The successful candidate will have an interdisciplinary background related to marine fisheries, with social science expertise. The candidate should have experience conducting research in coupled social-ecological systems using qualitative social research methods and analytical approaches that are grounded in relevant theoretical frameworks. The role includes community-engaged research with fishery participants, managers, and community leaders. Strong collaboration skills are essential, as our projects are highly interdisciplinary and often implemented with industry, management, and policy partners.

The position is based in the Integrated Systems Ecology Lab at GMRI, led by Dr. Kathy Mills, in close collaboration with EDF’s Ocean Science team, including co-supervision by Dr. Jacob Eurich. This full-time position is based in Portland, ME, and is funded for two years. The position may be extended beyond this period contingent upon satisfactory performance and success in securing grant support to continue funding.

Responsibilities/Tasks:

• Design and conduct research to understand how fisheries management systems are planning for and implementing responses to climate change, and the enabling conditions, barriers, and pathways that shape those efforts.
• Lead the design, implementation, analysis, and interpretation of qualitative research, including targeted interviews with managers, scientists, and rights holders across contrasting fishery systems.
• Build partnerships, facilitate communication, and engage diverse groups in research activities.
• Collaborate with FishSCORE2030 working groups and broader network to integrate insights, identify focal fisheries, and help plan and facilitate a regional workshop and multi-stakeholder review sessions.
• Contribute to the development, validation, and trialing of the planning-to-implementation framework, synthesizing principles, pathways, and evidence into practical guidance for fisheries managers.
• Communicate research results through peer-reviewed manuscripts, conference presentations for scientific and practitioner audiences, public-facing policy documents, and speaking engagements.
• Contribute to (and potentially lead) competitive grant proposals.
• Participate in working groups and research networks related to climate adaptation in fisheries as relevant opportunities arise.
• Participate in lab and GMRI/EDF staff meetings and other activities, including peer groups and mentorship roles.

Requirements

Required Qualifications:

• Ph.D. in a marine social science discipline (e.g., anthropology, sociology, political science, or interdisciplinary program with strong social science training)
• Strong background and familiarity with literature and theories associated with climate adaptation and resilience
• Experience designing and conducting qualitative social science research, including IRB protocols
• Experience coding, analyzing, synthesizing, interpreting, and presenting qualitative social science data
• Experience in marine fisheries and understanding of a range of fishery management structures and contexts
• Demonstrated ability to work independently and collaboratively
• Ability to establish and maintain relationships with relevant stakeholders and partners
• Strong written and oral communication skills, as evidenced through publications in the peer-reviewed scientific literature and presentations to a variety of audiences
• Ability and willingness to travel for fieldwork, meetings, workshops, conferences, and other purposes as needed
• Ability to manage multiple tasks, timelines, and partnerships effectively
• Fluent in English
• Eligible to work in the United States. Visa sponsorship is not available for this role

Preferred Qualifications:

• Experience working across natural and social science disciplines
• Experience and expertise related to quantitative data collection and analyses in social sciences
• Ability to analyze, interpret, and communicate results from ecological and fisheries data
• Understanding of fisheries science, stock assessment, and management processes
• Experience engaging directly with resource users, community leaders, tribal entities, or other groups relevant to research topics
• Experience working across research-to-practice pipeline
• Experience working with transdisciplinary research teams
• Experience organizing workshops
• Experience managing projects, including administrative responsibilities
• Experience contributing to the development and writing of grant proposals.
• Ability to work in a statistical computing environment (e.g., R)
• Fluency in a language other than English

Diversity and Inclusion:

The Gulf of Maine Research Institute (GMRI) has a long-standing policy and commitment to providing equal access and equal employment opportunities in all terms, conditions, processes, and benefits of employment without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, family status, veteran status, or any other classification protected by law. GMRI's employment decisions are made without regard to race, color, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity, national origin, age, disability, genetic information, family status, veteran status, or any other classification protected by law.

Applicants and employees are encouraged to voluntarily provide certain status data to assist GMRI in fulfilling various reporting requirements of the federal government. This self-identification is completely voluntary, will be kept confidential and separate from your application data, and used only to meet certain state or federal reporting requirements. Providing or declining to provide this information will not result in adverse action of any kind.

Salary and Benefits:

GMRI offers a competitive salary and benefits package.

Application Instructions:

All applications must be accompanied by a cover letter, CV/résumé, and a list of three professional references with their contact information. Review of applications will begin immediately and will continue until the successful candidate has been selected. The deadline to submit applications is October 9, 2026.