Dr Megan Ross is the president and CEO of Lincoln Park Zoo, where she oversees all strategic, operational, financial, and programmatic initiatives. She joined the zoo from Zoo Atlanta in 2000 and during her two decades with the institution, she has served as curator of birds, general curator, vice president of animal care, and executive vice president.
Ross became zoo director in 2018 and took on her current role at the start of 2022. She is the first woman to run Lincoln Park Zoo and only the eighth head of the institution in its 153 years. She has won grants from the Conservation Endowment Fund at AZA (the Association of Zoos and Aquariums) for her population management work and is part of the team behind ZooMonitor, a behavioural monitoring app that is used by over 300 zoos across the globe.
Ross is also widely regarded as an expert on zoo ethics and has served as chair of AZA’s ethics board. She is interested in topics such as how zoos can provide optimal care and encourage positive welfare for animals in their care, how zoos are responsibly sustaining animal populations, and how individuals can connect with wildlife in zoos while still giving animals the space and social structures they need to thrive.
These questions of sustainability, conservation, and ethics drive her leadership strategies as she works to evolve Lincoln Park Zoo as a leader within the global zoo and aquarium community.
Speaking to blooloop about Lincoln Park Zoo in 2022, Ross said: “The zoo’s mission is to connect people with nature,” says Ross. “Our tagline is ‘For wildlife. For all’, which encompasses who we are and what we stand for.
“Our vision is concerned with where we’re going, and how we can, in this urbanizing world, really connect communities with the nature around them, making sure that not just animals and nature thrive, but that the people thrive as well. We are really interested in figuring out how to make sure that communities of the future can thrive and flourish.”