UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. -- Joel N. Myers will speak at 4 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 26, in 22 Deike Building on “Transforming the Weather Enterprise.” His talk is free and open to the public. A reception will follow.
Myers earned his bachelor of science, master of science and doctorate in meteorology from Penn State and taught meteorology for 21 years at Penn State, 17 of those years as a faculty member. After retiring from the faculty, he served as a Penn State Board of Trustees member for 33 years and continues on the board as a trustee emeritus.
Myers – a foremost pioneer in meteorological business applications – will outline accelerating changes in this extraordinary age of transformative innovation and projects, and describe what these changes will mean for us personally and in the weather enterprise across academic and research, weather industry and government sectors. He gave a similar speech as a keynote at the 2015 American Meteorological Society’s Annual Meeting in Phoenix.
"We are on the threshold of a time of accelerated change, presenting opportunities for transformative innovations. If we identify and effectively address them, they will enable us to make forecasts even more accurate, localized, forward-looking and relevant," Myers said.
Myers has been recognized by Entrepreneur magazine as one of the greatest entrepreneurs in American history. He founded AccuWeather in 1962 and successfully established and guided the company as the largest and fastest growing weather media company in the world. AccuWeather, with global headquarters in State College, now reaches more than 1 billion people worldwide every day through smartphones, tablets, wired and mobile Internet sites. AccuWeather also serves 1,700 radio, television and newspapers, in addition to 245 of the Fortune 500 companies and thousands more.
Myers is considered the nation’s most respected source on the business of meteorology, having been named “the most accurate man in weather” by The New York Times. He has frequently appeared on national television programs such as “ABC Nightly News” and “Larry King Live,” written articles that have appeared in leading publications including Scientific American and the Journal of Applied Meteorology, and has been quoted in Time, Businessweek and thousands of other publications. He has received many awards in the meteorological community, including recognition as a Fellow of the American Meteorological Society.
Myers donates his time and resources and is committed to giving back, including a generous gift for the Joel N. Myers Weather Center at Penn State, a state-of-the-art teaching facility, the weather vane atop Beaver Stadium and sundials honoring the Department of Meteorology, which are located at The Nittany Lion Inn and The Arboretum at Penn State.