Storyteller grounded in data and context

I use writing and visual media to tell stories at the intersection of data analysis and political ecology. My work helps mission-driven organizations make informed decisions and anchor projects in context, evidence, and community experience. By grounding stories in data, I craft narratives that are strategic, meaningful, and responsibly framed.

Read more about me here

Resumé, Biography, Artist Statement

Author of research proposals and analytical reports

I write reports that draw on both qualitative and quantitative data and are informed by social-ecological systems thinking. My work translates complex evidence into clear, persuasive narratives that support strategic planning, communications campaigns, funding decisions, and equitable policy outcomes. Across climate resilience, international development, and nonprofit contexts, I focus on clarity, rigor, and real-world applicability.

Review my research reports here

Bound to the Profit Motive, Thriving Communities Grantmaking Program

  • An aerial view of a landscape with mountains, forests, and patchwork fields in shades of green, yellow, and brown.

    BOUND TO THE PROFIT MOTIVE:

    The Globalization and Commodification of Costa Rica’s Payment for Environmental Services (PES) Programs

    report
  • Book cover titled 'The Collaborative Nonprofit: Polycentric Governance & Cross-Sector Coproductions' by Malcolm Wyer, featuring a network diagram with interconnected nodes and lines on a light background.

    THE COLLABORATIVE NONPROFIT:

    Transformative Governance and Co-production Management

    report
  • Map of Indonesia with text overlay highlighting NGADA WATER ASSOCIATION and a solar-powered water pump system in Kampung Watu, Magilewa & Jere, Flores, Indonesia.

    NGADA WATER ASSOCIATION with GLOBAL WATER 501(c)3

    Solar-Powered Water Pump System Kampung Watu, Maghilewa, & Jere, Flores, NTT, Indonesia

    report
  • A black-and-white mural depicting themes of social injustice, environmental destruction, and political protest. It features figures with expressive faces, a person with a megaphone, industrial factories emitting smoke, an eye in the sky, scales of justice, and damaged buildings, illustrating chaos and societal issues.

    THE THRIVING COMMUNITIES GRANTMAKING PROGRAM (TCGP) LAID TO REST

    Lessons from a Short-Lived Experiment in Environmental Justice Governance

    report
  • X-ray image of a rabbit with highlighted seeds coated with neonicotinoid insecticides in its stomach. Overlayed text discusses bird toxicity from ingesting these seeds, mentioning neurotoxicity, altered metabolism, endocrine disruption, and immunotoxicology.

    TARGETING NEONICOTINOID-COATED SEEDS FOR BIRD CONSERVATION

    report
  • Diagram showing Bali's landscape features: mountains at the top, plains in the middle, and the sea at the bottom, with labels in Balinese and English.

    THE CULTURAL LANDSCAPE OF BALI PROVINCE:

    UNESCO and Strategies of Resilience

    report
  • A poster about community-supported contamination remediation on the Housatonic River. It features a panoramic landscape at the top, a map of the Housatonic River in a blue shaded area on the left, three black-and-white portrait photographs of individuals in the middle, and text that reads 'Reconfiguring the Framework for PCB Remediation on the Housatonic River' at the bottom.

    COMMUNITY SUPPORTED CONTAMINATION

    Reconfiguring the Framework for PCB Remediation on the Housatonic River

    report

Consultant for organizational decision-making

I work with business and nonprofit leaders to improve organizational efficiency and strengthen decision-making. Rather than viewing governance as a choice between top-down command and bottom-up collaboration, I see it as a layered and hybrid process that balances vertical efficiency with horizontal inclusion. Combining assessment surveys, collaborative facilitation, and multimedia deliverables, I help organizations refine how decisions are made in practice — clarifying roles, improving information flow, and cultivating habits of alignment.

To schedule a consultation, contact me here

malcolm.wyer@gmail.com

  • Policy and Learning Processes. It shows a grid with 'Spatial level' on the y-axis from local to national, and 'Phase' on the x-axis with three stages: strategic goal setting and policy formulation, developing operational goals and measures, and implementation and monitoring. The diagram includes white and black squares indicating action situations, with large squares indicating a set of action situations and links showing the flow between phases. Text explains the importance of vertical integration and multi-level processes in policy development.

    Policy and Learning Processes

  • Participatory Design Model

    Participatory Design Models

  • A text-based infographic explaining the concept of verticals in a studio organization, divided into three sections: Vertical by Function, Vertical by Sector, and Hybrid Vertical. Each section describes the purpose, typical verticals, possible roles, and benefits.

    Increasing Efficiency with Verticals

  • Flowchart illustrating the Open Training Network. It includes components like open schools, businesses, and organizations with various programs such as superintendent forum, Baldwin White Hills School District, Bike PGH, homeless children's education fund, yoga training with organizations like Office of Vocational Rehabilitation and Edith L. Trees Charitable Trust, open yogis visiting teacher program with different yoga groups, yoga teacher professional internship, and others. The chart also shows partnerships, sponsors, and funding sources.

    Organizational Flowcharts

  • Organizational chart with concentric circles showing roles like intern, designer, senior & associate, director, principal, office manager, and external stakeholders like PR & Media, Communications, & Outreach, Personnel & Finance, Standards & Processes. Connected staff include Nick, Claire, Emily, and Dave, with various responsibilities and communication lines.

    Shared Authorship/ Systems Models

  • A detailed organizational chart for the Environmental Justice Thriving Community Grantmaking Program, including connections to various acts, agencies, grant components, and technical assistance centers, with color-coded sections and partner details.

    Understanding Accountability & Oversight

  • Diagram of a nested governing council within an adaptive co-management network related to sustainability, showing interactions among social pressures, ecological disturbances, health resources, financial grants, technical assistance, and sustainability institutes, with labels highlighting targeted responses and partnerships.

    Adaptive Co-Management Networks

  • A pyramid illustrating nonprofit responsibilities, from bottom to top: mission to make a positive social impact, lawfulness to follow the law, accountability to be transparent and efficient, ethics to respect community norms, citizenship to advance the collective movement, and leadership to model innovative practices.

    Pyramid of Nonprofit Responsibility

  • A collage of six photographs from a third tax meeting, showing diverse people in discussion and listening, with subtitles about leadership, payment, language, financial needs, and fairness for coastal residents.

    Designing A Well-Aligned Pivot

  • World map showing countries with REDD+ projects in orange and REDD+ supporters in purple, highlighting efforts to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation.

    Nested Co-Governance

  • Ethical Storytelling

  • Flowchart diagram of community-supported contamination organization. It shows the hierarchy and working groups under various units like Program, Finance, Monitoring, and Legal at the community coalition, supported by consultants and supervisors.

    Polycentric Working Groups

  • A map showing environmental and community projects in Berkshire, with photos and names of individuals involved, categorized into sections such as Green Technology, Dredging Infrastructure, Industrial Structures, Industrial Woodlands, River Ecology, Riverside Conservation, Commuter Railroad, and Toxic Landfill.

    Stakeholder Analysis

  • Diagram of transformative governance with categories of participatory governance and adaptive governance, including components such as public participation, participatory design, equity, adaptive co-management, resilience theory, and environmental management, within social and ecological spheres.

    Integrating Social and Ecological Governance Models

  • Mind mapping

  • Testing Assumptions

  • Coordinating Collective Impact Networks

  • Website As Public-Facing Corpus

  • Financial Flow Diagram

  • Story Collection Management

  • Affinity Mapping

Mapmaker with a focus on scale

Biological and cultural actors perform very differently across community, regional, and territorial scales. Through geospatial mapping, I strive to describe landscapes as layered networks of social, ecological, and economic relationships. I use maps as measured, investigative tools to make complex systems more visible—and more actionable.

Explore my mapping videos here

Metabolic Borneo, Housatonic River Stewards

  • Map showing geographic and climate data of the Mid-Atlantic region including Baltimore, Washington D.C., Harrisburg, Wilmington, and Philadelphia with areas marked in various colors representing exposure levels, habitat loss, and toxic waste sites.

    Mid-Atlantic Exposure & Habitat Loss

  • A geospatial land use map of Rancho Garza, depicting Guanacaste and Alajuela Provinces of Costa Rica as well as Lake Nicargua.

    Land Use in Northwestern Costa Rica.

  • Map of a Ngada Bajawa region of Flores, Indonesia, including, Aimere, Bajawa, Gunung Inerie, Watu, Maghilewa, Jere.

    The Ngada People, Flores, Indonesia.

  • Four aerial images of a mountainous or hilly terrain with changing color schemes: gray, blue, black and green, showing variations in elevation, terrain features, and vegetation.

    Timelapse of Mountaintop Removal Mining (MTR) in Beckley, WV

  • Topographical map of a region with elevation shading, water features, and various geological details, including lakes, rivers, and mountain ranges surrounding Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

    California's Central Coast

  • Map of northern Mesoamerica showing lights from urban areas and transportation networks, including Mexico City, Mérida, Cancún, Oaxaca, and Guatemala, with the Pacific Ocean and the Yucatán Peninsula.

    Mesoamerica norte

  • EPA Region 5 Environmental Burdens

  • Topographical map of Chumash, California, showing geological features, boundaries, protected ecosystems, and marine sanctuary areas.

    Vandenberg Air Force Base

  • Maps of Baltimore showing various urban disadvantages, including language isolation, wastewater issues, coastal flood risk, traffic, health burden, energy and health burdens, job training, unemployment, and overlapping disadvantages.

    Justice40 in Baltimore

  • FEMA Flood Zone in Great Barrington, MA

  • Map of the Ensenada region showing various research centers, wildlife areas, and geographic features in California and Mexico, with color-coded regions and labeled locations such as Audubon California Starr Ranch Sanctuary, Centro de Investigación en Alimentación y Desarrollo, Navopatia Field Station, and WILDCOAST/COSTALAVAGE.

    Sonoran Joint Venture

  • Rising Pond Intervention proposal by Malcolm Wyer in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, showing PCB waste landscape and river bypass design.

    Rising Pond PCB Cleanup

  • Priority Conservation Areas (PCAs)

  • Map of Borneo showing flatlands and floodplains with various colored areas indicating floodplain regions.

    Peatlands in Borneo

  • A colorful illustration of a green and yellow great green macaw with pink on its face, showing its wings spread wide. Next to it, a map of Central America highlights regions where the species is found, marked with red. Additional maps depict its habitat in tropical and subtropical moist broadleaf forests in green, four management zones in pink, yellow, blue, and orange based on conservation zones, respectively.

    Great Green Macaw Management Zones

  • An illustration of five layers representing different landscapes, including snow-capped mountains, lakes and forests, urban areas, farmland, and desert terrain, arranged from top to bottom against a black background.

    Axonometric Diagramming

  • Nueces County, TX

  • Deciphering Forerst Data

  • Measuring Emissions

  • Connecting Conservation

  • Mapping Migrations

Advocate for sustainable agriculture

My work is grounded in long-term engagement with communities and institutions across the Global South, where environmental vulnerability intersects with histories of colonialism and extraction. I believe that sustainable agriculture practices—like agroforestry, Integrated Pest Management (IPM,) farmer collectives, and soil health technologies—must be linked directly to smallholder profit, advanced by remaking value chains through government and private investment in sustainable production.

Review my project reports here

Bound to the Profit Motive, The Ngada Water Association

  • Infographic titled 'NAMA Climate-Smart Livestock Practices' showing a layered farm landscape with trees, livestock, and various farm activities, along with text describing practices such as financial incentives, training, silvopastoral systems, and integrated tree species for sustainable livestock management.

    Climate-Smart Production

  • Map showing Costa Rica in 2010 with forest cover in purple and PSA project locations marked with orange dots. The map includes a legend, scale bar, and a highlighted text box noting that about 20% of Costa Rica's territory, or 1 million hectares, received PSA funding.

    Payments for Environmental Services (PES)

  • Wildlife Corridors

  • Diagram showing the installation of solar panels, water pumps, and water tanks in a village, with a line graph illustrating distance between the locations.

    Solar-Powered Irrigation Pumps

  • Infographic titled 'The Cattle Grazing Carbon Cycle' showing how extensive, low-investment cattle grazing affects carbon emissions and sequestration. It includes illustrations of cattle internal digestion, soil and plant processes, and labels indicating methane emissions, carbon dioxide sequestration by plants, and the impact of grazing on soil porosity and biodiversity.

    Limiting Extensive Agriculture

  • Sustainable Cattle Grazing

  • Person wearing gardening gloves harvesting broccoli from a garden with leafy green plants.

    Labor Collectives

  • A person holding a chainsaw near a tree trunk surrounded by green foliage.

    Living Fences

  • Coordinated Irrigation Schedules

  • A man wearing a blue, red, and white sports jersey with various sponsor logos, including 'Costa Rica' and 'KCRL', standing outdoors in front of a rural background with trees, cows, and a barn, framed by a wooden border with a yellow plaque reading '2025'.

    Agroforestry

  • A person using a shovel to dig a hole in the ground amidst leaves and grass, wearing muddy boots.

    Ranch Work

  • Chart showing the increase in applied weights of various anti-malarial drugs from 1984 to 2011 and the crop yields of wheat and oilseed rape from 1984 to 2011.

    Integrated Pest Management (IPM)

  • World map showing REDD+ projects in orange and REDD+ supporters in purple across various countries, including Brazil, Indonesia, and some African and Asian nations. Text explains REDD+ as a mechanism to create incentives for developing countries to protect and manage forest resources, involving financial value for carbon stored in trees, with developed countries paying developing countries for their standing forests.

    Forest Transition Curves

  • Palm Oil Plantations in Borneo

Let’s talk

I’m eager to contribute my energy, perspective, and craft to meaningful, mission-driven collaboration.

Contact me

malcolm.wyer@gmail.com