Team

Sarah has a first class joint honours degree in Zoology and Marine Zoology from the University College of North Wales (UK), and an MSc in Conservation Studies from University College London (UK). Since then, Sarah has been employed for over 45 years as a marine biodiversity conservation expert. During this time, she has worked in various capacities for several government departments, national and international NGOs, and biodiversity consultancies.

Sarah’s interest in sharks and rays began in childhood, with sightings of feeding Basking sharks and bycatch of Tope shark and skates while fishing in the summer holidays. She was appointed to the IUCN Species Survival Commission’s Shark Specialist Group (SSG) upon its establishment in 1990, chaired the SSG for many years, and is its longest-serving member. Sarah led the first IUCN global Red List assessment for the chondrichthyan fishes (1996–2011), and compiled IUCN’s first global Status Report for Sharks, Rays and Chimaeras (2005). She is also an editor of the second global Status Report, published almost 20 years later in 2024.

Sarah also founded the European Elasmobranch Association in 1996 and its UK member, the Shark Trust, in 1997, and is still an advisor to the former and a member of the Board of Trustees of the latter. She became a scientific advisor to the Save Our Seas Foundation in 2011, and is also an advisor to Mar Alliance, the MantaTrust, and the Shark Conservation Fund.

Sarah was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to marine conservation in 2004, and a Pew Fellow in Marine Conservation in 2005.