Cara Schulte

Cara Schulte

Cara Schulte is a researcher at Climate Rights International, where she leads the organization’s work at the intersection of climate impacts, health, and human rights. She is also a postdoctoral research associate at UC Berkeley; a contributing scholar with the Sabin Center’s Global Network on Climate Litigation at Columbia University; and a NextGen Scholar with The Lancet Regional Health – Europe Commission on Climate, Migration, and Health.

Cara earned her doctorate in public health from UC Berkeley, where her research focused on perinatal vulnerability to climate change and extreme heat in low- and middle-income countries. During her doctoral training, she received several fellowships, including from UC Berkeley School of Law’s Human Rights Center, the Institute for South Asian Studies, the Mayhew Derryberry Fund, and the Bixby Center for Population, Health, and Sustainability. She also conducted research as a member of the Global Environmental Health Equity Lab, served as a research assistant to the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Climate Change and Human Rights, and taught courses in environmental health science and global health ethics.

Before pursuing her doctorate, Cara earned a BA and an MHS from Johns Hopkins University and spent five years at Human Rights Watch, where she worked on a range of environmental justice issues.

Cara is a member of the Delta Omega Honorary Society in Public Health and a 2026 recipient of the Bay Area Physicians for Social Responsibility Emerging Health-Activist Award. Her work has been cited in The New York Times, the Associated Press, The Guardian, and Carbon Brief, among other outlets.