Alison E. Crawford | Marine Biological Laboratory

Chief of Staff and Secretary to the Board of Trustees

Female presenting person with short blond hair standing in front of the water.

Alison Crawford serves as Chief of Staff & Secretary to the Board of Trustees at the Marine Biological Laboratory (MBL) in Woods Hole, Massachusetts. In this role, she is a senior advisor and trusted partner to the Director and to MBL's top leadership team, helping set the agenda and priorities for the executive team and tracking progress on institutional initiatives. She leads special projects on the Director's behalf and helps guide alignment of vision, strategy, and execution across MBL's programmatic leaders and administrative managers.

Alison oversees MBL’s governance and Board Secretary functions and filings including the preparation, distribution, and record-keeping of Board and Board Committee meeting materials, resolution log, bylaws, and trustee rosters. Alison is MBL’s liaison with outside counsel on governance and other organizational legal matters. She helps to ensure alignment of Board governance with the institution's mission and strategic plan.

Before joining the MBL, Alison spent seven years at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Washington, D.C. in executive support roles for the Editor-in-Chief of Science and as the inaugural managing digital producer for the Science family of journals. Prior to AAAS, Alison served in executive administrative roles at the Regulatory Affairs Professionals Society, and the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum, where she built a strong foundation in governance, strategic planning, organizational alignment, and philanthropic engagement.

Alison holds a Master of Science in Nonprofit and Association Management from the University of Maryland University College and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Merrimack College.