Ellen Kappel received her bachelor of arts degree in geology from Cornell University and her Ph.D in marine geology and geophysics from Columbia University. After pursuing post-doctoral research at Columbia's Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, she joined Joint Oceanographic Institutions (JOI). Over the next 12 years, Ellen managed day-to-day operations of the international Ocean Drilling Program (ODP), directed the JOI/U.S. Science Support Program (USSSP) and was the principal investigator of several other geoscience programs. In addition to managing these programs, Ellen wrote much of the content for two multimedia educational CD-ROMs, "Ocean Drilling Program: From Mountains to Monsoons," and "Ocean Drilling Program: From Gateways to Glaciation." Ellen also compiled and edited "ODP'S Greatest Hits," a compendium of scientific abstracts written by researchers for the layperson. While at JOI she also edited the "JOI/USSAC Newsletter" and numerous reports and plans written by the geoscience community. Ellen's interest in promoting the geosciences through various media, including written reports and booklets, CD-ROMs and the World Wide Web inspired her to establish Geosciences Professional Services, Inc.