2019 Bright Award Winner
Aisha Khan, winner of the 2019 Stanford Bright Award, combats climate change while promoting economic resilience in the high-altitude mountain regions of Pakistan. In 2001, Aisha Khan took her first trekking trip in northern Pakistan’s Karakoram range, the grand, glacier-filled home of K2, the second-highest mountain in the world. While on her trek, Khan saw that tourism in the area had produced a shocking amount of pollution – and she was determined to do something about it.

About the Bright Award
The Bright Award was created by a gift from Raymond E. Bright, Jr., JD ’59 in 2007 on behalf of his late wife, Marcelle, and himself. Mr. Bright died in 2011. Under the terms of his gift, the Bright Award is given annually to an “individual who has made significant contributions in the environmental preservation and sustainability area” and is awarded to an individual from one of ten rotating regions. The regions the winners have been chosen from since the award’s inception are: the Middle East; West Asia; Africa; Europe; South America; and North America.