Prior to graduating from the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies with an MEM focused on sustainable finance, clean energy and business, Franz served eight years in the Obama Administration. He has been working at the intersection of policy, climate change, environmental and social issues for more than a decade. Franz served as Senior Advisor to the Special Envoy for Climate Change at the U.S. Department of State, working on the team that successfully negotiated the Paris Agreement. Prior to that, he was Deputy Associate Director at the White House Council of Environmental Quality working on energy, environment and climate policy and public engagement; and a Confidential Assistant and Legislative Analyst at the U.S. Department of Agriculture working on conservation, energy, food security, science policy and open data. He also worked on both of Barack Obama’s successful presidential campaigns in 2008 and 2012. Franz holds a Bachelor of Arts in Linguistics and a Bachelor of Arts in Politics from the University of California, Santa Cruz.