When Jerry Masters talks about the Salish Sea, it’s not just as a place on a map — it’s home.
Raised on a Skagit Valley dairy farm near the Swinomish Channel and the Swinomish Reservation, Masters grew up where the land meets the tide, in a place shaped by salmon, sediment, and saltwater. His great-grandfather helped build the dikes on Fir Island to create farmland at the river’s mouth.
“This region gave me so much growing up,” he says. “It’s only right to give something back that helps protect it for the generations ahead.”
Now, after a long career in business and many years dedicated to public service, Masters is giving back in a transformational way: with a $500,000 gift to establish the Endowed Salish Sea Studies Professorship at Western Washington University. Once matched to reach $1 million, the endowment will permanently support a faculty leader who brings Indigenous knowledge, teaching excellence, and leadership to the Salish Sea Institute.
Funding the endowed professorship is not a solitary effort, but as a shared endeavor—a catalyst for connecting academic research with community-based stewardship. It will support classroom instruction and real-world collaboration, particularly with Coast Salish Tribes and First Nations, on urgent transborder issues such as habitat restoration, ocean health, and climate resilience.
“We want this to be a group project—something the community can be part of,” Masters says.
Since its founding in 2017, Western’s Salish Sea Institute has emerged as a leading hub for transboundary collaboration, advancing science, policy, and community engagement across the Salish Sea region. Through acclaimed publications, webinars, workshops, and transformative fellowships, the institute has built a solid foundation on and off campus.
In 2019, the institute created a minor in Salish Sea Studies, offering students an opportunity to develop a sense of place and a sense of responsibility for where they live. The place-based, experiential, and multidisciplinary curriculum introduces students to the complex human-environment systems of our shared region.
Masters’ path to this moment spans both the private and public sectors. After executive roles at Masco Corporation and The Home Depot, he led and helped to grow Valley Supply Company, a construction material supplier in the Pacific Northwest. There, he walked his environmental talk, installing what was then Snohomish County’s largest commercial solar array at the business headquarters in Woodinville and driving an early model Nissan Leaf for business and personal travel. He and his partner, Cyndy Clegg, are currently building a carbon net-zero home in Edmonds.
His parallel journey in conservation included serving on the Northwest Straits Commission and leading the board of the nonprofit Northwest Straits Foundation.
“You’ve got to be stewards,” he says. “This is a little bit of penance for my younger days — and a recognition that we’re part of 150 years of development in a place that looked very different just a few centuries ago.
“We’ll never get back to where we were before,” he says. “But maybe someone in this new role can help us retain a sense of who we are, what we want to be — and remind us that there are some things that shouldn’t change.”
To Masters, Western is uniquely suited to lead. While other institutions around the Salish Sea have staked out distinct territories, he sees Western — both in mission and in geography — as positioned to bring people together.
“This is a cultural issue, not just a policy one. No single government or institution connects all the dots. But education can.”
“There’s nobody else who’s really asking, ‘How do we all live together? How do we incorporate Indigenous knowledge into this work?’ Western is trying to plow ground that others aren’t — and that’s exactly what we need.”
That includes threading connections across borders, cultures, governments, and ecosystems. “This is a cultural issue, not just a policy one,” he says. “No single government or institution connects all the dots. But education can.”
The new professorship will be more than a teaching role — it will be an anchor.
As a result of Masters’ gift, the Salish Sea Institute is taking a bold step: establishing a Salish Sea Studies Professorship and Leadership Position.
This endowed position will:
“Jerry’s generosity is truly amazing,” says Ginny Broadhurst, director of the Salish Sea Institute. “This gift, once it’s matched, will allow the institute to take a huge step forward, centering Indigenous knowledge in our work on and off campus.”
“We’re excited at the possibility of bringing a scholar with Coast Salish expertise into the institute, in a leadership role,” she adds. “Philanthropy is critical to make this happen.”
The faculty leader will guide curriculum, mentor students, and shape cross-disciplinary, cross-cultural, and transborder work that centers Coast Salish values and knowledge systems. By securing funding in perpetuity, the gift reduces the budget burden and allows Western to focus on mission and momentum.
The Salish Sea Institute is already popular with students, drawing them to its courses and minor. The endowed professorship will allow those opportunities to grow. “We need to make it easier for them,” says Masters. “We need to make sure there’s a faculty member who can carry that forward without worrying about how to fund it year after year.”
For Masters, this isn’t a solo legacy — it’s a call to collaboration. He hopes others will join in supporting the endowment, seeing it not just as a gift to an institution, but an investment in a shared future.
Salish Sea photos by Luke Hollister
