Team,

At Apple, we’ve dedicated ourselves to leaving the world better than we found it. And we are making real progress. I am proud and inspired when I see how our products and our people are improving lives around the world. This is what happens when we focus on putting our core values front and center in our products and operations.

Today, Apple is an industry leader in renewable energy, elimination of toxics and protecting working forests. As you know, Lisa Jackson joined us two years ago and we could not have come this far without her leadership on environmental initiatives across our company.

There’s much more to do, not just on the environment, but on other issues we value such as human rights, education, and accessibility of our products to those with physical or developmental challenges. Apple can and will play an important role in each of these areas. Already, we are actively working with 114 schools in the U.S. through our ConnectED program. We are putting more accessibility tools in the hands of our wonderful app developers. And we have made our voice heard on public policy issues that affect us including clean energy and equality. These issues are critical not only to us, but to our customers, our shareholders, and in the communities where we all live and work.

So I’ve asked Lisa to lead our work in these areas and to take on a broader role as vice president of Environment, Policy and Social Initiatives. Lisa will apply her passion and her unique skill set to integrate teams across Apple and make our impact even greater. As part of her new role, Lisa will also take over management of our worldwide Government Affairs function. Lisa already interacts regularly with governments around the world so she is a natural for this new role leading our public policy teams.

You can expect to see us create even more innovative programs which drive progress on these issues and others we care about most deeply.

Lisa will be the first to tell you, we have a long way to go and a lot to learn. But, like to many things at Apple, great challenges inspire us to work harder and aim higher.

Please join me in congratulating Lisa on her new role.

Tim