WESTPORT — Tony McDowell, executive director of Earthplace since 2013, will step down from the post at the end of this year, according to a statement from the environmental and education center.

McDowell, a longtime Westport resident who led the Woodside Lane organization through a period of “significant growth and development,” the Earthplace statement said, will transition into a volunteer role on the Earthplace Capital Campaign Committee.

Earthplace’s board of directors is searching for a new executive director, led by a committee chaired by Alison James. The transition period is designed to allow McDowell to work with his replacement to facilitate a smooth handover.

During McDowell’s tenure as executive director, “Earthplace has experienced tremendous growth, both in financial health and programming, and we’re confident that the transition will be seamless,” Mo Tooker, the board chair, said in the statement.

“I am proud of all we’ve accomplished …,” McDowell said. “I look forward to supporting the organization’s next chapter, focusing on the capital projects and fundraising that will help us continue to thrive.”

He will be focusing on fundraising and donor stewardship, as well as program and exhibit development for a new environmental science center.

Before taking the Earthplace leadership role, McDowell had a 30-year career in marketing and business management for companies in the paper and forest products industry, according to biographical information on the center’s website.

He also was a founding board member of the Stepping Stones Museum for Children, president of the board of the Child Guidance Center of Southern Connecticut and member of the board of the Northeast Community Church and the American Institute of Graphic Arts.

McDowell’s record at Earthplace includes:

• Full-time preschool and summer camp programs for children 6 months to 5 years old.

• Growth in nature-based school programs, including more than 4,000 urban youth from Norwalk and Bridgeport.

• Harbor Watch environmental scientists have expanded water-quality monitoring from Stamford to Milford, and lead the Long Island Sound Pathogen Monitoring Network utilizing the Earthplace testing lab.

• Facility upgrades include a new amphitheater, Harbor Watch lab and research vessel, pond teaching platform and interpretive signs for visitors to the center’s 84 acres of trails.

• Assembling an “exceptionally skilled and dedicated teaching staff and management team.

• Earthplace’s operating revenue has more than doubled in the last decade, and cash reserves have more than quadrupled during the same period, the organization said.