Earth Week Speaker Biographies
Thanks to everyone who is participating this year! (More information will be available as it becomes available.)
Dan Albert, Associate ASLA, LEED AP, Civesca LLC
Dan Albert, Associate ASLA, LEED AP, is a landscape designer and graphic specialist with Civesca LLC in Seattle. His design philosophy revolves around creating places that value culture, celebrate ecology, and sustain economic prosperity. Dan was a member of the team that developed the conceptual project Eco-laboratory, which won first place in the USGBC 2008 Natural Talent Design Competition. During his Master of Landscape Architecture study at the State University of New York – ESF, he developed Selling the Sustainable Aesthetic, an educational resource designed to positively shape the way people develop, understand, and interact with the built environment. An adapted version of this work was runner-up in the 2009 Next Generation Design Competition and was published in the May issue of Metropolis Magazine. Dan specializes in urban agriculture and vertical farming.
Design by Thinking - Dan's blog
César Arizmendi, Architectural consultant. Arizmendia EcoDesign
César Arizmendi is a talented green designer, innovator, author and founder of Arizmendi EcoDesign.
Arizmendia EcoDesign web site
Yoram Bauman, Economics Instructor, Author and Stand-Up Economist
Yoram Bauman performs at comedy clubs, colleges, and corporate events around the world as “the world’s first and only stand-up economist”. Yoram is the co-author of The Cartoon Introduction to Economics and the organizer of the humor session at the American Economic Association annual meeting. He has appeared in TIME Magazine, on PBS and NPR, and on YouTube, where his videos have over 800,000 hits.
Yoram lives in Seattle and appears regularly at the Comedy Underground as part of a political comedy benefit show called Non-Profit Comedy that has raised over $75,000 for local non-profits. He has a BA in mathematics from Reed College, a PhD in economics from the University of Washington, and spends his non-comedy hours teaching in the UW environmental studies program, researching the economics of climate change, and campaigning for environmental tax reform. In July 2011 he’s heading to Beijing for 5 months as a visiting scholar at UIBE’s Global Institute for Low Carbon Economy.
Stand-Up Economist web site
The Cartoon Introduction to Economics: Volume One: Microeconomics (Amazon.com)
Vera Chang, Bon Appétit Management Company
Vera Chang is West Coast Fellow for the Bon Appétit Management Company Foundation. A 2009 graduate from Carleton College, Vera changed campus culture through founding Food Truth, a student organization dedicated to raising awareness about the impacts of our food choices, as well as leading the college Dining Board's Social Responsibility Taskforce. Vera was also an intern with the California Food and Justice Coalition, completed a farm apprenticeship in Ecological Horticulture at the University of California Santa Cruz, and is certified in Permaculture Design. As West Coast Fellow, Vera travels to farms that supply food to Bon Appétit's kitchens to research their agricultural and labor practices. She is also working on a soon-to-be-released report on farmworker protections and health and safety issues. Vera sees the way we eat as a key social issue of our time, loves connecting with fellow young eaters and activists, and is dedicated to working towards a more sustainable and just food system.
Bon Appétit Management Company web site
Katherine Davies M.A., D.Phil., Core Faculty, Environment & Community and Associate Director, Center for Creative Change, Antioch University
Originally trained as a biochemist, Katherine Davies also holds a graduate degree in cultural anthropology and social transformation. Her interests include social change and social movements, sustainability, environmental health, social justice and public policy. She has more than 25 years of environmental experience as a program manager, consultant and senior government adviser in Canada and internationally. She has taught at the University of Toronto and the Queen's University.
She is a speaker at local, regional and national conferences, publishes in academic journals, newspapers and magazines and has received several awards for her work. Katherine received a B.Sc. from Sheffield University an M.A. from California Institute of Integral Studies and a Ph.D. from Somerville College, Oxford University.
Antioch Seattle's Environment and Community web site
Andrea Gargas, Director, Symbiology, Inc.
Andrea Gargas received her PhD at Berkeley in December of 1993. After graduating,, she worked as a postdoc at the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC with Paula DePriest, where she was studying the systematics, chemotaxonomy, and molecular evolution of lichens, especially the Cladoniaceae of South America and Africa and molecular-genetic variation in natural populations.
In 1996 Andrea accepted a position as an associate professor of Mycology at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark, where she worked until December of 1998. From 1999 to 2007, Andrea was a professor of Botany at the University of Wisconsin in Madison. Currently she is the director of Symbiology, Inc. in Middletown, Wisconsin.
Symbiology, Inc. web site
Christina Gallegos, Board Co-Chair, Community Coalition for Environmental Justice
Christina has been instrumental in the development of Environmental Education and interpretative programming at Seward Park and in the southeast corridor of the city. She currently holds the position of Naturalist at Seward Park.
Christina has also been active in the Seattle community through her volunteer work. Christina was a founding member of HACE, the Hispanic Association of City Employees, the Manana Coalition’s annual Latino Youth Conference and the Rainbow Book festival. She has participated as a member of the Cleveland Memorial Forest Committee and the Langston Hughes Advisory Council. When not in the park you can find her camping, creating her dream garden, listening to jazz or blues and managing her two teenagers. (Bio from CCEJ site)
Community Coalition for Environmental Justice web site
Deric Gruen, Sustainability Coordinator, BC
Deric Gruen is the Sustainability Coordinator and Resource Conservation Manager at Bellevue College. He works with students, faculty and staff to plan, implement and evaluate initiatives to integrate sustainability into all aspects of Bellevue College. Deric has weaved experience in sustainability, community and economic development and international affairs at organizations such as the Sightline Institute, the Puget Sound Regional Council, and the Trade Development Alliance at the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce. Deric received his Masters in Public Administration from the Evans School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington where developed recommendations for the State Legislature on transportation demand strategies for schools. He completed a capstone project developing a framework to integrate community development into environmental sustainability initiatives, which was adopted by the City of Seattle's Office of Policy and Management. Deric recently returned from a 9-month fellowship traveling with a bicycle in the Middle-East, Africa and Latin America.
Sustainability@BellevueCollege Blog
Mike Hanson, Botany Instructor, BC
Dr. Michael Hanson obtained a B.S. in Agriculture from the University of Nebraska, a Ph.D. in Botany from Claremont Graduate University and Post-Doctoral research positions at the University of Minnesota and Cornell University. His specific interests are in symbiotic interactions, especially domestication of humans by plants and animals and vice versa. Due to these interests, he has taught numerous interdisciplinary courses at Elmira College, SUNY-Empire State College and Bellevue College utilizing the learning community model. Michael is not a self-made man: he benefits from the waste products of photosynthetic organisms and the storage products and bodies of plants, animals, fungi and protists, encourages alimentary bacterial growth and eyebrow mite habitation, and derives pleasure from the assistance and friendship of other life forms, including humans.
Bellevue College Science Division web site
Reverend Robert Jeffery, Title, Clean Greens Market
Rev. Dr. Robert L. Jeffrey came from Roanoke, Virginia in 1986 to pastor the New Hope Missionary Baptist Church. He brought with him a vision; a mind to work, to create new programs, a spirit to lead and a willingness to teach his people how to be self-sufficient. He received a Doctor of Divinity Degree from Union Theological Seminary in Richmond, Virginia at the age of 26. In 1988, Pastor Jeffrey founded the Black Dollar Days Task Force (BDDTF), a non-profit organization committed to facilitating economic self-sufficiency for inner-city African Americans. It is in this capacity that he is most recognized in the City of Seattle – as a dynamic advocate for every person’s right to dignity. The BDDTF promotes economic development, self-sufficiency, and community cohesiveness and achieves its goals through the energies of grassroots people eager to control their own destiny.
Dr. Jeffrey has always been involved in his community through providing leadership on the Governor of Washington State’s transitional team and by serving on the boards of the Boys and Girls Club of Seattle, the Church Council of Greater Seattle, and Washington State SANE/Freeze. He has received numerous awards including the Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Community Service Award and the W.E.B. Dubois Talented Tenth Award. Some of the programs are, entrepreneur training classes, welfare to work programs, Campaign 5000 endowment fund, The African American Business Directory which is now in the process of publishing the 20th edition and has expanded to include all small businesses.
In 2007 Dr. Jeffrey started the Clean Greens Project, a 22 acre chemical free farm in Duvall, WA where we employ people from our community and produce healthy vegetables to sell in the community at low cost as to reduce the risk of high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes. Dr. Jeffrey consistently look for ways to help people and improve the community.
Gleen Greens Farm and Market web site
YES! Magazine interview with Reverend Jeffery - "Lentils and Justice for All" (Feb 2011)
Tim Kearney, Mathematics Instructor, BC
Tim Kearney was born in the US to a French mother and an American father. He grew up on the Eastside (with a hiatus in Minnesota and in France) and got a BS in Math at UW. After graduating, he traveled for a year and a half (in western Europe, North Africa, and the US). After that, he was in the Peace Corps in Mali for 2 years (Mali’s is on the southern part of the Sahara desert in Africa) where he taught math. He then got an MA in Math at Portland State University. After graduating, he joined the Peace Corps in Gabon for 2 more years (Gabon’s on the equator in Africa). While in Gabon, he was knighted for organizing environmental education workshops and for developing math education materials. After Gabon, he lived in Central Oregon for 2 years before going back to Africa to teach math. This time, it was in Ivory Coast for 5 years. He was forced to leave because of civil war. After that, he went to Mexico for a year and a half, then to Colombia for another year and a half. He’s been vegan for 20 years.
Bellevue College Mathematics Department web site
Peace Corps web site
Jerry Kroon, Vice President, Damar AeroSystems
Jerry brings over 30 years of government related service to Thomas James International and our manufacturing center, Damar AeroSystems. He provides expertise in contract management at the Federal, State and Business to Business level. Prior to 1997, when he joined the TJI team, Jerry was involved in program management for several companies specializing in government relations and federal defense initiatives. Jerry started his carrier in the public sector as a research analyst for the Washington State Legislature and worked for several State and Federal elected officials before joining the private sector.
After leaving government service, Jerry pursued an advanced degree in Manufacturing Engineering, with specialties in Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma. Jerry works with our affiliated companies, developing business processes that maximize our value to our customers. Jerry is recognized as an expert in Lean Manufacturing, and has been a guest lecturer at the University of Washington. He has been a guest speaker for the National Association for Manufacturing Excellence (past President), the Institute of Industrial Engineers, and the Society of Manufacturing Engineers.
Jerry has an undergraduate degree from Seattle University in Public Administration and Economics, a graduate degree in Manufacturing Engineering from the University of Kentucky, and completed the Aerospace Industry Manufacturing Seminar series at the University of Washington’s Foster School of Business.
Jerry is a life member of the United States Navy League (past Board member and past Vice President) and serves on the National Defense Industry Association’s (NDIA) Small Business Executive Committee, as well as being a member of numerous other professional associations.
In his spare time, Jerry is a partner in the Knead and Feed restaurant on Whidbey Island (Coupeville), is continuing to work on his private pilot’s license, and when there is a free moment, spends it with his dog Flaps.
Damar AeroSystems web site
Lisa Lynch, Faculty in the Ecopsycology Program, Antioch University
Lisa Lynch is currently the Coordinator of Antioch Seattle's Ecopsychology concentration in the Integrative Studies in Psychology Master's Program. She also teaches classes in Ecopsychology, Indigenous Psychology and Ecological Ceremonies in the BA program at Antioch Seattle. Her current areas of interest and study include psychology and climate change, literature and ecopsychology, and the importance of gardens and plants.Lisa received her Ph.D. from Union Institute & University where the focus of her dissertation was Restoring the River: An Ecopscychological Novel and Contextual Essay, was on the use of fiction to explore and illustrate environmental issues surrounding a river in central Oregon.
Antioch Ecopsychology web site
Blog created by students in Lisa Lynch's Psychology of Climate Change class
Michael Meyer, English Instructor, BC
Michael is an instructor of English at Bellevue College, where he is very involved in the interdisciplinary studies program. He received his graduate degree from Marquette University.
Bellevue College English Department web site
Tom Murphy, Chair of the Department of Anthropology, Edmonds Community College
Dr. Thomas Murphy is Chair of the Department of Anthropology at Edmonds Community College. He has a PhD in anthropology from the U. of Washington and has studied traditional ecological knowledge in Mayan, Zapotec, Nahua and Coast Salish communities. He is the founder of the Learn and Serve Environmental Anthropology Field (LEAF) School, an innovative program that combines AmeriCorps service with college-level academic courses. The LEAF School employs an intensive service-learning experience to get students directly involved in using traditional ecological knowledge, especially ethnobotany and wildlife tracking, to help address sustainability problems of the twenty-first century. The Community College National Center for Community Engagement honored the LEAF School with a Service-Learning Collaboration Award in 2007 for its partnerships with fishing, farming, forestry and recreation industries. The Associated Students of Edmonds Community College selected Dr. Murphy as Outstanding Faculty of the Year in 2005 and the college's Board of Trustees recognized him with their highest honor, an Excellence in Education Award in 2008.
Abstract fro Dr. Murphy's talk: Humanity is facing what may be the greatest crisis in our existence as a species. Simply put, we are living well beyond our means. We must, as a global community, change the way we interact with each other and our environment before we destroy ourselves. How can anthropology help us solve this looming crisis? Dr. Thomas Murphy highlights three significant ways that anthropology students from the Learn and Serve Environmental Anthropology Field (LEAF) School at Edmonds Community College are contributing to sustainability solutions in Western Washington. By using service-learning as a form of participant observation students are reconnecting with sources of their food and water while helping to make the harvest, transport and disposal of these ingredients of life more sustainable. Through collaboration with Coast Salish tribes anthropology students are contributing to a rejuvenation of traditional ecological knowledge and applying ethnobotanical and wildlife tracking skills to help solve modern health, safety, education and transportation problems. Finally, anthropology students have learned that the biggest polluters of the Salish Sea are you and me. To help address this problem they are contributing to social marketing efforts of local governments that combine social scientific research and marketing expertise to change consumer behavior.
Thomas Murphy's page at Edmonds Community College
James Rasmussen, Coordinator, Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition/Technical Advisory Group
James Rasmussen serves as Duwamish River Cleanup Coallition / Technical Advisory Group (DRCC/TAG) Coordinator, overseeing technical, policy and administration of the organization. The DRCC/TAG has been working since 2001 to secure a thorough cleanup of south Seattle, Washington’s Lower Duwamish River. Founded by local environmental, tribal, and community organizations, the coalition has been formally recognized as the “Community Advisory Group” for the Duwamish River Superfund Site. The Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition works to ensure that the Duwamish River Superfund cleanup not only restores environmental health and protects fishers and families who use the river, but also reflects the priorities, values and will of the people who live and work in the region. DRCC/TAG’s programs include guided river tours, educational forums, habitat-restoration events, river festivals, youth programs, and neighborhood activities designed to link people to the river.
Duwamish River Cleanup Coalition web site
Keith Rose, Environmental Scientist, Environmental Protection Agency
Keith earned a PhD in Biophysics at University of California at Berkeley where he conducted research on primary photochemical reactions in plant photosynthesis using innovative Electron Paramagnetic Resonance methods.
In 1980 he began working as a project manager for the U.S. Department of Energy where he managed a research and development program for innovative solar thermal technologies, including several design projects utilizing solar central receiver technology for industrial and electric utility applications.
In 1987 he moved to the EPA where hewas the Remedial Project Manager in the Superfund Program. Starting in 2000, Keith moved to the EPA's Region 10 (Pacific NW) where he served as an environmental scientist responsible for strategic planning and assessment of the regional ambient air monitoring network, analyzing data for comparison to air quality standards, and proving technical assistance to local air agencies to implement ambient air monitoring projects.
EPA web site
Julia Ruedig, Product Manager, Blue Marble Biomaterials
Julia Ruedig brings a diversity of talents and experiences to the Blue Marble team. As Project Manager at Blue Marble Biomaterials, Julia draws on her strong organizational and multitasking skills to keep the engines well oiled (with waste-veggie oil, naturally) and smoothly running. She is proficient in Mandarin Chinese and has international experience with film production and journalism. In 2008, Julia was employed by China Central Television in the China Central Newsreel and Documentary division to liaise between the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Official Olympic Documentary and selected United States athletes. In Beijing, her work with the IOC included research and recruitment, logistical coordination between US and Chinese representatives and agents, and technical assistance in public relations. These skills are valuable in Julia’s current position at Blue Marble Biomaterials; she coordinates state and federal grants as well as manages marketing and outreach for the company.
Blue Marble Biomaterials web site
Christian Sarason, Product Manager, 3tier Renewable Energy Information Services
Bio coming soon.
3tier Renewable Energy Information Services web site
Amanda Senft, Biology/Environmental Science Instructor, BC
Amanda is a biology and environmental science instructor at Bellevue College. She likes all living organisms, although she has a certain fondness for photosynthesizers.
Bellevue College Science Division web site
Mark Storey, Philosophy Instructor, Bellevue College
Mark Storey teaches Eastern Philosophy in the Philosophy Department of Bellevue College. He is a long-time participant in Earth Week, bringing a philsophical perspective to environmental issues.
Bellevue Colelge Philosophy Department web site
Courtney Sullivan, Education Manager for the National Wildlife Federation
Education Manager, Pacific Region, National Wildlife Federation
Courtney Sullivan has been developing, directing, and managing programs offering sustainable educational opportunities for communities for nearly fifteen years. She earned her BA in Environmental Science and Education from Alaska Pacific University and also holds a MS in Management of Non-Profit Agencies from Capella University. Courtney joined the National Wildlife Federation in April 2008, where she works in our Pacific Region (WA,OR,CA,HI,AK) engaging and developing community stewards, advocating for educational policies, and building coalitions to support sustainable environmental education.
National Wildlife Federation web site
Kevin Wilhem, CEO, Sustainable Business Consulting
Kevin Wilhelm is the country’s preeminent consultant on business sustainability and climate change. As CEO of Sustainable Business Consulting he leads clients in developing profitable and sustainable business strategies. Kevin draws on his fourteen years of corporate experience ranging from Fortune 500s to renewable energy start-ups to deliver practical solutions that benefit the bottom line.
He is the author of Return on Sustainability: How Business Can Increase Profitability & Address Climate Change in an Uncertain Economy, a market-based call to action to stop global warming. He also chairs the Clean Energy Committee for the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce and writes a monthly column for Sustainable Industries. Kevin teaches sustainable business at the Bainbridge Graduate Institute and has been an adviser to City University-Seattle’s Sustainable Business MBA program.
Kevin is both an avid outdoors person and a rabid sports fan. So if he’s not hiking, biking, kayaking, or skiing with his wife or friends, then you can bet he’s either at a Seattle Sounders game or at home watching a college football game or US soccer match.
Sustainable Business Consulting web site
Return on Sustainability (Amazon.com)
BC Earth Week is organized by the BC Student Science Association. For more information contact Rob Viens in the BC Science Division at rob.viens@bellevuecollege.edu or (425) 564-3158.
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