I come to the job as Director of the Office of Environment and Society from a broad background in the humanities and environmental studies, and with connections to SUNY-ESF as well as Syracuse University.

Having successfully "completed" an academic career in Slavic Languages and Literatures, I embarked on a new career in interdisciplinary environmental studies. In 2001, I left a tenured position in Russian at Macalester College to pursue a Master's degree in environmental communication at SUNY-ESF, where I specialized in urban environmental issues. A grant from the New Directions Initiative in 2002 enabled me to collaborate with a landscape architect and an urban ecologist on an interdisciplinary study of the Neva River in St. Petersburg and to attend workshops on interdisciplinary collaboration between the earth sciences, humanities, and social sciences. I became director of the Office of Environment and Society in July, 2003 and have also taught urban ecology classes at SUNY-ESF and LeMoyne College.

Since 2007 I have also been engaged in promoting campus and urban sustainability in Syracuse. As part of the University Sustainability Action Coalition I have been able to collaborate with staff from many areas of campus operations and students and faculty from a variety of disciplines to start changing campus culture at SU and ESF. Our Campus Commuter Challenge in 2007 got hundreds of university employees to leave their cars at home and try more sustainable ways of commuting. Our Focus the Nation event on January 31, 2008 engaged a wide swath of the university community in brainstorming about solutions to the climate crisis. And the Sustainable Desgn Assessment Team that brought planning experts to Syracuse in 2006 is resultingin important developments in helping Syracuse regain ground as a thriving northern city.