ABBEY PALMER grows food in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. She is the Special Projects Coordinator at the MARQUETTE FOOD CO-OP, where she works to educate people of all ages about the benefits of choosing local food—and how to grow it themselves. She manages the NMU HOOP HOUSE on the campus of Northern Michigan University, works at ROCK RIVER FARM, and loves to eat good food in good company.

ALEX EPSTEIN works for The Urban Creators. This is a youth and community driven organization, which inspires inner-city neighborhoods to transform neglected landscapes into food hubs, social enterprises, and models of urban sustainability. We are change makers; storytellers, urban farmers, dot connectors, movement builders, and innovators, cultivating knowledge, skills, and local resources to take the health of our communities into our own hands. We engage diverse networks in neighborhood revitalization efforts that build self-sufficiency and pioneer grass-roots economic development, while igniting a unified generation of passionate change agents, social entrepreneurs, and urban creators.

ALEX FOULIARD is the outreach assistant at Maine Farmland Trust, a nonprofit organization working to protect farmland, support farmers, and grow the future of farming in Maine. Alex also farms with her partner’s family in rural Washington County, Maine, and is a passionate advocated for food security and access in rural communities. She is excited to curate a pop-up show, and use the show as a conversation starter to spark the further development of the lexicon of sustainability in Maine!

ALICE EVANS is a native of Huntsville, Alabama. She is the Executive Director of the Alabama Sustainable Agriculture Network (ASAN), a statewide grassroots network that uses peer-to-peer learning, relationship-building, and resource-sharing in order to empower sustainable farmers and strengthen Alabama’s local, sustainable food system. Alice is a graduate of Swarthmore College in Swarthmore, PA, and a former apprentice (2011) at the Center for Environmental Farming Systems (CEFS) in Goldsboro, NC. In 2012 she co-founded the Tennessee Valley Community Garden Association, based in Huntsville, which hosts monthly potlucks, an annual Seed Swap, and an annual community garden open house. Alice is deeply rooted in Alabama, and is committed to intersectional social justice work through groups like Southerners on New Ground (SONG) and the Alabama Coalition for Immigrant Justice (ACIJ) that work in solidarity for collective liberation.

ALISON HENSLEY arrived in Santa Barbara in 2000 as a UCSB student, graduating with a degree in Global Studies and Spanish Literature. After graduation, Alison took her first steps into the world of Farmers markets, and never looked back. After 7 years of working full time with the Peacock family learning the ins and outs of agriculture, farming, marketing and nutrition, she set out to share all the information she had gleaned with the greater Santa Barbara community, and SOL Food was born. Co-Founder of the Santa Barbara SOL Food Festival, Permaculture Designer and Food and Sustainability Director for Lucidity Festival, Alison has spent the last 12 years developing a passion for creating sustainable food culture through education, inspirational events and talks, and empowering herself and others to live into the change they see is possible. She believes that food is our common denominator and powerful agent of change. Alison is a life long student who is committed to supporting and growing businesses and community endeavors that are working towards creating a more sustainable, regenerative, and just human presence on the planet, and has a blast in the process. When she is not working you can find her hiking the trails of the backcountry, studying plants, or creating something new in the kitchen.

ALISON VAN DYKE is the Food Security Coordinator for Community Food Connections Association in Medicine Hat, Alberta.  She was raised on a farm in Southeastern Alberta and her early exposure to gardening, foraging, preserving and cooking has been a major influence in her life.  She enjoys gardening, cooking, canning, and encouraging others to do the same!

ALISTAR HARRIS is a sustainable food grower, photographer, and chief coffee maker at ORIGINS FARM in Hanover, VA. Together with his wife, Rebecca Ponder, they grow more than 40 varieties of vegetables, herbs and fruit on six acres of CERTIFIED NATURALLY GROWN land. They are committed to the idea that “eating is an agricultural act”. They operate one of the largest CSA programs in the Richmond, VA area and are members of the local Slow Food chapter, as well as the Virginia Association of Biological Farming. At Origins Farm, they “plough their stories into the soil; their farmland is suffused with human feeling; and they strive to be a bridge between earth and table, seed and sustenance.” Origins Farm represents a rediscovered connection to the land, and the origins of growing food. Their vegetables are always fresh, harvested by humans, compost-grown, and always delicious. Alistar loves cooking and sharing meals with family & friends, walking in the mountains, and savoring good quality chocolate. Rebecca is passionate about autism education & awareness, feel-good music, and the most beautiful city in the world–Cape Town, South Africa.

ALLA GUELBER is an educator, community builder and facilitator who lives at the confluence of the Bow and Elbow Rivers in Calgary, AB, Canada. Alla is the founder of the Meaningful Work Project, an educational initiative focused on knowledge sharing and capacity building for creating meaningful work that supports people and ecosystem integrity. She recently completed Master of Arts – Environmental Education and Communication from Royal Roads University, and her thesis focused on developing and evaluating effective educational programs to support the transition to the ‘new economy.’ Inspired to spur on the rapid proliferation of permaculture, urban agriculture and other progressive changes in her home city, Alla has been a key organizer with the Permaculture Calgary Guild as well as City Repair Calgary. As someone who likes having her hands in many pots, Alla balances her passion for community-based change-making with yoga practice, wildcrafting, and forays into the nearby Rocky Mountains. She is looking forward to sharing the Lexicon of Sustainability throughout various events in Calgary.

Ally Candy is an education coordinator for Groundswell’s Community Greenhouse. Groundswell is a grassroots organization tapping into the hunger for change through applied sustainable living programs and projects. We connect research, discussion and action to develop ecologically literate citizens, communities, governments and corporations. We have built a 3000 square foot solar powered greenhouse and permaculture garden beside a high school in a small town in East Kootenays of British Columbia. Recently Ally and other delegates from our local Slow Food chapter attended the Terre Madre 2014 gathering in Turin, Italy. Besides the fantastic Italian people and food, a presentation by Alice Waters, Jamie Oliver and Carlo Petrini was a highlight of the visit. Everyone everywhere is needed to help in a global groundswell to build a resilient future…

AMI FREEBERG is a Community Outreach Coordinator at Cultivate Kansas City, a locally grown nonprofit working to grow food, farms and communities for a healthier local food system. The organization helps members of the community make the connection between real food, good health and vibrant communities. Cultivate Kansas City engages growers, customers, volunteers and donors who live this vision.

Through Gibbs Road Farm, Cultivate Kansas City maintains direct farming experience. The urban farm grows fresh, local, certified organic food, which it makes available to the metro community. The farm also serves as a teaching tool, working with several apprentice farmers each year and opening its doors visitors.
Cultivate Kansas City shares its knowledge with area farmers and gives them the tools they need to succeed. The organization also develops new approaches and builds on existing ones to improve farm processes and output, then shares those techniques with local farmers so the whole community benefits.
The goal of Cultivate Kansas City is to bring together local farms, local food and the local community for healthy lives, a strong local economy, and a more sustainable future.

AMY KOLINER travels the country as an advertising manager for Ogden Publications Inc. which is the leading information resource serving the sustainable living, rural lifestyle, farm memorabilia and classic motorcycle communities. Key brands include Mother Earth News, Mother Earth Living, Utne Reader, Capper’s and Grit.Through advertising, she has helped small to large companies spread the message to millions of consumers monthly about the importance of sustainability. She has learned about the fun of foraging for morel mushrooms as a child in the woods in Yankton, South Dakota from her parents, the labor of processing chickens on her grandma’s farm in Wynot, Nebraska and the joy of watching her own children pick basil and tomatoes from their front yard edible garden in Minneapolis, Minnesota.  Amy is excited to help further the message of sustainability in Minneapolis/Saint Paul with the Lexicon Project.

AMY S. BROWN, co-publisher of Edible Omaha has deep roots in the soils of both Iowa and Nebraska. She is a life-long learner who loves to think, have meaningful conversations and solve problems. She first became aware of the dilapidated state of the food system after attending a special screening of the documentary Food Fight with a post-show discussion with Director Chris Taylor. Deeply disturbed and needing to take action, she continued to educate herself while converting the diet of her family and countless others to clean eating and supporting fresh, local and organic food. Wanting to share her passion for a healthy food ecosystem she is thrilled to bring Edible Omaha to her community as a vehicle for creating mutually beneficial and sustainable connections.

Amy Stone is an Extension Educator with The Ohio State University working out of the Lucas County Office in NW Ohio. She began working with Extension in 1992, and has been in her current position since 2000.  Amy has earned degrees from Owens Community College and the University of Toledo including a Master’s Degree in Vocational Education. Her specialization has been invasive species and began with a local infestation of the gypsy moth in the county in the mid-nineties. In 2003, Amy collected and submitted the first known infestation of the emerald ash borer in Ohio. Amy worked on EAB for nearly ten years on USDA project dollars from APHIS and the Forest Service. Work with Purdue University and Michigan State University on Emerald Ash Borer University continues. As Ohio faces numerous invasive species threats, Amy is part of an Extension team to address those threats through outreach and education efforts.  Amy and her family live on her husband’s grandparent’s farm in southeastern Michigan where they once had a forty acre truck farm and sold produce at the Detroit’s Eastern Market. While their garden is much smaller than grandma and grandpa’s they enjoy having fresh produce from their garden and chickens too. Amy and her husband have two grown children and one grandchild, and three papillons!

ANDE SPENCER moved to California in 1994 for graduate school and decided she never wanted to shovel snow again, so she stayed. For this transplanted Brooklynite with a career as an interior designer, an education as an American social historian, a personal commitment to social justice action, and a passion for sharing good food, Slow Food became a natural outlet after retirement. Elected to chair Slow Food Redlands at the beginning of 2014, a new board was constituted to promote the ideals the organization espouses: good, clean, fair food for all. Educational lectures, practical demonstrations, fun communal activities, legislative and policy involvement, and building coalitions between like-minded people and groups, all revolving around food, fuel the new board’s, and Ande’s, vision for the future.

ANDREA TERRILE, a curator in Argentina, says: “The Lexicon is an amazing tool to inspire and propagate the ideas behind it. It is an excellent way to bring the concepts of sustainability in a very simple form to the average person, providing them with the vocabulary to address today’s global environmental situations. Being a curator for the show gives me the opportunity to create awareness about our food system, showing initiatives, ideas and people working together to create more resilient communities”.

ANDREW LENTINI has worked in recycling and waste-reduction education in both municipal and university settings. In addition to waste-reduction outreach, Andrew directs the communications for the office. Mr. Lentini holds Bachelor and Masters degrees in education and a graduate certificate in non-profit organization administration. Andrew represents the University of Georgia as a director on the boards of the Georgia Recycling Coalition (state) and the College and University Recycling Coalition (national) and the Keep Oconee Beautiful Commission (local). In his spare time he can be found playing the banjo with his family.
• M.Ed. Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of Georgia
• Graduate Certificate in Non-profit Organizational Management, University of Georgia
• BS, Art Education, University of Georgia

Ann Scott is the Assistant Director and Outreach Librarian for a mid-sized Tampa Bay area public library. She holds her Masters in Library and Information Science from Drexel University in Philadelphia, PA and began working for the New Port Richey Public Library in March of 2003. She manages public relations, marketing and the library’s online presence while leading programming librarians and groups of volunteers whose activities range from a thriving five-county wide literacy program to a variety of cultural and arts events to a year-round weekly organic market in the library courtyard. New Port Richey has developed a love for sustainability projects, and its community members continue to ask for help in spearheading programs for their beloved green town by the river that leads to the Gulf. Ann’s library has a mission to help members make their world better by connecting them with resources, both print and digital, indoors and in nature, and with one another, to form magical inspiring conversations that grow community. One of their current projects is the NPR Library Seed exchange, featuring heirloom non-GMO seeds.

Anne Lewis works as a part of Greater Oahe Action League to build sustainability and resiliency in the Central South Dakota region. Her interests include food systems, climate, multi-modal transportation and connecting to the outdoors. She says she is a lousy gardener, which makes her a great customer at farmers markets. In the summer she likes to hike, paddle and contribute pictures to iNaturalist. In the winter she likes to read and think about summer.

BECCA LESLIE is a science teacher and the Sustainability Coordinator at Northfield Mount Hermon, a boarding school for grades 9-12 whose mission is to “”engage the intellect, compassion and talents of our students, empowering them to act with humanity and purpose.”” NMH students are intentional citizens of a rapidly changing world, and Becca thrives on the problem-solving energy they bring to the classroom. She was a co-founder of the Green Cup Challenge, an energy-saving program now run by the Green Schools Alliance in schools nationwide. In 2012, she founded NMH’s annual Farmers’ Market Teach-In; a full day of classes focused on the lessons to be learned at a Farmers’ Market in the center of campus. The event fosters networking opportunities between schools and their local food systems, and grows in its impact every year.

BECCA RIMMEL’s great-aunt told her once that she was a country girl trapped in the suburbs. Becca identifies with farms and food producers and has always hoped to put her skills to use within food system communities. In 2011 and 2012, she had the opportunity to manage a small Farmersʼ Market in Essex Junction, Vermont. She had no idea what went into managing a market, but was excited at the prospect of becoming more engaged with the agricultural community. What she had not anticipated was the amount she would learn from each farmer, prepared food vendor, and customer about the change food can create in any town or city. Not only has she had the chance to work within the Farmersʼ Market community in Vermont, but she’s also had the chance to work within the school systems and non-profit field. She hopes that through her experience as an educator, a naturalist, a non-profit worker and a farmersʼ market manager, she can apply her knowledge, skills and ideas to leverage change in her community. Becca was born and raised in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and spent time in quite a few different mid-western and New England states, most recently relocating to Ithaca, NY.

Becky Crump is a lead communications and media consultant with The Frontier Project, a certified health coach, and an integrative nutritionist. Between the health consulting and workplace wellbeing program design, the meeting moderation and speaking engagements, the communications strategy and video production, Becky’s work exists at the intersection of communications strategy, storytelling, and workforce engagement. She’s focused on shifting human behavior by matching story to audience and inspiring lasting change through targeted messaging. Her passion for healthy and engaged people, communities, and companies gets sharpened every time she witnesses the limitless determination of the human spirit, works with companies who value the engagement of their employees before product and profit, and every time she rises in the morning to a blended family of five daughters who look to her to co-create their future.

Ben Thomas is the Sustainability Manager for Dining Services at the University of California, Davis. He graduated in 2012 from Siena College in Albany, New York, with a BA in Economics. Ben worked with student leaders and campus stakeholders to commit to more fair and real food purchasing through building Fair Trade Colleges and Universities and Real Food Challenge campaigns on the Siena campus as well as on the regional and national levels. At UC Davis, Ben works with Dining Services to help empower students to continue developing a more sustainable food system through conscious purchasing, community engagement and waste reduction.

BETHANY WILCOXON is a senior planner at the Des Moines Area Metropolitan Planning Organization. She believes in fostering relationships to create unique opportunities for community collaboration and to rally people together. A passionate and energetic planner, Bethany continually strives to bring new ideas – big and small – to Greater Des Moines. Originally from Atlantic, Iowa, and a graduate of Iowa State University’s Community and Regional Planning program, Bethany has spent the last several years leading the development of The Tomorrow Plan, seeking to advance sustainability in Greater Des Moines by looking at interconnected systems. She is president of Urban Ambassadors, a non-profit that is the hub for sustainable living in Greater Des Moines, serves on the Drake Neighborhood Association board, and is a mentor in the Big Brothers Big Sisters program.

Bonnie Gregory has worked as the Sheridan Farmers Market Manager at the Downtown Sheridan Association (DSA) since 2009. She currently serves on the Sheridan Farmers Market Steering Committee, as a Board of Director for the Wyoming Farmers Marketing Association, as Co-Chair for the University of Wyoming’s Sheridan Research & Extension Center’s Horticulture Committee and on the State of Wyoming’s Midwifery Board. As a 5th generation Wyoming native, with an agriculture background, Bonnie is an advocate of healthy food, informed consent, her community, and honey bees. She and her husband Ryan, along with their three boys are proud to call Sheridan home.