Executive
Bob
Davis, President and CEO, Director
of Operations,
holds an M.S. in organization development from American University,
and an M.A. in religious studies from Yale University. He
is skilled in the areas of project administration, financial
management, personnel management, program logistics, conservation
area project design and appraisal, organizational development
and management, and facilitation. Having joined TMI in 1979,
Mr. Davis has worked in many of the organization's programs
and regional projects. He has extensive international conservation
and development experience from his fifteen years of involvement
in the Himalayan Program. He is a long time resident of Pendleton
County, West Virginia and held the position of Appalachian
Program Direction from September, 2001 to June 2003. Mr.
Davis also serves on the board of directors of a number of
non-profit organizations, consults on organizational issues,
and has taught university courses in organizational development
and management.
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Elsie
Walker, Director of Special Projects,
is also the founder of TMI’s Peak Enterprise Program
in the Tibet Autonomous Region of China (TAR or Tibet), (1997-2005),
and Vice Chair of the Board of Trustees. She has worked
for
25
years on
projects
and
programs
benefiting
mountain
people, particularly in India and China, and is interested
in the design of programs that integrate economic development
with cultural and environmental conservation. She has a background
in NGO and program development and management; fundraising;
project design and implementation; private sector collaboration;
small enterprise development strategies and citizen exchanges.
In 2002, she arranged the first exchange between the U.S.
Supreme Court and the Supreme People's Court of China, led
by Associate Justice Sandra Day O'Connor. She is on the board
of First Voice Iinternational and The U.S. East Timor Society.
She received a B.A. from
Sarah Lawrence College in 1969.
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Lyn
Soudien, Director
of Development, recently held the position of Director
of Planning and Outreach at The Atlantic Council of the United
States where she was responsible for managing the Council’s
relationships with The Atlantic Treaty Alliance, its board
members, National Councillors and corporate members as well
as its development initiatives in the private and public
sectors and for the oversight of its Senior Fellows Program.
Ms. Soudien was Director of Business Development for The
National Foundation for Teaching Entrepreneurship (NFTE).
Previously, she was executive director in the South African
office of the United States-South Africa Leadership Development
Program (USSALEP) and coordinated the fundraising and program
activities for the organization’s Washington, DC office
prior to taking up her responsibilities in Johannesburg.
While at USSALEP, she made a significant contribution toward
increasing corporate funding, helping to close significant
cooperative agreements with USAID and fulfilling contractual
obligations related to The Transition to Democracy Project
and South African Black Economic Empowerment Program. A South
African by birth, Ms. Soudien has a B.A. and M.B.A. from
The George Washington University.
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Research
and Education
Alton
C. Byers, Director of Research and Education,
is a mountain geographer specializing in mountain protected
areas, integrated conservation and development programs,
and historical/contemporary landscape change. He received
his doctorate from the University of Colorado in 1987, focusing
on landscape change and human-accelerated soil loss in the
Sagarmatha (Mt. Everest) National Park, Khumbu, Nepal. Following
two years working on conservation of mountain gorillas in
Ruhengeri Prefecture, Rwanda, he joined The Mountain Institute
in 1990 as Environmental Advisor. Between 1993-94, he and
his family were based in Khandbari, Nepal where he served
as TMI's co-project manager in Nepal's newest national park,
the Makalu-Barun National Park and Conservation Area. During
1994-1996, he was Acting Director of Andes Programs, helping
to develop new projects in the Huascarán National
Park, Peru; directed TMI's Appalachian Program and Spruce
Knob Mountain Center (SKMC) in West Virginia between 1998-2000;
and currently provides technical, implementation, and fundraising
support to various TMI programs.
For
more information
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| Alton Byers on Island Peak, Khumbu,
Nepal, September 2004 |
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Andes
Program
Jorge
Recharte, Director, Andes Program,
is based in Huaraz and Lima, Peru, and holds a Ph.D. in
Anthropology from Cornell University, 1989. He worked in
Ecuador between 1994 and 1996 for the Latin American Social
Science Faculty (FLACSO), designing and heading the graduate
education and research Program Mountain Societies and Sustainable
Development. Between 1980-1981 and 1990-1993 Dr. Recharte
was an associate researcher at the International Potato
Center where he worked developing participatory research
methodologies in agriculture. He is a member of the Technical
Board of Advisors of the Consortium for Sustainable Development
in the Andean Ecoregion (CONDESAN) since 1993; member of
the Board of Directors of the SANREM CRSP based at University
of Georgia (1999 -2001); member of the Andes Chapter of
the International Mountain Society (IMS). His main area
of personal and professional interest is development of
participatory approaches and the application of human ecology
perspectives to improve the sustainable use of renewable
natural resources and the conservation of high-altitude
mountain ecosystems and cultures.
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Appalachian
Program
Brent
Bailey, Director of the Appalachian Program, is
based in West Virginia, drawing on more than 20 years'
experience in forestry, natural resource management, environmental
education, and local community development on three continents.
Prior to joining TMI in 2004, he was a Senior Technical
Director for Conservation International, managing biodiversity
projects in Latin America and West Africa. He holds a bachelors
degree in biology and French (Kalamazoo College, 1977);
a masters in environmental studies (Yale 1985); and a Ph.D
in Forest Resources Science (West Virginia University,
1999). He also has a faculty appointment in biology with
West Virginia University. A West Virginia native, he has
presented and written extensively on the harvest and economic
uses of wild products such as ginseng, goldenseal, black
cohosh, and others. At the local level, he is active as
a volunteer in urban forestry, land conservation, and citizen
science.
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Himalayan
Program
Brian
Peniston, Co- Director of the Himalayan
Program, has Master degrees in Forestry (Yale,
1992) and Public Health (Univ of Hawaii, 1982). He has
worked in international conservation and development projects
since 1975, and has overseas work experience in Nepal,
Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand-Cambodia, and Peru. Mr. Peniston
has also helped design integrated conservation and development
projects in Bhutan, Papua New Guinea, Vietnam, Tibet Autonomous
Region of China and Central Asia.
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Lhakpa
Norbu Sherpa, Co-Director of the Himalayan
Program, holds a Ph.D. in Forest Resources from
the University of Washington, USA, and he is the first
person from the Sherpa community to receive a doctorate.
He attended the Sir Edmund Hillary School in Nepal's Khumbu
region and his higher education was supported through series
of educational awards including Colombo Plan and Fulbright
scholarships. Dr. Sherpa worked as a National Park Manager
with Nepal's Park Service in the 1980s, participating in
the establishment and management of Sagarmatha (Mt. Everest),
Rara Lake, and Makalu-Barun National Parks. He worked with
the The Mountain Institute in 1989 to carry out planning
of Nepal's Makalu-Barun National Park. He joined the Institute
on full time basis in 2000 and now works to strengthen
conservation capacity on the north side of Mt. Everest
managing TMI's Qomolangma Conservation Programme. Dr. Sherpa's
career in the field of Conservation and sustainable mountain
development expands over nearly 30 years.
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Ang
Rita Sherpa, Senior Program Manager,
has 14 years of experience in management of protected areas,
eco-tourism, and sustainable development projects. He also
has extensive experience in project design, development,
and monitoring and evaluation and he has facilitated many
workshops on ecotourism and sustainable development. He
has a masters degree in Protected Landscape Management
from the University of Wales, UK, and an undergraduate
degree in Parks, Recreation and Tourism from Lincoln University,
New Zealand. He has served as a volunteer for the National
Parks Service in the United States, where he spent nine
months working in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National
Park before he joined The Mountain Institute in 1988.
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Peak Enterprise
Program
Christopher
Ladue, Director of the
Peak Enterprise Program, brings more than 10 years
of combined professional and scholastic experience in Chinese
and Tibetan languages, cultures, economics, and development
policies to his work in the Tibet Autonomous Region of
China. He is a seasoned enterprise development professional
with experience in subsector analysis, business service
assessment, development finance, integrated conservation
and development program design, evaluation, implementation
and monitoring. Mr. Ladue received his Bachelor's degree
in East Asian Language and Cultures, with a focus concentration
in Chinese economics, from Columbia University, and worked
in the private sector, primarily in banking, before joining
TMI in 2000. |
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| Christopher Ladue with one of the cows
donated by PEAK |
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Sacred Mountains
Program
Edwin
Bernbaum, Director of the Sacred Mountains
Program, holds a B.A. in Mathematics from Harvard
College and a Ph.D. in Asian Studies from the University
of California at Berkeley, where he is a Research Associate.
A scholar of comparative religions and mythology focusing
on culture and the environment, he worked with TMI on a
program in the Indian Himalaya to involve pilgrims in reforestation
and initiated TMI’s project to develop interpretive
materials for US National Parks based on the cultural and
spiritual significance of mountains. He is the author of
the award-winning Sacred Mountains of the World,
the basis for a photographic exhibit at the Smithsonian
Institution, and The Way to Shambhala, a study
of Tibetan myths of the hidden valleys resembling the fictional
Shangri-La of Lost Horizon. He has climbed and done research
in mountain ranges throughout the world, and leads seminars
and lectures on mountains, leadership, culture, and the
environment for organizations and audiences such as the
Smithsonian, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Wharton
School, and the American Museum of Natural History.
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