People

My name is Zane Hoover. I teach high school science in Fayette County, Ga., and I have 16 years experience teaching AP Environmental Science. I have hunted and fished most of my life. After high school, I joined the US Navy and trained to become a nuclear reactor officer. I served in the Persian Gulf and Red Sea during the first Gulf War. I went to college at Ga. State after the Navy and worked at Delta Airlines whille in college. 

I am a long-time professor of biology and ES in 4-year and 2-year institutions. In addition, I have experience as an industrial chemical production scientist and as a professional environmental scientist. I volunteer as an environmental scientist as science educator for various NGOs.

My name is Virginia Illera Ramon. I come from Spain and I live now in North Carolina with my husband and our two daughters. I completed in Spain my studies in Environmental Biology and I have worked many years in a non-profit organization where we offered environmental education activities for children and for adults. The activities focused in plants and we used to work in a greenhouse, go in field trips to learn about different species or planting trees. 

Megan Fink serves as the Partnerships & Policy Manager for the North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE). Working in the field of Environmental Education for over a decade, Megan brings a robust, place-based, outdoor education background to the NAAEE team. She has built enduring working relationships across the Chesapeake Bay watershed and the Mid-Atlantic region. As a graduate of Virginia Tech with a Bachelor of Science in Wildlife Science and Biology, Megan began her career as an Environmental Educator at the North Carolina Aquariums before joining the Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) in 2011. Through several program management positions with CBF she led students, teachers, school administrators, and environmental professionals on ecological, cultural, and historical investigations of the Bay. She also managed a statewide leadership program for high school students, teaching them how to become environmental advocates at the local, regional, and national levels.

Megan earned an Executive Master of Natural Resources from Virginia Tech’s Center for Leadership in Global Sustainability in 2020. In 2022-23, she served as Education Director for the Annapolis Maritime Museum & Park, supervising 15 Environmental Education Programs and expanding their reach to 14,000 participants annually. She also initiated and managed a project to launch a brand-new, nature-based preschool and served on the Maryland State Department of Education’s Workgroup to develop statewide Outdoor Preschool licensing standards. 

Throughout her career, Megan has designed programs that inspire participants to act on behalf of their local natural resources and enhance people’s understanding of and connection to the natural world through compelling environmental education experiences. In her spare time, she can often be found hiking, gardening, paddling, and spending time with her loved ones, including her dog, Ruby, splashing around the Bay watershed!

I work as an interpreter in several parks in Sonoma County, incl. at Pond Farm Pottery, a National Historic Landmark, Armstrong Redwoods, and at the Sonoma Coast State Park beaches. While working with school-age students, my greatest joy is seeing them lose all sense of time and self-consciousness in exploring their surroundings. I aim to create memories that create understanding, curiosity and appreciation for a place, no matter whether it's a cultural landmark, a harbor seal pup, the grassland or a sprouting redwood tree.

Angela has dedicated her career to serving young people. She holds a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Tennessee Technological University and a master’s in education from Old Dominion University, specializing in students with emotional and learning challenges. Angela has over 28 years of expereince in education as a teacher. She designed and taught award-winning programs in environmental education and established a non-profit, Full Circle Education Center, created to address the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual needs of students. Angela is a pragmatic visionary dedicated to redesigning K12 educational systems and instruction so they support and inspire young people to change the world for the betterment of all beings.

Angela has worked in special education, taught, designed, and written curricula for Career and Technical Education for the Virginia Department of Education, designed and taught outdoor learning and school-wide sustainability programs that won her the Presidential Innovation Award for Environmental Education in 2014.

NAAEE’s Senior Director of Capacity Building, Sarah Bodor comes from the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, where she held a number of program management and leadership positions throughout the organization. She worked closely with state education agencies in Maryland, Pennsylvania, and Virginia to develop and pilot standards-based curricula and provide teacher professional development. Her background also includes communications and fundraising. In 2008, she served as the writer of Maryland’s Children in Nature Plan, which resulted in passage of Maryland’s environmental high school graduation requirement.

Preethi Mony is a specialist in the field of environmental education, program evaluation and grants and has a wide range of experience from developing resource matierials, conducting programs with children and adults, as well as evaluating programs and grant reporting.

Growing up in the busy metropolis of Mumbai, she quickly recognized the importance of the social aspects of conservation in protecting the natural world. She has worked with organizations in India and the US to help with environmental education program planning and resource development. She has over 20 years of experience working with zoos and museums to evaluate programs and exhibits and recommend strategies to improve the overall visitor experience. Over the last 2 years, she has worked at a local community college to support grant work (federal, state, and private) as well as to inform data driven decision making in the diversity, equity, and inclusion space. She brings all of these experiences to her current role of EE Grant and Program Manager at NAAEE.

Preethi holds a Ph.D. in Natural Resources from The Ohio State University. She earned her M.S. in interdisciplinary Ecology from the University of Florida, and a B.Sc. in Life Sciences from the University of Mumbai, India.

Madeline is a senior specialist for international and leadership programs at NAAEE, supporting the Global Environmental Education Partnership (GEEP), youth leadership programs, and other global initiatives.

My name is Abbie, I am 22 years old. I am from Mechanicsville, Virginia, and I love to travel, spend time with my family, and drink coffee!

Bora Simmons serves as the founding director of the National Project for Excellence in Environmental Education. The North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE) initiated the Project in 1993 to help educators develop and deliver effective environmental education programs. The Project has drawn on the insights of literally thousands of educators across the United States and around the world to craft guidelines for top-quality environmental education.