Leadership
Naomi Roth
Executive Director
Prior to assuming her current position, Naomi served for four years as Green Corps’ senior organizing director. Naomi has played a key role in developing the classroom training program, has acted as head of the Donor Program, and has coordinated campaigns with organizations such as the Sierra Club, World Wildlife Fund, Alaska Wilderness League, Clear the Air, Infact, and the National Parks Conservation Association. Naomi received a BA in American Studies at Skidmore College.
Cindy Kang
Associate Director
Prior to becoming Associate Director, Cindy served as Green Corps’ Recruitment Director for four years and was instrumental in doubling the size of Green Corps’ program during a critical growth period. Cindy is a graduate from the Green Corps Environmental Leadership Training Program and has grassroots campaign experience with the Sierra Club, Heritage Forests Campaign, Ozone Action, U.S. PIRG, and Toxics Action Center. Cindy received a BA in Molecular Biology from Yale University.
Organization’s Objective
Today, the environmental movement is struggling to keep pace with the threats facing the country. Despite the enormity of the problems and opinion polls that indicate that a majority of Americans support stronger environmental protections, the U.S. environmental movement is struggling to mobilize the diverse constituencies necessary to win significant environmental policies, particularly at the federal level. An overwhelming range of environmental problems – from global warming to toxic pollution to the destruction of our last remaining wilderness areas – demands more leaders who understand and are capable of acting on the imperative to engage and organize the public to win substantial and ongoing environmental reform.
However, during these critical times, the environmental movement is facing a leadership crisis. As the current leaders of the modern environmental movement mature, organizations struggle to find talented staff for their vacant positions. With the growing number and size of nonprofit organizations, the retirement of leaders from the vast baby-boomer generation, and the movement of existing nonprofit leaders into different roles outside the sector, the nonprofit sector will need to attract and develop 640,000 new senior managers over the next decade.
In particular, there is a growing focus and demand for trained and experienced environmental organizers, as more organizations turn towards grassroots organizing as a strategy for change. During the Bush years, environmental organizations found that coordinated, large-scale public mobilization was needed to combat environmental rollbacks. Grassroots organizing was a key strategy in mobilizing public support to protect the Arctic Refuge, stop the “Clear Skies Initiative,” defend the Endangered Species Act, and elect more pro-environment candidates to office during the recent 2006 elections. Since 2000, many of the large national organizations, who traditionally focused on research, litigation, and lobbying, have started to develop or expand their abilities to mobilize their memberships and the larger public in order to advance bold solutions to the next generation of environmental problems. However, organizations are challenged to recruit and retain talented staff — particularly grassroots organizers – and most environmental organizations do not have the time or resources to invest in extensive staff recruitment efforts or training programs.
Energy Independence and Environment
