Category: Speakers

Dr. Ellen Bronson

DR. ELLEN BRONSON

Senior Director of Animal Health, Conservation, and Research, Maryland Zoo

Ellen Bronson, DVM, DACZM, graduated from the Freie Universitaet Berlin with a degree in veterinary medicine. After graduation, she completed multiple training programs, including a one year internship in small animal medicine in Indiana, a two year internship in zoo medicine at the Maryland Zoo, and a three year residency in zoo medicine at Smithsonian’s National Zoological Park. She started as a staff veterinarian at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore in 2006. She became a board-certified specialist in zoo and wildlife medicine with the American College of Zoological Medicine (ACZM) in 2007. She is currently the Senior Director of Animal Health, Conservation, and Research at the Maryland Zoo, and oversees the veterinary and nutrition programs, as well as field conservation and research endeavors at the zoo. Her field experience and interests center especially around the human-domestic animal-wildlife interface, in species ranging from Maryland black bears, bog turtles, snowy owls, and Bolivian river dolphins. Her current position is her absolute dream job, but if she didn’t work at the zoo, she would be a full-time field researcher in some remote corner of the globe!

Elise Bernardoni

ELISE BERNARDONI

Director of Engagement, Canopy Strategic Partners

Elise Bernardoni is the Director of Engagement at Canopy Strategic Partners, helping mission-driven organizations improve the planet. Previously, she was the Assistant Director for Education Programs at Friends of the National Zoo (FONZ), where she worked for 14 years, overseeing various education programs and managing special projects. She is an active advocate for zoo-based conservation organizations, an instructor for AZA professional development courses, and the national education co-advisor for the Felid Taxonomic Advisory Group.

Elise holds a BFA in Drama from Carnegie Mellon University and an MA in Teaching; Museum Education from The George Washington University. Passionate about youth conservation, she is a Connecticut native who enjoys traveling, kayaking, and wildlife spotting.

Jaxson Mack

JAXSON MACK

Urban Forester, Casey Trees

Jax is a charismatic and innovative conservation biologist who is passionate about increasing community involvement and environmental education. He has created national environmental initiatives, organized large volunteer teams, worked to rebuild forests, and spoken to diverse stakeholder communities. He is especially committed to increasing participation within Citizen Science projects and increasing forested habitat for migratory species.

Currently, Jax protects the Chesapeake Bay by increasing canopy cover. Within his position as Assistant Director, Jax has created national upcycle programs, Leave No Trace trainings , and begun the orginazation’s first environmental committee. While working for the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, he guided landowners to foster better ecosystems on their own properties and worked with Title I schools around the country to implement scientific tools for research. During his graduate studies at the University of Rhode Island, Jax directed conservation efforts with the Nature Conservancy to protect genetic heritage of mammals on surrounding islands. He has developed a wide and unique set of skills, perfect for tackling large conservation issues.

Dr. Alan Byrd

DR. ALAN BYRD

Dean of Admissions, George Mason University

Alan Byrd began his tenure as Dean of Admissions at George Mason University in November 2020. With over 20 years of experience in enrollment management and community engagement, Dr. Byrd has a long, successful track record of leading, planning, and coordinating student recruitment and retention initiatives. He brings a team-oriented, data-driven recruitment approach to Mason that prioritizes exceptional service and commitment to student success.

Prior to Mason, Dr. Byrd was the chief enrollment officer at the University of Missouri-St. Louis. He led UMSL to several new milestones for enrollment growth, diversity of the student body, the academic profile of incoming students, and graduation rates. Removing financial barriers for students was central to his work in St. Louis, where he developed innovative financial aid programs such as the “UMSL Grant” and “Finish Your Degree Scholarship” that reduced the average student loan debt at graduation by 12% and earned UMSL national recognition as a top 100 institution for social mobility according to U.S. News & World Report.

Dr. Byrd received his Ph.D. in Educational Leadership and Policy Studies at UMSL. He earned a B.A. in Communication and an M.A. in Higher Education Administration from Southeast Missouri State University.

Claudia Quintanilla

CLAUDIA QUINTANILLA

Director of Capacity Development, Rare

Claudia is passionate about contributing to community and environmental well-being.

In her current role as Director of Capacity Development at Rare, she guides and supports the creation of training and program delivery support tools for the implementation of the Fish Forever program in the Philippines, Indonesia, Mozambique, Brazil and Mesoamerican Reef Region. Her previous Rare experiences include Training Director for the Brazil and Latin America offices which included coordinating the customization, execution and evaluation of global curriculum for the fisheries management, reciprocal water agreements and alumni programs implementing projects in Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Brazil.

Prior to joining Rare, she was Peace Corps Mexico’s Technical Trainer for the Technology Transference and Environmental Programs and Peace Corps Honduras’ Programming & Training Specialist for the Protected Areas Management Program. Before that, she worked with the European Union and ChildFund on consultant projects in environmental education and risk management with public school teachers, communities and municipal leaders in Central America; taught an undergraduate Ecology class for nearly five years and conducted numerous qualitative environmental assessments. Claudia holds Environmental Engineering and Management degrees.

Renee Grebe

RENEE GREBE

Northern Virginia Conservation Advocate, Nature Forward

Renee Grebe is Nature Forward’s Northern Virginia Conservation Advocate. With a background in user-experience design, she brings her ability to see issues from many sides in order to determine the best path forward to the field of environmental advocacy and education. She serves on Fairfax County’s Environmental Quality Advisory Council, leads invasive plant removals through Fairfax County’s IMA program, installed a rain garden on her homeowner association’s common property, and has been certified as a Virginia Master Naturalist since 2014.

Christine McCoy

Christine McCoy is a solid waste and recycling professional who has worked for the public, private, and nonprofit sectors of the industry, focusing on reuse, waste prevention, recycling composting, and energy-from-waste. Ms. McCoy became interested in solid waste during a stint as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Commonwealth of Dominica, a small island in the Caribbean. Upon her return to the U.S., Christine obtained a M.A. in Cultural and Environmental Geography from Louisiana State University, where she focused on sustainable solid waste management on small islands of the Caribbean. Christine is also a past board member of the NRC and the Virginia Recycling Association.

Brandt Ryder, Ph.D.

BRANDT RYDER, PH.D.

Research Scientist

Brandt was born and raised in Acton, MA and was a naturalist from an early age. He received his bachelors of science in 1999 from a small environmental school in Maine called Unity College. Brandt completed his Ph.D. in Biology in 2008 from the University of Missouri-St. Louis. Dr. Ryder has worked as a Research Scientist at the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute for the las 10 years. Brandt is a broadly trained avian ecologist that works on the migration, behavior and conservation of birds. His research program leverages novel tracking approaches to study the complex social networks of animals and document the movement patterns of migratory birds. Effective conservation requires understanding when and where birds face threats and how social systems contribute to population persistence.

Tracey Barnes

TRACEY BARNES

Senior Animal Keeper, Great Cats and Bears, Smithsonian National Zoological Park

Tracey Barnes is a senior animal keeper at the Smithsonian’s National Zoological Park, where she began as a keeper aide in the Mammal Department in 1994. She has been involved with the care of everything from elephant shrews to elephants (including a number of non-mammals), but her areas of specialty have been primarily bears, great cats, cheetahs and hoofstock. For the past 17 years, she has worked exclusively for the Great Cats and Bears Unit, where she currently cares for African lions, Amur and Sumatran tigers, Andean bears, small cats and other small carnivores, a variety of rodents, and domestic farm animals.

Kristina Vsevolodova

KRISTINA VSEVOLODOVA

Research Intern, Elephants

Kristina is a lifelong animal lover. Currently she lives in the outer suburbs of Washington DC, however she spent majority of her adult life down under in Australia. Kristina graduated from The University of Melbourne with a Bachelor of Science and a major in Zoology. With her degree she was fortunate enough to have the flexibility to explore different subjects as she was unsure as to what her future held. In the end she focused on conservation genomics, a field to which she had never been exposed before. This led Kristina to return to her childhood ambition of working in wildlife conservation and, given this opportunity at the Smithsonian National Zoo, she is on her way to living her dream.

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