My mission – as a researcher and educator – is to contribute to solving social and environmental problems through sustainability education and civic engagement among youth in urban communities, organizations, and schools. I worked in environmental education since 1996, first in a Siberian nonprofit and then in the U.S. and internationally. After finishing my PhD on sense of place and urban environmental education, I taught through the Cornell’s Civic Ecology Lab a number of global online courses for environmental educators. My academic interests focus on environmental and sustainability education, urban agriculture education, green cities, and professional development of environmental educators. I am also the first editor of the Urban Environmental Education Review 30-chapter book (Cornel University Press, 2017). Outside teaching and research, I am a traveler (all 7 continents, 50 US states, and 38 countries so far), lover of national parks, vegan, and avid reader.
