About
Background
Having a global footprint in 70+ countries and all 7 continents, with degrees in Economics and Education from the University of Virginia, I'm currently taking courses towards my Masters in Global Development Practice from Harvard Extension School, or as I call it Hardvard, I infuse my daily living practices with a green lifestyle. I'm working towards my 2nd Masters concentrating in both Creating Sustainable Cities and Communities and Social Justice so I can help our local marginalized members of the Charlottesville community while assisting and facilitating projects and ventures globally.
Born and raised in Zionsville, Indiana, I started my first official business at age 15 distributing tie-dyed shirts. I never thought when I started babysitting for neighbors as a 9-year-old, that my most successful business would be a childcare service I created for the US Army Special Ops in the Southeastern US.
Hobbies
When I'm not managing a litany of projects and adventurous ventures, I love to help people through voluntarism. l also love anything outdoors from golf to tennis, hiking to mountain biking, I always maintain an annual pass to the Shenandoah National Park. When the weather is nice, I take my foster dogs for hikes while indulging in my passion for nature photography.
Having lived, worked, studied, or traveled to over 70 countries and all 7 continents, I'm exceptionally grateful to have explored many places most people will never see or imagine. From the untapped rainforests of the Sarawak province of Malaysia on Borneo to the jungles of the Congo to spend time with a gorilla family of 13, I'm truly grateful for these endeavors and opportunities.
Although my extreme risk-taking in sports and sporty activities has waned as I've gotten older, I still like to scuba dive in awesome places like the blue holes of Andros, Bahamas, or skydive in unique places like the Namib desert near Swakopmund, Namibia. I also appreciate extreme swimming to the point of being kicked off Wrightsville Beach for life for outswimming 3 lifeguards, including the head lifeguard, as I like to swim past the piers and have done so on several occasions from North Carolina to Los Angeles, from 4-5 miles each adventurous swim.
My favorite activities also include exploring exotic cuisines including cooking as well as always trying to partake in local cooking classes wherever my passport takes me. Trying to reduce my carbon footprint, I didn't own a car for 10 years in addition to not owning a cell phone for 7 years.
Favorite Things
Although the focus of Managing Love, the 501c3 I founded, is International Economic Development, we facilitate many local and domestic issues as well. From our small production company, Vision Forward Media to the Love Mother Earth Kids Climate Club program which was funded by a Dave Matthews Band BAMA grant, we have many programs including International Villas which happens to also be my Harvard capstone.
My small consulting business, Managing Projects, has had clients ranging from the US Army Special Ops to the Royal family of Saudi Arabia, from serving UHNW families to serving the currently homeless and refugee populations of Charlottesville, my various teams pride ourselves on providing exceptional service and the highest quality of service while infusing our clients' rate of return in a positive manner. Having facilitated global policy helping the currently unhoused at the United Nations, we are currently working on creating new policy towards combatting child trafficking in the State of Virginia before working on novel federal policy.
My small production company, Vision Forward Media, already had our first documentary short premiere at the United Nations, and our production team just completed our first award=winning documentary in our social justice documentary film series:
If It Could Happen to Me, It Could Happen to You.
The Super Kids Group book series creates children's books on difficult topics from children being trafficked to divorce, cancer to climate change, each book has 5 vocabulary words and 5 discovery questions for further discussion and understanding.
Currently, I'm leading a team of Harvard students in creating Trafficking Tales, a compilation of short stories to facilitate trafficked survivors in their healing and therapeutic modalities. I also sit on the Central Virginia Task Force to Combat Human Trafficking.
Recently selected by the Darden School of Business as the 'fashion expert' for their Ethics and Sustainability conference, it brings me great joy to discuss why EcoChic Boutique, which focuses on selling bamboo, hemp, and organic cotton blends as well as Fair Trade jewelry and gifts from our global suppliers, is making strides in the world of fashion.
Teaching little ones from all over the world brings me so much joy, but guest lecturing at my alma mater on the Empirical Analysis of Secondhand Commodities, Slow Fashion, Fast Fashion, and Social Entrepreneurship brings contentment knowing that I am helping to shape young adults in their purchasing power in the area of fashion. We are slowly transitioning EcoChic Boutique to a B-Corp.
