our Board and Staff

Our Board of Directors
	Charles Dunkerly, President First connecting to the environment as a West Virginia river guide, Charles is currently a film producer/director for the National Park Service. For the past ten years, he has worked on award-winning interpretive films, on topics as diverse as on the Olympic National Park, Thomas Jefferson, and "prescribed fires."


	Keith Alexander, Secretary
	Dr. Keith D. Alexander is Director of Archives at the Robert C. Byrd Center for Legislative Studies at Shepherd University. He also coordinates the Historic Preservation program, part of Shepherd University’s Institute for Environmental Studies. After graduating from Penn State in 1992, Alexander worked in Washington, DC as an environmental policy analyst before returning to graduate school. He received his MA in 1996 and his PhD in 2003 in history from the University of Maryland, completing his dissertation on the history of the German Green Party. He has been involved in historic preservation efforts in West Virginia and in Germany. His research interests include historic preservation and environmental sustainability, as well as service learning in preservation education.

	John McGrath, Treasurer
	John is an analyst for the Internal Revenue Service coordinating and managing information technology projects. Before graduating in from Penn State in 1990, he studied developmental economics in Lima, Peru. He worked in the privatization effort of state run companies in Budapest after the fall of communism. He has founded or helped build new technology companies in data warehousing for multi-unit restaurants and accounting compliance for federal contractors. He is a native of North East, PA and now resides in Shepherdstown, West Virginia.

	Catherine Irwin, Chair, Development Committee
	Catherine is the Director of the Contemporary American Theater Festival's Casting the Future Initiative. She was the CATF Managing Director from 1999 to the fall of 2004. Her theater management career includes work as the Director of Development of Arena Stage and Managing Director of the Living Stage Theater Company, Arena Stage's outreach program. She has also worked with the Round House Theatre, the African Continuum Theatre Company, Child's Play in Arizona and the MeadowBrook Theatre in Michigan. Catherine lives in Shepherdstown and is a member of the Rotary Club, having served on their Board as Vice-President and then as President. She was a member of the Leadership WV Class of 2001.

	Mark Madison, Chair, Selection and Programming Committee
	Mark Madison is the historian for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. He teaches environmental history to professional conservationists at the National Conservation Training Center . He has previously taught environmental history at Harvard University and the University of Melbourne (Australia). He has degrees in history, biology, and the history of science. For almost three years, as a Peace Corps volunteer, Mark did tropical reforestation in the rain forests of the Philippines.

	Steve Chase, National Conservation Training Center Liaison
	Steve Chase is the Chief of Facility Operations and Administration at the National Conservation Training Center of the Fish & Wildlife Service. He also oversees the NCTC Conservation Heritage Program and works on community-related projects. Steve graduated in 1983 from the University of Hartford , with a BA in Mass Communications and Earth Science. He received a Master of Public Administration from the Barney School of Business and Public Administration in 1990. He has served as a Legislative Fellow for the Connecticut State Legislature and was awarded a Presidential Management Internship in 1990.

	Amy Mathews Amos, Board Member
	Amy has 20 years experience working in environnmental science, policy and advocacy for non-profit conservation groups and government agencies. She holds a B.S. in natural resource management from Cornell University and graduate degrees in environmental science and public affairs from Indiana University's School of Public and Environmental Affairs. In 2001 she started her own consulting business, continuing to do research and advocacy work for conservation groups and charitable foundations, and assisting them with program development and strategic planning.


	Jeff Feldman, Board Member
	A leadership development trainer, team building facilitator and green building consultant, Jeff Feldman has been a teacher of one sort or another for over twenty years. With degrees in Environmental Education and Experiential Learning, Jeff served five years on the faculty at Penn State University. In 1993, Jeff founded Eagle’s View Enterprises, a leadership development and team building firm offering training, facilitation and coaching to leaders and organizations across the public and private sectors. Jeff’s latest venture, GreenPath Consulting, shares approaches and attitudes for living more lightly on the planet. Jeff lives in a passive solar, strawbale house with his wife, dogs, cats and chickens.


	Chris Hoelzl , Board Member
	As Vice President for Program Development for the Smithsonian Channel, Chris is responsible for the programming and development of all original productions, co-productions, and the acquisition of completed programming for Smithsonian Networks. Prior to this he worked for TLC when the network emerged as the pre-eminent non-fiction network on North American Cable. He was the lead development producer for all BBC and UK programming at TLC during his tenure, supervising more than 80 hours of programming annually. As a television and radio reporter he reported for NBC and NPR affiliates in the Midwest, and has worked as sports cinematographer on assignment for ESPN. He has worked as a writer and editor for Time-Life Books, and as a political consultant. He is a graduate of the University of Missouri, and holds an MA in journalism. He spent two years at German universities on scholarship studying History and Economics.

	Alexander Kemnitzer, Board Member
	Alexander has spent his entire life living along the banks of the Potomac River and the C&O canal. He currently lives in Shepherdstown and is a student at Shepherd University, majoring in Economics.

	Edward Leavy, Board Member
	Edward Leavy attended Columbia College in New York City graduating in 1964. He earned two law degrees including a Masters of Lawfrom New York University Law School. Since graduation from law school Edward has worked in various capacities as a civil rights attorney. Howeverover the past years he has seen that the despoliation of the environment is the most major threat to continued human habitation ofthe globe, and would like to put his remaining finite energies towards whatever steps can be taken to support any and all conservation efforts.

	Susan Womeldorf, Board Member
	Susan Womeldorf is a Family Medicine Physician working in the area. She has worked or volunteered as a physician in Malawi, various places in Honduras, and at several domestic clinics as well. Before going to Medical School, she worked as a Seasonal NPS Park Ranger, a Student Conservation Association Park Service Volunteer, and an AmeriCorps Service Member teaching environmental education in northern New Mexico. She feels at home in the desert, on the river, and at sea and after moving all over the country, she has made this little corner of West Virginia her home.

Our Staff
	Candi Byrne, Festival Director
	Candi has over 20 years experience in marketing and communications, designing media campaigns and strategic communications plans for government agencies, the private sector, non-profit organizations, and academic institutions. She holds a B.S. in Communications from the University of Maryland, and attended Rutgers University graduate program in Library and Information Sciences.

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