Worldviews create worlds. Our civilizational crossroads reflects a crisis of consciousness. Everything's going to change, and the only question is how.
For our 30th conference, "Seeding the Field: Growing Transformative Solutions," we've assembled a visionary program reflecting decades of transformative solutions and trail-blazing pathways that this growing community has so brilliantly developed.
An idea whose time has come is unstoppable. Please join with us to help realize 30 years of transformative solutions and make the Revolution from the Heart of Nature and the Human Heart. October 18-20, San Rafael, CA.
2019 Keynote Speakers
Valarie Kaur
Founder | Revolutionary Love Project
Valarie Kaur, born into a family of Sikh farmers who settled in California in 1913, is a seasoned civil rights activist, award-winning filmmaker, lawyer, faith leader, and founder of the Revolutionary Love Project, which seeks to champion love as a public ethic and wellspring for social action.
Bill McKibben
Founder | 350.org
Bill McKibben, our nation’s most significant environmental activist, is also a leading journalist, author and academic. A Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College, Bill’s The End of Nature (1989) was the first book for a general audience about climate change. A founder of 350.org, the first planet-wide, grassroots climate change movement, he has won slews of prestigious awards, including the Right Livelihood Award and the Gandhi Prize and Thomas Merton prizes.
Eve Ensler
Founder | V-Day
Eve Ensler, Tony Award-winning playwright, performer, and one of the world’s most important activists on behalf of women’s rights, is the author of many plays, including, most famously the extraordinarily influential and impactful The Vagina Monologues, which has been performed all over the globe in 50 or so languages.
Heather McTeer Toney
National Field Director | Moms Clean Air Force
Heather McTeer Toney, born and raised in Greenville, Mississippi, was elected that town’s first African-American, first female, and youngest ever Mayor at the age of 27. After her 2nd term, she became Regional Administrator for the EPA’s Southeast Region, appointed by President Obama. A nationally and internationally renowned, award-winning leader in Environmental and Climate Justice, she is currently Field Director for Moms Clean Air Force, an organization of over 1 million parents committed to fighting climate change and air pollution.
Terry Tempest Williams
Author
Terry Tempest Williams, one of the greatest living authors from the American West, is also a longtime award-winning conservationist and activist, who has taken on, among other issues, nuclear testing, the Iraq War, the neglect of women’s health, and the destruction of nature, especially in her beloved “Red Rock” region of her native Utah and in Alaska.
Isha Clarke
Climate Justice Organizer | Youth Vs. Apocalypse
Isha Clarke is a dynamic, passionate high school student environmental and social justice activist born, raised, and educated in Oakland, CA. Her experience has taught her first-hand that threats to the environment disproportionately affect people of color, low-income folks, and young people, and this realization has fueled her passion to fight to create a just and equitable world while maintaining a livable climate.
Paul Hawken
Founder | Project Drawdown
Paul Hawken, one of the most important environmental authors, activists, thinkers and entrepreneurs of our era, has dedicated his life to sustainability and changing the relationship between business and the environment. His many bestselling books include such massively influential texts as: The Next Economy; The Ecology of Commerce; Blessed Unrest; and most recently, Drawdown, The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reverse Global Warming.
Monika Bauerlein
CEO | Mother Jones
Monika Bauerlein is CEO of Mother Jones, the American Society of Magazine Editors’ 2017 Magazine of the Year. Previously, she served as co-editor with Clara Jeffery, who is now editor-in-chief. Together, they spearheaded an era of editorial growth and innovation, marked by tenfold growth in audience and newsroom staff.
Jerry Tello
| Sacred Circles Center
Jerry Tello of Mexican, Texan and Coahuiltecan ancestry, raised in South Central Los Angeles, has worked for 40+ years as a leading expert in transformational healing for men and boys of color; racial justice; peaceful community mobilization; and providing domestic violence awareness, healing and support services to war veterans and their spouses.
Demond Drummer
Co-Founder and Executive Director | New Consensus
Demond Drummer is the Chicago-based co-founder and Executive Director of New Consensus, a nonprofit working to develop and promote the Green New Deal that has advised many progressive leaders and organizations, including Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the Sunrise Movement. Demond’s other notable projects include CoderSpace, a computer science learning lab where youths develop leadership skills, and LargeLots.org, a community-driven effort to reclaim and city-owned vacant lots in Chicago.
Julian Brave Noisecat
Director of Green Strategy | Data for Progress
Julian Brave NoiseCat, Director of Green Strategy at the think tank, Data for Progress, and “Narrative Change Director” for the Natural History Museum artist and activist collective, is also a correspondent for Real America with Jorge Ramos and a Contributing Editor at Canadian Geographic.
Kenny Ausubel
CEO and Founder | Bioneers
Kenny Ausubel, CEO and founder (in 1990) of Bioneers, is an award-winning social entrepreneur, journalist, author and filmmaker. Co-founder and first CEO of the organic seed company, Seeds of Change, his film (and companion book) Hoxsey: When Healing Becomes a Crime helped influence national alternative medicine policy. He has edited several books and written four, including, most recently, Dreaming the Future: Reimagining Civilization in the Age of Nature.
Leila Salazar-López
Executive Director | Amazon Watch
Leila Salazar-López, the Executive Director of Amazon Watch, has worked for 20+ years to defend the world’s rainforests, human rights, and the climate through grassroots organizing and international advocacy campaigns at Amazon Watch, Rainforest Action Network, Global Exchange, and Green Corps. She is also a Greenpeace Voting Member and a Global Fund for Women Advisor for Latin America.
Nina Simons
Co-Founder | Bioneers
Nina Simons, co-founder of Bioneers and its Chief Relationship Strategist is also co-founder of Women Bridging Worlds and Connecting Women Leading Change. She co-edited the anthology book, Moonrise: The Power of Women Leading from the Heart, and most recently wrote Nature, Culture & The Sacred: A Woman Listens for Leadership. An award-winning social entrepreneur, Nina teaches and speaks internationally, and previously served as President of Seeds of Change and Director of Strategic Marketing for Odwalla.
brandon king
Founding Member | Cooperation Jackson
brandon king is an community organizer and cultural worker originally from Hampton Roads VA, currently living in Jackson MS. After graduating from Hampton University in 2006 with a BA in Sociology, brandon moved to New York City where he worked as a union organizer and later as an organizer working with New York City homeless people.
Casey Camp-Horinek
Councilwoman | Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma
Casey Camp-Horinek, a tribal Councilwoman of the Ponca Tribe of Oklahoma and Hereditary Drumkeeper of its Womens' Scalp Dance Society, Elder and Matriarch, is also an Emmy award winning actress, author, and an internationally renowned, longtime Native and Human Rights and Environmental Justice activist. She led efforts for the Ponca tribe to adopt a Rights of Nature Statute and pass a moratorium on fracking on its territory, and has traveled and spoken around the world.
Mishka Banuri
Co-Founder | Utah Youth Environmental Solutions
Mishka Banuri is an 18-year-old organizer from Salt Lake City, Utah. After moving to Utah from a suburb in Chicago, she fell in love with the Colorado Plateau's mountains and red rock. She has been politically active since 7th grade, holding statewide organizations, institutions, and politicians accountable for their actions on climate and social issues.
David Orr
Professor | Oberlin College
David W. Orr, a Professor of Environmental Studies & Politics (Emeritus) at Oberlin College, is a pioneering, award-winning thought leader in the fields of Sustainability and Ecological Literacy. The author and co-author of countless articles and papers and several seminal books, including, most recently, Dangerous Years: Climate Change and the Long Emergency, he has served as a board member or adviser to many foundations and organizations (including Bioneers!). His current work is on the state of our democracy.
Thanks to Our Conference Sponsors
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