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SPEAKERS - PRESENTERS AREA 2024
| AYANA MELVAN, BA An Environmental Justice Movement: Centering Community in a Jargon Heavy Industry In an era where Environmental Justice is being centered in Environmental Education and the Environmental Industry more broadly how to we achieve justice while centering people and the communities they live in. Topics include addressing Environmental Racism, place-based strategies, acting as neutral convenors, and identifying success. We will talk through envisioning and implementing a 7 generation strategy where Environmental Justice will thrive.Ayana Melvan is the Director of Conservation Action with the Aquarium Conservation Partnership where she is responsible for strategic partnerships, policy, and advocacy with a special focus on Ocean and Environmental Justice and Equity. Ayana has led work with a racial equity lens using the collective impact approach locally and nationally for more than a decade. Ayana formerly worked as the Senior Director of Strategic Partnerships for Mission Programs at the Sea Research Foundation/Mystic Aquarium. She has worked in the field of youth development and education for over 20 years in several capacities, including most recently heading up the Youth Development work at United Way, and leading the Rhode Island After school Network, with a heavy focus on environmental justice with a racial equity lens. Ayana has led work with local and statewide initiatives including the Rhode Island Working Cities Challenge from the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston on ending racism and helping the City of Cranston create more equitable opportunities for youth and families. She has also led the work on eliminating the school to prison pipeline in Rhode Island for Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) youth with national and local entities. She has worked as a partner with Mystic Aquarium for over a decade in Connecticut and Rhode Island to help bring conservation-focused STEM education opportunities to lower income and BIPOC youth in out-of-school time. In her spare time, Ayana enjoys hanging out with her family at the beach, pool side, or outdoors and loves living in Westerly, RI. She spends most of her free time with her husband Mark, father Dwight, and two beautiful and amazing children Phoenix and Kingston along with Percy and Pippin’ the furbabies of the house. |
KEYNOTE AREA 2024
| CAPTAIN DAVE MONTI Dave grew up on the water and has been shell fishing, fishing, and boating all his life. He held a scallop license on Nantucket for 15 years, where he scalloped during the fall and winter months. Dave holds a master captain’s license and works as a charter fishing captain, keeps his charter boat in Warwick, RI and fishes in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island and Block Island Sound. Capt. Monti is the fishing columnist for the Providence Journal (the major daily newspaper in RI) and writes for eleven other newspapers, blogs and magazines. He also is a regular contributor to the Marine Fish Conservation Network blog and a writer/editor of the Saltwater Anglers Association Magazine. Dave writes about the environment, fishing policy, regulations and ocean issues such as spatial planning, federal and state fishing law, offshore wind energy, climate change impacts on fish and fishing as well as fishing tactics and strategies. Dave is a recreational fisheries communications consultant and advocate, is past vice chair of the RI Marine Fisheries Council, serves as an active member of the RI Saltwater Anglers Association (the largest recreational fishing association in the northeast with over 7,500 affiliated members), is a member of the Rhode Island Party & Charter Boat Association, is a founding board member of the American Saltwater Guides Association, and serves as vice chair on the steering committee for the Narragansett Bay Estuary Program. He formerly worked in the advertising and public relations industry, as partner and treasurer of the RDW Group marketing and digital communications firm. |
