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SGN board of directors

Laurel Anderson
PRESIDENT  
Laurel Anderson is a founding member of the School Garden Network. She worked as the garden teacher for 14 years at Salmon Creek School where she loved to cook up the harvest with students and look for interesting insects!
She currently is the coordinator of SGN’s Schoolyard Habitat Program- providing professional development opportunities and helping schools design and use habitat projects as an extension of the classroom.
Laurel is also passionate about  seedsaving  and is very active with the Community Seed Exchange.
Scotty Brown
Raised in West Sonoma County and deeply rooted in the community, Scotty attended Oak Grove elementary, Willowside Jr. High and El Molino High School growing up.
A father of four, Scotty holds a certification in the Human Services field while serving on numerous boards in Sonoma County and beyond.
His hope is to better be in service for the kids and land of our area and feels that joining the School Garden Network can help do that.
Katherine Golfinopoulos
SECRETARY
​Katherine believes in the power of growing beautiful gardens to sustain healthy kids, vibrant communities, and a resilient planet. She has taught children in Honduras and Utah’s canyon country, as well as adult learners in Slovenia and Arizona. As the Horticulturist for the Arboretum at Flagstaff in Arizona, she stewarded native plant conservation projects and helped others learn about and appreciate the region’s native and endemic plants. In the high elevation desert of the Colorado Plateau, Katherine mentored K-8 teachers from the Four Corners region of Arizona, Utah, Colorado, and New Mexico to provide professional development in hands-on, place-based education so that teachers would have greater support and resources to take their students outside.
 
She holds a Master’s degree in Sustainable Communities with a focus on place-based and ecological education. Katherine currently manages the educational community farm for Petaluma Bounty and is thrilled to be calling Sonoma County her new home.
Tina Poles
Tina Poles has been teaching  at Sonoma Country Day School since 2007 and is also the director of the sustainability and environmental science program. She currently the lower school science teacher and also runs the school garden.
Before SCDS, Tina was the Director of School Gardens at Occidental Arts and Ecology Center. In that capacity, she was able to visit hundreds of school gardens around the state, and see best practices in a wide range of schools. Tina has a permiculture design certificate and completed a four year Waldorf teacher training program. As a 2010 fellow at the Leadership Institute for Ecology and Economy, Tina spent the year studying local food systems, energy and waste management, water uses, business practices, transportation and social justice. She was a 2017 fellow at the Center for Climate Protection Center.
Tina has a number of publications about School Gardens, including a Handful of Seeds.
Tina lives  in a co-housing community in Cotati. She was a founding member, working on the development, design, legal, and marketing aspects of the project.
Carmen Snyder
TREASURER
Carmen Snyder is the Executive Director of Sonoma County Farm Trails, a nonprofit started by farmers in 1973 to bring awareness to the importance of local food, to promote agritourism, and to facilitate direct sales.  Inspired by Sonoma County’s thriving, diverse agricultural community, Carmen is passionate about supporting local farmers and working to preserve farms forever. She oversees Farm Trails operations and events, from budgets to band selection, and is most interested in cultivating community, bridging gaps, building resilience, and fulfilling Farm Trails' mission to instill an appreciation of ag as the vital part of our lifestyle. Carmen sits on the advisory board of Colorado State University’s Western US Agritourism Project.  She also serves as a member of the Sonoma County Food System Alliance, a county-based coalition of stakeholders and leaders working to improve our food system through community engagement and collective action. ​

SGN staff

Laurel Anderson
SCHOOLYARD HABITAT 
​COORDINATOR
Laurel Anderson is a founding member of the School Garden Network. She worked as the garden teacher for 14 years at Salmon Creek School where she loved to cook up the harvest with students and look for interesting insects!
She currently is the coordinator of SGN’s Schoolyard Habitat Program- providing professional development opportunities and helping schools design and use habitat projects as an extension of the classroom.
Laurel is also passionate about  seedsaving  and is very active with the Community Seed Exchange.
Alania Cowie 
HEALTHY ROOTS
​INSTRUCTOR
​Alania joins us from the world of organic retail where she sourced and sold hand-crafted products for babies and children. After selling her store and relocating with her family to Sonoma County she pursued her passion for food and health with a certification in Holistic Nutrition. Alania is an avid home chef and gardener, forager, food preserver and seed saver. She is a garden nutrition educator at Rainbow Garden Preschool in Kenwood where she shares her love of edible plants with 3 and 4 year olds.
As a mother of 2 young daughters and 2 grown stepsons, Alania has had much opportunity to test recipes, cook with kids and pass along her knowledge of eating well. She believes that healthy food must be delicious and fun!
Sue Davis
PROGRAM DIRECTOR
 Sue has 15 years of experience working with non-profits and community organizations that focus on sustainable agriculture and education. She is dedicated to the mission and vision of the School Garden Network and has spent many years previously serving on its Board of Directors and developing and evaluating its programs.   She has a background in farming and nutrition and is a founding and active member of the Bohemian Farmers' Collective as well as an independent contractor for small businesses.  She holds a M.A. in Leadership and Humanities and a certification in Holistic Nutrition Education.  Sue is raising 2 young girls and enjoys the journey of motherhood while weaving together family, farming and personal interest for a dynamic and meaningful experience.
Annie Klein
APPRENTICESHIP &
​WATER WISE
PROJECT MANAGER
​As an environmental educator, “coyote teacher,” organic farmer, and sociologist, Annie enjoys weaving together her wilderness knowledge and passion for exploring the natural world to mentor youth as conscious earth stewards. She has been the co-founder and director of Coyote Camp at Ocean Song Farm and Wilderness Center in West Sonoma County since 2005. Recently awarded the “Best Summer Day Camp” in 2017 by the North Bay Bohemian, Coyote Camp is a summer day camp that focuses on place-based, experiential nature education. In her 13 years as an Ocean Song resident, Annie has worked with the Bohemian Farmer’s Collective (BFC) to manage Ocean Song’s CCOF organic farm. She has developed and facilitated numerous children’s environmental education programs on the land including Coyote Tracks, Raven Moon, and Scout Skills. She is currently working with the BFC to grow seeds for their local seed company, Bohemian Seeds. She holds a BA in Sociology from UC Berkeley. As the mother of a 3 year old son, she is deeply committed to helping create a more balanced world rooted in peace, love and justice for all relations and the generations yet to come. Annie is excited to join the School Garden Network team as the Project Manager for the School Garden Apprenticeship Program in 2018.
Anne Loarie
HEALTHY ROOTS
PROGRAM MANAGER
 ​An educator by trade, food justice advocate by calling, and passionate by nature, Anne believes that dynamic food literacy programming will affect our health outcomes and lead to stronger, happier, and more connected communities. Anne envisions an education system that integrates whole child concepts through authentic, inquiry led, project-based learning so that our youth have the skills and opportunities to self-actualize in an increasingly hectic and yet isolating society.
 
Anne has a BA in Environmental Studies and Politics from the University of Oregon and a “MA in Life” by serving in the Peace Corps as a permaculture volunteer in the Ngäbe-Bugle Indigenous Reservation in Panama. She cut her teeth on public education in a San Francisco Spanish immersion school before making her way back up north where she landed in Sonoma County with her family. All the while she has witnessed the deterioration of food culture and food systems in our communities and how this has contributed to a poverty of well-being.
 
She is currently the Garden and Wellness Educator at Alexander Valley School and enthusiastically joins School Garden Network to help build upon our vision to empower youth to embrace healthy eating habits and to develop respect for and stewardship of all living things.
Annie Silverman
HEALTHY ROOTS PROJECT MANAGER
Annie has worked at the intersection of agriculture and education for several years. Her passion for school gardens is rooted in a college internship in which she worked as a school garden intern in a preschool classroom in South Tucson. This experience opened her eyes to the beauty of a school garden’s ability to build community and increase nutritional awareness in a relaxed and organic way. After she graduated from the University of Arizona in 2010, her journey never led her far from growing food.  Whether using the garden as on outdoor learning space in her own preschool classroom to managing a small organic farm in Homer, Alaska, she has always been interested in how to marry agriculture and education in way that builds community resilience. Previous to moving to Sonoma County, she lived in Fairbanks, Alaska where she earned a master’s degree in Professional Communication focusing on agricultural education throughout the state.
Lynn Wheeler
Administrator

A native of Pueblo, Colorado, Lynn landed in California by way of long hot summers in the Panhandle of Texas on her grandparent’s farm.  Lessons learn there paved the way for her life as an environmentalist, a mother, a winemaker, and a business owner.
Earning a B.S. in Botany from UC Davis, Lynn managed the CSA at the student organic farm, went on to cataloged the flora of Rocky Mountain National Park, and was the program director at Eco-Farm for several years before moving to Sonoma County to start a family and a winery.  17 harvests, 2 girls, Tofu the dog, a winery, and countless wines later Lynn is very excited to join the School Garden Network team.
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When Lynn is not at the winery or organizing files, her passion is in the garden with her girls or as the Garden Coordinator at the French American Charter School in Santa Rosa.  She values the lessons the garden can provide and strives to instill environmental stewardship alongside the joy of growing your own food.
If you're interested in learning more about our Board of Directors and our amazing staff,
​contact info@schoolgardens.org