SSC Staff

Jon Barrows

Trainings Director - Washington, DC

Jon started organizing as a high school student in the beautiful state of Maine. He first joined the SSC in 1998 while interning with the NH Chapter of the Club. He was a founding member of the Trainings Department, helping to create the current model of SPROGs, staffing a near record number of programs over the next 4 years.

Jon coordinated the Vote Environment campaign during the 2000 election for the SSC, worked as a Conservation Organizer with the NH Chapter on sprawl and forestry issues, served as the NH Chapter Chair during his two year stint at Antioch New England Graduate School (home of the nation's first Master's level degree for Advocacy & Organizing), made a foray into the world of high school biology teaching, and coordinated the Greenpeace Organizing Term in the Fall of '06.

He is grateful to be back home at the SSC, helping expand and shape our training programs.  Jon was also the Co-Chair of the Power Shift '09 Steering Committee of the Energy Action Coalition.

When not training students to be more effective organizers, Jon enjoys contra dancing, ultimate frisbee, and writing poetry.

Jenny Bedell-Stiles

Northwest Regional Organizer - Portland, OR

Jenny began organizing as a college student at the University of Oregon, leading a campaign to pressure campus Housing to give dorm residents the option of purchasing wind power to cover their personal energy consumption. She also spearheaded a project to gather data for a university greenhouse gas audit.

After graduating in 2006 with an Honors degree in Environmental Studies and Political Science, she accepted a position with the environmental leadership training program, Green Corps. In the following year she traveled across the country, organizing for Wisconsin League of Conservation Voters, Minnesota Environmental Partnership, and Vermont Public Interest Research Group. Her experiences further solidified her commitment to student organizing, addressing the climate crisis, and love for her Portland home. Upon returning to Portland, Jenny helped launch the Cascade Climate Network, the PNW’s regional college student climate activism group. After a brief foray into the national political scene with the National Environmental Trust and organizing for Earth Day with Focus the Nation, Jenny is stoked to be returning to her roots, working with the most passionate students to organize in the Pacific Northwest to address climate change!

When not working with fantastic, inspiring young people on climate solutions, Jenny can often be found biking and walking the streets of Portland, hiking, reading movement and non-movement books, watching $3 movies, and tossing around frisbees.

Maura Cowley

Campaign Director - Washington, DC

Transitioning from the SSC's Northeast Organizer to its National Campaign Director, Maura has been with the SSC since August of 2006. She began organizing while attending Penn State University, where she served as the president of the university's environmental activist organization for two years. During that time, she coordinated two successful campaigns and had the privilege of working with some top-notch student organizers. Together, they organized Penn State's Farm to College campaign, which asked the university to purchase locally grown produce. Following the campaign, Maura was hired by Penn State to implement the school's Farm to College program. While she was wrapping up the Farm to College program, Maura began coordinating a campaign asking Penn State to commit to a comprehensive energy policy which included renewable energy purchasing, energy efficiency and conservation and on-site renewable energy generation. The campaign was supported by over 4,500 students at Penn State and received local, regional and national media attention.

Maura graduated from Penn State in August of 2006 with majors in political science, anthropology and economics. After graduating, she jumped right into her job, which was created as a result of the SSC/Climate Campaign Merger. She is very excited to be working with dedicated and talented student leaders from across the Northeast on the issue that she believes truly is the challenge of our generation- global warming.

Aside from working with students to win rocking victories, Maura also enjoys traveling, spending time with friends, reading and hiking.

Sasha Shyduroff

Rust Belt Regional Organizer - Pittsburgh, PA

 

Sasha was born in Boston and lived in Cambridge, MA until moving to mid-coast Maine at age 11. It was during this time that Sasha developed her appreciation for the environment and started getting involved in local activism. During her gap year, Sasha was chairman of Windplanners, a group of students and community members interested in building a wind turbine at the local high school.

Sasha then moved across the country to attend Reed College in Portland, OR where she graduated with a BA in Anthropology in 2008. Sasha was actively involved both in environmental and social justice work on campus. She helped institutionalize environmental efforts by pushing the administration to form the Sustainability Committee and draft the college’s first Sustainability Policy. In the fall of 2007, Sasha co-founded the Cascade Climate Network, the regional student network. Sasha interned for four years at the Multicultural Resource Center creating programs around issues of social justice and supporting a diverse student body.

In 2008 Sasha joined the SSC staff for Change the Climate ’08/Power Vote as a Campus Organizer at Ohio University in Athens. She fell in love with Ohio and Appalachia, and is excited to be back working in the region.

Sasha is a life-long vegetarian and enjoys knitting, cooking, sailing and being near water. She’s passionate about feminism and always enjoys a good conversation over a cup of tea.

Kim Teplitzky

Field Coordinator - Pittsburgh, PA

Before starting as the SSC's National Field Coordinator, Kim was a Regional Organizer helping students campaign for sustainable campuses and communities in Pa., Ohio, Mich. and W.Va and was a founding member of the Energy Action Coalition.  

As a student, she led a wind power campaign on her campus and attended her first SSC SPROG (summer training program) which led her to a trainings internship in the SSC's DC office. It was there she stepped up to work with the Conservation and Energy Committees and through them she helped organize the U.S. and international youth presence at the U.N. Climate Negotiations in Montreal in 2005.

Previously, she interned with Campus Progress where, among other things, she blogged undercover from conservative events and was a Young People For 2006 Fellow.  Kim loves traveling in Latin America, playing and coaching basketball, seeing small local bands in small local venues and cooking delicious food.

Zo Tobi

Northeast Regional Organizer - Keene, NH
Zo joined the youth clean energy movement at Clark University in 2003, finished an International Development degree in 2007, and chose to forgo a free master's degree to organize full-time in 2008.

Zo was raised in New Hampshire by his father Ariel and his mother Nancy.  Ariel, born into a working-class Israeli home, married after serving in Israel's elite paratrooper force, and, with little English, launched a house-painting business to support his young family.  Nancy, born into a middle-class Jewish-American home, has juggled motherhood and employment in the corporate world, while somehow making a name for herself as an environmental & democracy advocate.

Through long walks in the woods and long days on the painting ladder with his father, Zo learned that all creation deserves reverence, all children deserve a chance, and all work deserves care.  Through his mother's organizing for citywide recycling during his young years and now for election protection, Zo learned we all have a responsibility to each another, and, with a little courage and strategy, we all can make a difference.

In his spare time, Zo is a Bikram Yoga enthusiast and has performed as a progressive folk-rock songwriter in the New England college scene. He may pursue music full-time, attend Rabbinical school, or take up holistic healing, after having attended to some of the converging catastrophies of the 21st century.

Cody Young

Great Lakes Regional Organizer - Madison, WI
Cody started organizing at Indiana University with INPIRG (Indiana Public Interest Research Group), where he helped initiate an office of sustainability and created the largest coalition in IU history. The coalition began working with local residents and organized concerts, marches, workshops, and discussions.

After graduation, he stayed in Bloomington and helped build one of the largest organic farms in Indiana, an experience that helped him recognize the power of communities. I began to see that community organizing is the only way that we, as nation, will ever adequately address some of the most dire problems in our country and our world. He joined the SSC in August of 2008 and has been striving to help build student communities ever since.

Cody says, “I firmly believe that humans never would have made it this far without cooperation. We are social creatures built for friendship and community, and it is out of friendship and community that our future will be born.”

In his free time he likes to pretend he’s a ninja.