Climate Cardinals announces inaugural advisory board
New York City, June 19, 2024 - Climate Cardinals, the world’s largest youth-led climate advocacy organization, has recently announced its inaugural advisory board.
The board consists of thirty members from government, advocacy, and private organizations, including the Nature Conservancy, National Geographic, the White House, and UNESCO.
Board members include oceanographer Dr. Sylvia Earle, named Time Magazine's first "Hero for the Planet," Hugh Evans, Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Global Citizen, Kevin Brege, Head of Climate and Sustainability for Google.org and Ryan Hathaway, White House Director for Environmental Justice.
"As we continue to grow, our Advisory Board will play a critical role in ensuring that our work remains thoughtful, informed, and driven by action, impact, and justice,” said Sophia Kianni, Founder and President of Climate Cardinals.
"We’re inspired by these visionary leaders who have generously volunteered to become a part of our journey, both in the past and now in the future,” adds Hikaru Wakeel Hayakawa, Vice President and a founding director of Climate Cardinals.
The Advisory Board assumes a pivotal role in forging new partnerships, offering strategic counsel, and providing invaluable insights to forthcoming initiatives. With their collective expertise, the board members serve as catalysts for driving program development and amplifying the organization's global impact.
Climate Cardinals looks forward to announcing new advisory board members in the coming months.
Read below to welcome and learn more about our incoming Advisory Board members.
Kerry Bannigan
As the Managing Director at PVBLIC Foundation, Kerry leads the organization to deliver high-impact campaigns, convenings, and programs mobilizing media, finance, and data for sustainable development, including the Fashion Impact Fund and the SDG Media Zone. PVBLIC Foundation has collaborated with more than 100 governments and their diverse economic development programs have reached over 2 billion individuals worldwide.
Nick Boedicker
Nick Boedicker is an entrepreneur and educator who is working to create a world where all young people are empowered as changemakers. He is currently working with the global nonprofit organization, Ashoka, and as an adjunct professor at American University in Washington, DC.
Kevin Brege
Kevin Brege is the Head of Climate and Sustainability for Google.org, Google’s philanthropic arm, where he leads initiatives that leverage emerging technologies and Google’s expertise to address climate and sustainability challenges. In previous roles at Google, Kevin led Google’s philanthropic efforts in the Asia Pacific region, funded and scaled the work of 400+ social entrepreneurs as head of the Google.org Impact Challenge program, and drove business development strategy for Google Energy’s emerging markets team. Beyond Google, Kevin has experience in infrastructure investments, management consulting, and startup acceleration.
Cameren Bullins
Cameren Bullins is program associate for the Rockefeller Brothers Fund’s Sustainable Development program, focusing on climate finance, movement building, and just transition. Ms. Bullins joined the Fund in 2018 as a program assistant for the Democratic Practice-Global Challenges and Grants Management teams. Prior to joining the RBF, Ms. Bullins conducted research to support tracking funding across the philanthropic field. Ms. Bullins is on the advisory board of the Youth Climate Finance Alliance, and currently serves as co-chair of the International Grantmakers Network, a working group of Philanthropy New York.
Karl Burkart
Karl is the Deputy Director of One Earth and formerly the Director of Media, Science & Technology at the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation. One Earth's Science Program supports academic institutions and NGOs working on the cutting edge of climate and energy science, biodiversity conservation, and sustainable food systems.
Dr. Sweta Chakraborty
Sweta Chakraborty is a renowned behavioural scientist whose expertise in climate change has seen her sought after for commentaries in international media. As Chief Executive Officer of We Don’t Have Time and part of the Global Commons Alliance Steering Committee, Sweta is a major influence in forming climate narratives locally and around the world. She is motivated by the need for clear, credible communication to urgently and proactively manage the climate impacts that threaten human well being.
Julia Cohen
Julia Cohen (she/her) is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Plastic Pollution Coalition, based in Washington, D.C. Julia has nearly three decades of experience in leading executive, strategic, communications, fundraising, and outreach efforts for a wide range of government, entertainment, and non-profit groups.
Nancy Colleton
Nancy Colleton is President of the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES), and leads a diverse set of professional educators, communicators, and scientists devoted to leveraging earth observation resources to better understand our home planet and communicate the impacts of climate change to the world. Nancy leads numerous initiatives that promote better understanding of the changing planet. She serves on the National Space Council Users' Advisory Group as well as the Boards of the Marshall Legacy Institute and Fairfax Water.
Sophie Cowling
Sophie is a Director at Freuds, where she specializes in campaigns focused on the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals. As part of the founding and leadership team of Goals House, she brings together a diverse community of business and political leaders, activists, foundations, NGOs, and entrepreneurs at significant global moments throughout the year; creating partnerships that drive impact towards the SDGs.
Jad Daley
Jad Daley leads the strategic direction of American Forests and serves as its “chief engagement officer” in building diverse partnerships to advance American Forests’ mission. Tapping into his skills and experience related to program development, he also is directly involved in the organization’s programmatic work, such as forest-climate science, policy development and communications.
Dr. Sylvia Earle
Sylvia Earle is President and Chairman of Mission Blue / The Sylvia Earle Alliance. She is a National Geographic Society Explorer in Residence, and is called Her Deepness by the New Yorker and the New York Times, Living Legend by the Library of Congress, and first Hero for the Planet by Time Magazine. She is an oceanographer, explorer, author and lecturer with experience as a field research scientist, government official, and director for several corporate and non-profit organizations
Hugh Evans
Hugh Evans is Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Global Citizen, the world’s leading international advocacy organization working to end extreme poverty now, an internationally renowned humanitarian, and one of the most recognized leaders in international development. Under his leadership, Global Citizen has grown into an unstoppable movement of tens of millions of people around the world taking action to defeat poverty, defend our planet, and address the systemic barriers that keep people trapped in inequality.
Manon Frezouls
Manon Frezouls is a French young specialist on climate change, international relations and meaningful youth engagement. She holds a master’s degree in International Relations and Diplomacy and a Maîtrise in International Law. She has specialized in Conflict Analysis and International Justice. After a six-month trainee experience at the French Embassy in San Salvador, Manon Frezouls works as Associate Project Officer at UNESCO Youth Programme, where she has been coordinating the UNESCO Youth Climate Action Network (YoU-CAN) at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris since 2019.
Lissie Garvin
Lissie Garvin is the Director for the 776 Foundation and Fellowship Program. The Foundation was started in March 2022 by Seven Seven Six founder Alexis Ohanian with a mission to fund problem-solvers combatting inequity worldwide.
Peter Gilmer
Peter Gilmer is currently a Strategy Consultant with number impact centric organizations including Ecosia, Leaders on Purpose, and One Earth, and formerly served as Chief Impact Officer, Executive Director, and member of the original Web Summit team. Gilmer specializes in start up mentorship, scaling, sustainability, consulting, sales, community building and networking and sits on several advisory boards including the Plastic Pollution Coalition.
Meg Goldthwaite
Meg Galloway Goldthwaite is The Nature Conservancy’s Chief Marketing and Communications Officer (CMCO) where she leads the Marketing and Communications division as it connects people worldwide with the urgent need to work toward a future where a livable climate, healthy communities, and thriving nature are the norm.
JT Hardin
JT Hardin serves as a Senior Manager on the Explorer Programs team at the National Geographic Society, where he leads the Young Explorer program. With a blend of expertise in education and youth empowerment, Hardin brings a unique perspective to his role, emphasizing the pivotal role of mentorship and community engagement as catalysts for change. Committed to uplifting and supporting youth leaders, he spearheads initiatives aimed at empowering early career changemakers to address urgent planetary challenges.
Ryan Hathaway
Ryan Hathaway is the Director for Environmental Justice and Director of The White House Environmental Justice Interagency Council at the White House Council on Environmental Quality in the Executive Office of the President. Prior, he worked at the U.S. Department of the Interior as the Environmental Justice Coordinator, and also led the Department's Major Infrastructure, Permitting, NEPA, and FAST-41 Program. Ryan served in several leadership roles, including previously as Branch Chief for National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and Land Use Planning at the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). He has over 15 years of experience in federal civil service from local fieldwork and administration to program management, policy, and leadership of multi-billion dollar national and international permitting and environmental programs.
Brian Kurtz
Brian Kurtz has dedicated his career to accelerating sustainable development through cross-sector innovation. He has partnered with government agencies like the US Department of Energy and spearheaded corporate innovation programs working with Fortune 500 companies such as Mars, Telstra, Google, Microsoft and many more. Brian has also played a pivotal role in building talent ecosystems for social innovators through organizations like the global Impact Hub, BMW Foundation, Nexus Global, Ashoka, and The League of Intrapreneurs, as well as accelerating the work of various family offices within the United Nations ecosystem. Most recently, he served as Special Advisor to the Chief Commercialization Officer of the US Department of Energy and founded the ClimateTech Association, where he focuses on mobilizing private finance to rapidly and responsibly scale climate solutions.
Garry Lace
Garry Lace is the founder of Storians, a storytelling studio for those with a story to tell: organisations, brands and people. Lace is also former Chief Executive Officer of some of London’s biggest advertising agencies including TBWA London.
Sophie Lambin
Sophie is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Kite Insights, as well as the Editorial Partner of the Women’s Forum for the Economy & Society and Curator of The New York Times Climate Hub. Sophie has two decades of professional services and consulting experience and is a globally-recognised thought leader on gender and climate action.
Debbie Levin
Since taking over Environmental Media Association in 2000, Debbie Levin has been singular in harnessing the power of the media and entertainment communities to pioneer a high-impact model of social activism, utilizing storytelling and message development to drive awareness into action and solutions. In addition, in 2003 she created the EMA Green Seal that guides global productions with sustainable options behind the scenes. It remains the only Seal that guides and promotes sustainable practices within the production world.
Kim Martinez
Kim Martinez, M.Ed., serves as the Vice President of Education and Engagement and Senior Advisor to the Climate Equity Collaborative where she oversees the development of pre-K-12, higher education, youth leadership, and community programs serving more than 15,000 schools in the U.S.
Michael Murphy
Michael Murphy has worked for the past 30 years at the nexus of science, public policy and communications to assist public agencies, businesses and nonprofits to solve environmental challenges and communicate the value of science and sustainability. He has expertise in biological and physical sciences, communications, government relations, resource economics, public policy, and consumer behavior. Michael currently serves as the communications director for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Research section. He received his M.S. in Marine Resource Management from Oregon State University and a B.S. in aquatic biology from the University of California at Santa Barbara. In his spare time, Michael loves to cook, fish, dive, travel and explore the outdoors with his wife and two daughters.
Inge Relph
Inge Relph is Executive Director and Co-Founder of GlobalChoices. Relph is a respected thought leader who has worked extensively in business, international development, and climate risk, and is known for policy innovation and building partnerships that create social value and meaningful change.
Christine Seibert
Christine Seibert works as a project manager for Harvard’s Climate Action Accelerator, a pillar of the Salata Institute for Climate and Sustainability. Her previous experience includes working at Williams College equipping and empowering students to navigate institutional change and become advocates for the world they want to see. She is a two-term AmeriCorps alum, serving a State and National Term in Orono, ME working on home winterization, and VISTA term in York, ME conducting a greenhouse gas inventory. Christine is passionate about student development, change management, and grounded action.
Kunal Sood
Kunal Sood, is a world-renowned social entrepreneur, Impact strategist and thought leader in the fields of disruptive innovation, leadership and wellbeing. As the founder of We The Planet, X Fellows and NOVUS he has made it his life’s purpose to make the impossible possible through living a life of service, fellowship and purpose. As a high-impact philanthropist, he launched #WeTheFuture, where he works tirelessly to guide and lead others in their search for meaning and purpose through giving them a voice, curating extraordinary experiences and hosting iconic global leaders at his flagship summit to inspire a better way of life. Currently in his role as the Chief Impact Officer at the Chopra foundation and as Partner at ChopraX he focuses on unlocking humanity’s limitless potential for global wellbeing through inner transformation to drive individual and collective global impact to help create a more just, sustainable, peaceful and joyful world.
Matt Tranchin
Matt Tranchin has fifteen years of experience working at the intersection of climate, finance, politics, and advocacy. He previously served in the Obama Administration as the social impact liaison in the White House Office of Public Engagement, overseeing outreach to non-profits, foundations, and social enterprises.
Emanuela Vignola
Emanuela Vignola has been a Senior Adviser at the Italian Environment and Energy Security Ministry for almost 20 years. She co-leads the Youth4Climate Initiative, overseeing a global youth network and supporting youth engagement on climate change at local, national, and international levels.
Zi Han Xuan
Zi Han is a climate advocate with YOUNGO, the youth constituency of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), and a second-year student of Philosophy, Politics, and Economics (PPE) at the UCL Department of Political Science.
Farhana Yamin
Farhana is an internationally recognized lawyer, author, funder and climate justice activist. She has provided legal and strategy advice to small islands leaders and ministers on UN climate negotiations and has attended nearly every COP/UN climate summit since 1991. She has extensive knowledge of climate philanthropy and currently runs the Climate Justice and Just Transition Donor Collaborative which brings together some of the world’s largest climate philanthropies to create climate solutions that also tackle systemic inequalities including through the creation of a multi-language, wiki called the Climate Justice Map.
For inquiries, please contact: executiveteam@climatecardinals.org.
About Climate Cardinals
Climate Cardinals is a youth-led nonprofit organization dedicated to making the climate movement more accessible to non-english speakers and championing grassroots climate education. It aims to educate and empower a diverse coalition of people to address the climate crisis. The organization has mobilized more than 16,000 volunteers who translate and source climate information into more than 105 different languages.
