Scholarships – New York State Urban Forestry Council

Sophia Rodbell & Her Post-MFI Reflection

March 23, 2020 by Michelle Sutton

Sophia Rodbell (left) with fellow 2020 MFI grad Jean Zimmerman (center) and MFI Teaching Cadre Member and Council Past President Andy Hillman, enjoying the early spring weather in Gulf Shores, Alabama.

NYSUFC Board Member Sophia Rodbell recently graduated from the 2020 Municipal Forestry Institute (MFI), funded in part by a scholarship from the Council. It was held in Gulf Shores, Alabama.

Can you tell us about your job background and education?
Sophia Rodbell: I started working at Davey Resource Group Inc. (DRG) after graduating from Roanoke College in 2014. I started as an inventory arborist, moved to urban forester, took on more responsibility as a site manager, and then became a project manager when I joined our NYC team to manage the urban forestry component of our office. Prior to moving to NYC I was on the road 365 days a year, working up and down the East Coast, all across the Midwest, as far south as Texas and as far west as California. DRG gave me the chance to see all parts of the United States—as long as they had trees, I was there.

I am currently a DRG Project Manager; I work with a team of five to ten arborists in different places in their careers. This is the same work I previously did, but on a regional scale. We help mid-Atlantic clients—from Northern Virginia to Central New York—with their urban forests. We also have the opportunity to send staff across the country to assist other regional offices; it is awesome seeing them have the same experience I received.

Arborist & Author Jean Zimmerman on Her MFI Experience

March 9, 2020March 9, 2020 by Michelle Sutton

Arborist and author Jean Zimmerman. Photo by Maud Reavill

Council Member and SavATree Arborist Jean Zimmerman recently attended the 2020 Municipal Forestry Institute (MFI) with partial assistance from a Council scholarship. With this MFI class, more than 750 urban forestry and affiliated professionals have completed the weeklong leadership training. Jean’s account of her experience is literary in nature because in addition to being an arborist, she is a published author.

Sugar white sands. Crashing waves. The occasional parabolic arc of a dolphin off shore. We gathered along Alabama’s famously gorgeous Gulf Coast, sixty-five pilgrims from all over the country and abroad. We had come to sharpen our leadership skills at the Municipal Forestry Institute (MFI), a long-running (since 2006) continuing education symposium that is celebrated as one of the best in the world. I remember arriving at the Gulf Shores Hilton, being unsure of whether I could fit in.

My fellow MFIers came from varied backgrounds. Some were urban foresters at municipalities of varying size, from New York City to Denton, Texas. Others hailed from not-for-profits, such as TreePhilly in Philadelphia. One participant, a champion tree-climber, represented the happiest place in the world, Disneyland. Another traveled from Sweden. There were representatives of PlanIT Geo and Davey Tree. I came to Gulf Shores from SavATree, the third largest tree care company in the United States, where I work as a commercial and consulting arborist.

Buffalo City Forester Ross Hassinger on Partners in Community Forestry Conference

December 5, 2019December 5, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

“Of particular interest on the Wednesday tour of Cleveland was a legacy white oak tree in Lakeview Cemetery. It’s one of only a handful of remaining trees thought to have been around at the time Moses Cleveland founded the city in 1796.” -Ross Hassinger

Scholarships for Council Members for SMA, Partners, MFI

October 9, 2019October 9, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

Deadlines extended!!

One of the benefits of being a Council member is being eligible for these conference and training scholarships. Please use the brief scholarship application form to apply to any of these:

Society of Municipal Arborists 55th Annual International Conference and Trade Show – $199 scholarships available, deadline Oct 18. For urban forestry professionals and those in allied fields like park management, landscape architecture, and city planning.
2019 Partners in Community Forestry Conference – $399 scholarships available, deadline Oct 18. “Partners” is THE conference for staff and volunteers in the nonprofit sphere of community forestry, but is also of interest to a wide range of professionals.
$1,000 scholarship for MFI 2020, deadline October 31. The Municipal Forestry Institute is a weeklong training in leadership skills for municipal foresters and anyone looking to more effectively navigate within a governmental space, including contractors who work with munis.

Danielle Gift on What the Partners in Community Forestry Conference Means to Her

March 26, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

NYC Parks Tree Preservation Senior Project Manager Danielle Gift reflects here on her experiences attending the Partners in Community Forestry (“Partners”) Conference, which includes the affiliated Society of Municipal Arborists (SMA) Conference. The next Partners will take place November 20-21, 2019 in Cleveland, just after the SMA Conference November 18-19. Partners is organized by the Arbor Day Foundation.

Kateri Savory on Her MFI Experience

March 26, 2019March 26, 2019 by Michelle Sutton

Council member Kateri Savory is the Davey Resource Group Project Manager for the Asian Longhorned Beetle Eradication Program in NYC. Kateri received scholarship funding from the Council toward attending the 2019 Municipal Forestry Institute, which took place in Silverton, Oregon.

Can you tell us about your job background and education?
Kateri Savory: I’ve always loved being outside, and beaches and rainforests are my favorite places. However, the forest, much less an urban forest, wasn’t where I thought I would find myself working.

Before changing fields, I was a district manager in retail where I enjoyed training teams and using my creativity to revamp stores. Constant goal attainment made the long hours satisfactory for a while, but I wanted to spend energy on something that would help others and feed my soul.

I studied Permaculture courses online through Cornell University and then pursued a degree in Ornamental Horticulture from Bronx Community College, which included courses with the New York Botanical Garden (NYBG). The array of adult education classes offered by NYBG were way too interesting for me to pass over, so I took any class that would teach me about gardening, biology, arboriculture, design, etc. I received a Certificate in Gardening and spent much time interning with NYBG, which gave me invaluable skills and knowledge.

I began working with Davey Resource Group in 2015 as an Inventory Arborist. I’ve had the opportunity to assist with various projects including tree inventories, pollinator garden creation, and invasive species management. Since then I became an ISA Certified Arborist and attained the Tree Risk Assessment Qualification (TRAQ).

Joe Charap on the Municipal Forestry Institute

September 24, 2018September 24, 2018 by Michelle Sutton

Green-Wood Cemetery Director of Horticulture and Curator and Council Board Member Joe Charap received scholarship assistance from the Council to attend the 2018 Municipal Forestry Institute in Litchfield, Connecticut. MFI 2019 in Silverton, Oregon: registration is underway!

What were the most valuable aspects of MFI for you?

I valued the chance to speak informally with the teaching cadre members, learn from their experiences, and ask them questions.

It was also fantastic to meet my colleagues from around the country; it gave me perspective and new ideas for potential solutions to the challenges I face in my work. I also got a deeper sense of the diversity of roles within the field of urban forestry and the impact our field has on city planning.

The role-playing session with Rosa Linda Perez on communicating with the press was excellent. I learned some new skills for interacting with the media around sensitive issues—I feel more confident knowing I can reference those skills should the situation arise.

What was one of your biggest takeaways?

It’s important for any urban forestry program—be it that of a cemetery, municipality, or other entity within the urban forest—to have a clear program identity and brand. Whether starting a program from scratch or taking over the supervision of an existing one, it’s important to have a vision—and to have a strategy to build it.

Any last words?

I sincerely appreciate and want to thank the Council for sponsoring me to attend MFI! Thank you for investing in my professional education, which will help me be a better Council Board Member, as well.

Council Board Member & New MFI Grad Mike DeMarco

March 15, 2017March 15, 2017 by Michelle Sutton

Council Board Member Mike DeMarco attended the 2017 Municipal Forestry Institute (MFI) on scholarship from the Council and NYSDEC. MFI is an immersive, weeklong leadership training for urban forestry professionals. Here, we learn about DeMarco’s takeaways from MFI, his current position, and his work and educational background.

DeMarco says, “I would like to give a big shout out and thank you to the New York State Urban Forestry Council and the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. Without the support and positive push from members of these organizations, I would not have been able to take part in MFI 2017.”

Mike DeMarco: Prior to any thought of a career in urban forestry, I spent most of my early and mid-20’s following an obsession with creating music and working as a master control operator at WWNY- TV7, a local news station in my hometown of Watertown, NY. After a few years of work in TV, I felt that something was missing in my life—that is, until 2008 when I found Tree Watertown (Watertown’s Street Tree Advisory Board). I began attending meetings and quickly discovered my love for the urban forest.

Before I knew it, I was being mentored by two individuals that have since played a huge part in my journey. They encouraged me to pursue higher education and in the fall of 2012, I graduated from SUNY-ESF with a BS in Natural Resource Management and a minor in Urban Forestry.

Our Woman in Indy: Christine Manchester Reports from Partners in Community Forestry Conference

December 8, 2016December 8, 2016 by Michelle Sutton

ISA Certified Arborist Christine (Chris) Manchester is the naturalist and sustainability coordinator for the Town of Dewitt, and as such she is heavily involved in the oversight of Dewitt’s urban forest. The NYSUFC provided financial assistance to Manchester to reimburse some of her expenses to attend the Partners in Community Forestry Conference last November 16-17 in Indianapolis. Additional support was provided by the Arbor Day Foundation and NYSDEC.

“I can’t thank the Council enough,” she says. “I had a great time, met some very interesting people (there were 559 registered), and gained valuable information. Thank you for this opportunity.” Manchester prepared a presentation about her take-aways from the conference and how they apply most to the work that she does for the Town of DeWitt. That presentation is excerpted here.

Christine Manchester:

The opportunity to network with this many people who are facing many of the same challenges nationally doesn’t present itself every day. Through an informal tally, the majority of people raised their hands that they had been in urban forestry for less than 10 years. There were so many incredible presentations—but there were a couple of topics that resonated with me more than others. The take-aways for me were: 1) partnership/collaboration, 2) thinking about trees as infrastructure and incorporating plantings into streetscapes and 3) focusing on planting trees in poor residential areas.

ReLeaf 2016 Reflections

July 21, 2016 by Michelle Sutton

Did you know that scholarships toward registration for the annual ReLeaf conference are available through the DEC for qualified applicants? These folks received awards this year.

Dewitt’s Nicholas Quilty-Koval:

The Releaf Conference was fantastic. It was a great experience and I was able to talk to many great people who encouraged me to pursue my goal of a career in urban planning.

In my community I have the opportunity to go door-to-door and talk to people about receiving a free tree. I am involved in the Save The Rain program for the Town of Dewitt. This program works with OEC (Onondaga Earth Corps) in an attempt to educate the nearby community about the benefits of trees as well as saving the rain. Our goal is to plant trees in the local area in order to do things such as decrease the amount of flooding, improve the air quality, and improve the appearance of the neighborhoods. I am also involved in the Town’s attempt to save ash trees that have been impacted by emerald ash borer. I have marked trees for removal as well as treatment. I also work with database software to help track the trees in our area.

Every aspect of the conference gave me insight into new topics and I learned a lot. It also connected ideas that I had originally been exposed to in my first year at college. There are many great takeaways that I received from the conference; the biggest one came from the Urban Wood Utilization talks with Jim Maloney and Tom Derby. I learned that we should not grind up ash and other trees into mulch, but instead should try to make them into something more useful and high-value, from a bench to a turkey call. Doing this would allow for more revenue from the tree and more meaningful products. I learned that marketing is a big key to the success of this idea of reusing the wood from urban trees.