Nina Simons

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Nina Simons (born January 10, 1957 in Manhattan, NY) is the co-founder & co-CEO of Bioneers.

Early life and career

Simons grew up in New York City. She was involved in theater in high school and college at Cornell University and Ithaca College..[1] When Simons was 30 she met husband Kenny Ausubel in Santa Fe, New Mexico and helped him complete a documentary film on the politics of cancer treatment called Hoxsey: When Healing Becomes a Crime.

After visiting Gabriel Howearth's biodiversity gardens near Gila, New Mexico, Simons quit her job and joined Howearth and husband Ausubel at their fledgling seed company, Seeds of Change.[2] She left Seeds of Change to become the strategic marketing director for Odwalla, building their brand and connecting the company with nonprofit organizations that could help Odwalla increase its sustainable business practices.[3]

Bioneers

In 1990, Simons and Ausubel co-founded the Bioneers organization and national conference to highlight existing solutions to the world's environmental and social struggles. The idea for the National Bioneers Conference arose from a 1989 meeting with Josh Mailman, a leader in social investment and philanthropy who was involved with Seeds of Change and the Hoxsey film. When Ausubel described various biomimetic innovators and other breakthrough environmental solutions, Mailman proposed a conference and offered to fund it.[4]

UnReasonable Women for the Earth

In the late 1990s, Simons began to focus on developing women's leadership. In 2002 she facilitated her first retreat for women leaders, called UnReasonable Women for the Earth, uniting 34 women to brainstorm how to initiate a broad progressive women's movement with the environment at its heart.[5] The name, sparked by Diane Wilson at the 2001 Bioneers Conference, stemmed from the belief that women were often raised to be too 'well behaved,' or 'reasonable,' a training which inhibits women from taking a stand for what they believe in. UnReasonable Women for the Earth encouraged "women everywhere to stand together, at each other's backs, in defense of life. Its goal is to strengthen women's voices and encourage women's engagement." The retreat resulted in the formation of CodePink: Women for Peace, a grassroots organization advocating for peace.[6]

Personal life

Simons lives in the mountains just outside of Santa Fe with husband Ausubel and their dogs.

References

  1. ↑ Road Trip Nation
  2. ↑ Simons, Moonrise: The Power of Women Leading from the Heart, p.4
  3. ↑ Utne Reader, March–April 1996
  4. ↑ The Bioneers Creation Story
  5. ↑ Source Watch
  6. ↑ Feigenbaum, The GreenMoney Interview GreenMoney Journal March/April, 2004

External links

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