Forest Her Movie Screening

Cheryle Franceschi is a digital content producer, highly regarded for creating and delivering educational content promoting forest conservation, environmental education, and agricultural stewardship. Through her small business, Por Eco Productions, One Idea/Dos Languages, LLC, she has directed, produced, written, and distributed three independent documentaries (Mr. Besley’s Forest, Conservation Kids: A Green STEM Documentary, and Forest Her: The Next Wave of Conservation) for which she has garnered several film festival accolades. Her films are currently streaming on PBS.org. She is the recipient of the MEL Award for Outstanding Service and Dedication from the Maryland Association of Forest Conservancy Boards and was part of the first co-hort of the Docs In Progress Fellowship.  Her professional memberships include Women in Film & Video Washington DC Chapter, the International Documentary Association, and the Maryland Association for Environmental and Outdoor Education. Her undergraduate degree is in Radio, Television and Film from the University of Maryland, Global Campus. She earned an Urban Environmental Education Certificate from Cornell University, 2019.  In 2023, she enrolled in a master’s certification program from the University of California concentrating on Science Communications. 

Melody Starya Mobley was born in Louisville, Kentucky.  After graduating from the University of Washington in 1979 as the first African American woman with a BS in forest management, Melody had a 28-year career with the USDA Forest Service as the agency’s first Black female forester.  She held a wide variety of positions from public affairs specialist to deputy forest supervisor all over the US and overseas.  She retired in 2005 and now lives in Sterling, Virginia. Melody’s goals as a member of the EcoAction Arlington Board are to increase its overall diversity, equity and inclusiveness in plans, programs and membership, to ensure service to all Arlington County residents, and to use the best science available.

Leah Nichols is the Executive Director of George Mason University’s Institute for a Sustainable Earth (ISE), where she leads the ISE team in creating connections – locally, globally, and across disciplines – to put Mason’s research and scholarship into action in support of a sustainable world. Under her leadership, ISE has launched new programs that catalyze the development of communities of research and practice, foster transdisciplinary research teams, and support the co-production of knowledge with local stakeholders. Nichols joined Mason after 8 years at the National Science Foundation (NSF) where she contributed extensively to the design and management of several agency-wide programs that funded convergent, use-inspired, socio-environmental system science. As the Executive Secretary for NSF’s Advisory Committee for Environmental Research and Education, she supported the development of reports focused on urban sustainability, human security, and engaged research. She also co-founded and led an interagency working group to integrate social sciences throughout the US Global Change Research Program. Nichols has a PhD from the Energy and Resources Group at the University of California, Berkeley and a BS in environmental engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She was also a AAAS Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the NSF and a Mirzayan Science and Technology Policy Fellow at the National Academy of Sciences.