Vanessa Robertson

Envirolution

Vanessa is a Reno native whose passion for the outdoors, sustainability and education has lead her to her dream job at Envirolution. Vanessa was raised by parents who worked for the Washoe County School District, her father was a brilliant science teacher at Wooster high school and her mother was a guidance counselor at Vaughn Middle school and Galena High school. Vanessa realized early on the passion and dedication required but also the barriers and challenges that educators face.

Vanessa received her undergraduate degree in Spanish and environmental studies at the University of Nevada Reno and after various internships exploring potential environmental careers, she decided to pursue a masters in International Environmental Policy.

While in graduate school at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey,Vanessa worked for two amazing non profits; Surfrider Foundation as the Volunteer and Events Coordinator and for the Agriculture and Land Based Training Association as the Program Development and Evaluation Assistant. She also started a student run community garden on an abandoned lot on the MIIS campus and was instrumental in helping ban the use of Styrofoam to-go containers in the City of Monterey. It was during these two years, while working towards a career in addressing environmental change from the top-down that Vanessa realized all her non-profit work implementing grassroots change, from the bottom-up was where her heart was.