The Steering Committee is comprised of up to two representatives from each of the six participating societies.

Joanna Friesner

North American Arabidopsis Steering Committee (NAASC)

Executive Director | North American Arabidopsis Steering Committee (NAASC) | The Danforth Center

Brandi Sigmon

Maize Genetics Cooperation (MGC)

Assoc Prof Practice | Plant Pathology Microbiology Program | University of Nebraska-Lincoln

John Fowler

Maize Genetics Cooperation (MGC)

Professor | Department of Botany and Plant Pathology | Oregon State University

Patricia Baldrich

International Society for Molecular Plant Microbe Interactions (IS-MPMI)

Director of Strategic Initiatives and Research Funding Genome Center | UC Davis

Sonali Roy

International Society for Molecular Plant Microbe Interactions (IS-MPMI)

Assistant Professor | Department of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences | Tennessee State University

Brenda Molano-Flores

Botanical Society of America (BSA)

Senior Plant Ecologist | Illinois Natural History Survey Affiliate – Entomology; Plant Biology | University of Illinois

Catrina Adams

Botanical Society of America (BSA)

Education Director, BSA | St. Louis, MO

Gustavo MacIntosh

American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB)

Professor | Roy J. Carver Department of Biochemistry, Biophysics and Molecular Biology | Iowa State University

Mary Williams

Principal Investigator

Features Editor, American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB) | Glasgow, Scotland

Crispin Taylor

co-Principal Investigator

Chief Executive Officer, American Society of Plant Biologists (ASPB) | ASPB

Marcia Puig-Lluch

Program Facilitator

Program Facilitator | ROOT & SHOOT RCN

Michelle M. Jacob, PhD (Yakama)

Anahuy Mentoring, LLC

https://anahuymentoring.com

Laura Minero, PhD

UCLA Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior

https://lauraminerophd.com/bio

Bathabile K.S. Mthombeni, JD, MS, LODc

Founder & Principal, Untangled Resolutions

https://www.blogtalkradio.com/bathabile

Nicole Cabrera Salazar, PhD

Founder and CEO, Movement Consulting

https://www.wearemvmt.com/

Melissa McDaniels, PhD

Associate Executive Director, Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research, University of Wisconsin-Madison

CIMER

Maria Elena Zavala, PhD

CSUN Professor of Biology

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Elena_Zavala

We are thrilled to have partnered with Movement Consulting as our Equity Consultant. 

Movement served as ROOT & SHOOT’s equity consultant from 2022-2023. For more information on our collaboration, please visit our blog. 

A bit more about Movement Consulting, from their successful proposal to the RCN Steering Committee

Our Philosophy. At Movement, we believe in making the world of science better now – not by checking diversity boxes, but rather by transforming organizational cultures through emotional, relational, and collective work. We value curiosity and vulnerability over shame and judgement while creating immersive learning spaces to build awareness of systems of oppression. With these foundational elements in place, we then contextualize and unpack behaviors on individual and interpersonal levels. It is from this place that we can sustainably build community and culture shifts.

Our Positionality. We are a consulting collective led by disabled, neurodivergent, queer women and nonbinary people with multiple intersecting class, race, and ethnic experiences (e.g. Black, Indigenous, mixed, white, Latine; class straddlers, lower, upper and middle class). We all hold the privileged identities of being collegiate students, advanced degree holders, or career academics, while many of us are first-generation students and immigrants. Our founder, Dra. Nicole, as a unique positionality as a white Latina with a PhD that has allowed us to navigate, speak to, and leverage the politics of academia while centering those most marginalized in STEM.

Our Impact. Since our founding in 2018, Movement Consulting has successfully partnered with students, faculty, and scientific leaders from over 25 universities and organizations across the US, Canada, and Europe. These include the American Physical Society, the American Astronomical Society, and the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada.