The end of May brings us closer to the end of the school year, large school groups visiting our campuses, and the associated buzz of the coming summer. June 1st also represents the end of our fiscal year when outgoing Board members step down and we welcome on new Board members.
This June we’ll say goodbye to three individuals who made a deep and lasting impact during an important period of evolution for Teton Science Schools (TSS). During their tenure on the TSS Board we educated almost 100,000 students from across the country and world. Our students, staff, and the organization as a whole extend a deep thank you for their positive impact over many years.
Joohee Muromcew joined the TSS Board in 2012. Over seven years, her sense of possibility touched all realms of TSS. Joohee Chaired key hiring committees as well as Advancement, Nominating and Governance, and the Journeys School Committees. Joohee is rotating off after her two years of service as the TSS Board Chair. During her tenure we launched our current strategic plan, adopted an updated mission, began important branding work, and improved our mission impact through integration across the institution. We will miss her conviction and optimism in all of her work.
Jack Livingood also joined the TSS Board in 2012. In his seven years of service his strong values and deep wisdom benefitted the organization in many ways. Our motivations for branding and an updated mission were influenced by his thinking. During his time at TSS he served on the Independent School, Housing, and Executive Committees. We will miss Jack’s ability to sort the important details from the noise keeping the big picture in mind.
Will MacNaughton joined the TSS Board in 2013. During six years of service, Will brought a calm pragmatism to his role as Chair of the Finance Committee, an Executive Committee member, and a key hiring committee member. Will helped TSS improve our financial strength and we will miss his steady voice and appropriate calls to action.
Beginning June 1, we welcome five new members to the Teton Science Schools Board listed alphabetically below. The entire TSS Board can be found here.
The Reverend Jimmy Bartz
Jimmy is the rector of St. John’s in Jackson. Before moving to Jackson, he was the founder and priest at Thad’s, an emergent, fresh expression Episcopal Church in Santa Monica, California. He has also served as the Campus Missioner at the University of Texas in Austin, at All Saints’ in Austin, Texas and All Saints’ Parish in Beverly Hills, California. He is a graduate the University of Texas at Austin, Virginia Theological Seminary, and NOLS. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, and in years past has worked with Red Bull High Performance teaching athletes spiritual disciplines, with Naval Special Warfare working to create systems for character development within special operations teams, and was a speaker at TEDx, Venice Beach.
Married to Cindy and dad to Jas (17) and Jade (13), the Bartz family loves to spend time outside mountaineering, skiing, fly-fishing, hunting and surfing. Jimmy is currently writing a book on the spirituality of risk.
Carter Higley
Carter Higley has been involved with Teton Science Schools for the past 15 years, working with both TSS staff and the graduate program to coordinate summer programming for inner-city middle school students out of Houston, Texas. As the founder and chairman of LEAD (Letting Everyone Achieve Dreams), Carter is committed to ensuring all students have access to an excellent education and firmly believes in the TSS model of inspiring curiosity, engagement, and leadership through transformative place-based education — so much so, that he and his wife, Jamil, moved their three children from Houston to Jackson in the summer of 2018 and enrolled them in the Journeys School.
Carter has had the good fortune to serve on boards in the past, including Breakthrough, a Teach For America alumni board, Southern Methodist University alumni board, the Bayou Breakfast Club board, and various alma mater alumni committees. While living in Houston, he enjoyed getting involved around the city and was a member of Leadership Houston.
Carter works in the energy business and is the founder and CEO of Bison Interests, a private investment firm specializing in the public oil & gas space.
Carter earned a BA (history and political science) from Southern Methodist University, where he attended on a leadership scholarship and received an MBA from the Acton School of Business. He and his wife have four children.
Pete Regan
Pete Regan was Chief Executive and Chairman of ERM Holdings, Ltd from 2000–2009. ERM has 145 offices in 41 countries across Asia, Europe, Latin America, and North America, and more than 3,500 employees around the world. The firm is one of the world’s largest global providers of environmental management, science and engineering services. ERM’s clientele includes over 60% of the Fortune 500.
His education includes degrees in Geology from Rutgers University (BS, 1979) and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (MS, 1982). He also attended the Advanced Management Program (AMP 168) at Harvard University in 2005.
Mr. Regan has twenty years of progressive line management within the ERM organization. Following a consulting career as a hydrogeologist and Partner in the firm, he was named President of ERM-Southwest in Houston, Texas in 1994. In 1998, he was named Chief Executive for ERM’s businesses in North America. Over the next two years, he led the leadership transition from the firm’s founders to the next generation of shareholders and business managers.
In 2001, he co-led the financial restructuring of ERM’s 34 operating businesses into a single entity, and was named Chief Executive of the newly-formed, global ERM Holdings, Ltd. Since his retirement from ERM in 2010, Pete has served as Chairman of the Board of Element Materials Technology (London), Trinity Consultants (Dallas), and JMJ Associates (Austin).
Pete, his wife Coleen, and their children Sean and Grace moved to Jackson in January 2013. Sean (a junior) and Grace (8th grade) have attended Journeys School since that the family’s arrival. Pete has served as one of the co-chairs of the Journeys School annual fund-raiser for the past 3 years.
Mark Snell
Mark Snell is a resident of Jackson Wyoming living in Jackson full time since 2017. Prior to moving to Jackson, Mark lived in San Diego, California. Mark was President of Sempra Energy a San Diego based Fortune 200 firm with operations throughout the United States, Mexico, Peru, Chile, and the United Kingdom. Prior to being President, Mark was the Chief Financial Officer of Sempra. He retired in 2017.
Mark was also active in the San Diego community, until his move to Jackson, serving as the Chairman of the Board of Directors of the business school at San Diego State University, member of the Board of Trustees of Rady Children’s Hospital of San Diego and Chairman of the Audit Committee for the San Diego Humane Society.
Mark is currently a Board Member, Chair of the Audit Committee and member of the Compensation Committee for Great Elm Capital a publicly traded NYSE Company. He has also served as a past Board Member, Chairman of the Compensation Committee and member of the Audit Committee for a publicly traded NYSE oil and gas company.
Married for 37 years, Mark and his wife Teri have two grown children. Their son Danny and his wife Shannon live in Los Angeles California and Taylor, their daughter, lives in Bozeman Montana.
Vanessa Torres
As a dual graduate from St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, TX with a B.A. in Political Science and M.A. in Public Administration and a Masters of Education from Ashford University, Vanessa Torres currently serves as the Deputy Chief of Interpretation for Lincoln Home National Historic Site in Springfield, IL. In her new role, Vanessa oversees the visitor experience operations throughout the park, including a visitor center, tours of the Lincoln Home, and multiple community engagement and education programs. Prior to Lincoln Home, Vanessa served as the Los Angeles District Supervisor for Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. The LA Office provides multiple programs and community engagement to the local gateway community. Vanessa worked to establish new partnerships in youth outreach and to connect underserved students and diverse populations to national parks in their backyard. Vanessa also serves as the co-chair of the National Park Service’s Latino Employee Resource Group. Additionally, Torres served as the Youth Program Analyst for the. Department of Interior’s Youth, Partnerships and Service under the Office of the Secretary; serving as a liaison to DOI Bureaus’ Youth Managers, youth employment, engagement and diversity, relevancy and inclusion.
Vanessa has aided in developing a variety of outreach programs bridging the gap between diverse communities and their local national green space. Torres was integral in developing Santa Monica Mountains NRA’s mobile engagement center — LA Ranger Troca. LA Troca provides programming in the downtown Los Angeles metro area to bridge the gap between urban communities and their parks. Vanessa was also co-founder of the NPS Academy — a pilot program that brought together 29 diverse college students for a weeklong spring break training to expose students to public lands and potential careers within the NPS. Vanessa was an integral part of developing the NPS Academy program curriculum and assisting in expanding the program to other regions within the NPS System and assisted in having the program adopted at the NPS national level under the NPS National Youth Program Office.
On her spare time, Vanessa enjoys gardening, cooking and exploring new areas and road trips with her husband, Juan and their dog Bucky.
