Everything in moderation, including moderation.
– Oscar Wilde
My name is Alison, and I moved to Pittsburgh from my hometown of Bethlehem, PA in February 2009. I applied to Duquesne University’s MBA-Sustainability program as soon as I found out that sustainability was a thing. I grew up being an activist before I knew there was any other way to be. My former-hippie parents instilled in me a sense of purpose and integrity early on, taking me door-to-door to canvass for causes, helping me write letters to conservation organizations, and even getting me on the news at the age of eight, as I read at a banned books reading.
As a kid I absorbed hobbies like a sponge: piano, violin, tuba, chess, horseback riding, martial arts, ballet, tennis, theater, and choir, to name a few. I was passionate about everything I encountered, even if I didn’t stick with it very long. In college, I almost majored in about five different things (English, French, Humanities, Sociology, or Anthropology) but wound up with Physics, focusing on my childhood love of astronomy.
After college I lived in Japan for two years, teaching English. Japan helped me really shift my perspective from my (very American) me-centric view to a society-centric view. As I sorted my garbage into seven different categories, I started to comprehend how much of an impact every individual action makes – and how easy it is to make little adjustments that add up to a big result.
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I’ve been in Pittsburgh for over a decade now, first spending several years in grad school and then in corporate America. I have very happily transitioned to the nonprofit world, most recently helping residents of low-income communities save energy in their homes by adopting simple tools and behavior changes, and now running an organization focused on examining health impacts of oil and gas development. My current job enables me to leverage my backgrounds in science, business, teaching, and conservation to help residents across the region and beyond.
It should go without saying that any opinions here are my own and not affiliated in any way with the Environmental Health Project, of which I am executive director, or any other organization I have been connected to as board member, employee, or donor.
Outside of my difficult but very rewarding job, I live in the suburbs with my husband Christian and our cats Siegfried and Pumpkin. I run when I can, doing the occasional half or full marathon. I have sung in a choir that performs music from the middle ages, and I have headed my local brewers guild. In my “spare time,” I like gardening and hope to get a beehive in the next year or two.
Between my job, hobbies, and passion projects, I do a good bit of research into a variety of topics. While I often share my findings randomly on Facebook, I wanted a more permanent medium for all of this information. I have also received requests from several friends to start a blog, so despite some initial reservations, here we are.
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I hope you find something useful and/or interesting on this site, and I hope you find something new worth exploring on your own. I’d love to hear about your journey too.