The NBNC Team

Emily Wetherell moved to Vermont in 2001 and lives in Montpelier with her husband and two children. Emily enjoys outdoor activities such as Nordic skiing, running, hiking, and biking. She has served as an ECO and Four Winds volunteer in her children’s classrooms. She and her family have participated in multiple NBNC programs and activities. In her professional life, Emily is an attorney and serves as the Deputy Clerk of the Vermont Supreme Court. Emily joined the NBNC Board in 2016 and served as Secretary of the Board from 2017 until 2020 when she became Board President.

Rick Paradis is Director Emeritus of the University of Vermont’s Natural Areas Center and Faculty Emeritus in the University’s Environmental Program, positions he held for 33 years. Both his faculty and administrative roles are intimately tied to land conservation and stewardship. As Director of the Natural Areas Center, Rick supervised the administration and management of the University's Natural Areas System and provided outreach services and professional development for those interested in the protection and management of natural areas and other conservation lands. His faculty appointment allowed him to pursue a research agenda that focused on the ecologies and conservation of mountain and desert landscapes throughout North America from the Canadian Arctic to the Sonoran Desert of Southern Arizona and Northern Mexico. Rick resides in Middlesex with his wife Susan, a retired preschool teacher who unflaggingly tries to keep him from using his outdoor voice indoors.

Georgia Valentine was first introduced to NBNC in 1998 on a visit to Vermont, where her children and grandchildren lived. On one memorable walk, an NBNC Teacher Naturalist plunged into a pond and pulled out a ferocious snapping turtle, much to the delight of her 4-year old grandson. These sorts of experiences at NBNC and remembering her own childhood rich in outdoor explorations helped Georgia see the value of first-hand nature education for children. When she moved to Vermont in 2003, she joined an early iteration of the Board of Directors, focusing on fundraising and public relations. She’s been on the Board ever since, and has been Treasurer for five years, putting to use her 22-year career in estate and trust accounting and her subsequent 15-years of experience preparing individual tax returns - families and finances! She’s a firm believer in full engagement with NBNC, from Board service, to consistent financial support, to participating in walks and classes and committees, with a full commitment to the nature center’s mission and people.

Carol Vassar practiced internal medicine in Montpelier for 35 years, retiring in 2016. She and her family have enjoyed jogging, hiking, canoeing, biking, Nordic skating and cross country skiing, often in the North Branch Park and on the NBNC land across the river. She has appreciated the evening lectures at NBNC and its exhibits of nature-oriented paintings, drawings and other artwork. An NBNC birding trip to Costa Rica introduced her to serious birding and, more importantly, to Chip Darmstadt, the NBNC founder, recently retired executive director, and current Bird Ambasador, who led the trip.  She believes that NBNC's land and programs increase our appreciation of and willingness to protect the natural world and that our future depends on that commitment. As a member of the NBNC board of directors, she is able to help accomplish that mission.

Bob Klein holds an undergraduate degree from Brandeis University and Masters degree in environmental management from Duke University. He has worked for the Martha’s Vineyard Conservation Society, the Maine State Planning Office, the Vermont Natural Resources Council, Goddard College, the University of Vermont, and The Nature Conservancy.  Bob opened The Nature Conservancy’s Vermont Field Office in Montpelier in 1979, and was State Director there for 34 years before retiring.  Bob lives in East Montpelier.

Emily Merrill teaches STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math) to 5th-8th graders at Twinfield Union School in Plainfield, and is a neighbor of NBNC. She is an avid nature-lover and photographer.  After years of recreating, taking classes, and volunteering at NBNC she decided to become a member of the board in 2020. She studied  Geology at the University of Alaska Fairbanks and Leadship for Sustainability at the University of Vermont. She believes that her work at NBNC is an extension of her purpose as an educator and caretaker of our land and community.

Janet (Jan) Heyman Thouron has studied ecology, marine biology, and specifically marine mammals at several academic institutions over the years. She studied the marine life of mangroves and bottlenose dolphin behavior at the New York Museum of Natural History’s marine research laboratory and studied humpback whales songs in Hawaii through grants from National Geographic and World Wildlife Fund with Drs. Roger and Katy Payne. Jan has been a Vet Tech, on ski patrol, a ski instructor, acted in local theater productions, and founded Splash Naturals in Montpelier. She is the chair of the discussion interview committee at the Thouron Award, a scholarship for postgraduate educational exchange between Britain and the US, is a recent graduate of an MA program at Vermont College of Fine Arts on Writing Books for Children, and writes environmentally based picture books. Jan has been on the board of North Branch since 2013, has three wonderful children, and lives with her charming husband on their beautiful land at the base of Mount Hunger in North Middlesex tending extensive gardens, fields and forest, bike and ski trails and a multitude of critters.

Karen Saudek is a retired Human Resources professional with a background that includes serving as VP of HR at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Vermont, Cabot Cheese, and the Institute for Sustainable Communities. She has served as board member on the State Board of Education, the District 5 Environmental Commission, Vermont Public Television, the Vermont Advisory Committee to the US Commission on Civil Rights, the Vermont Labor Relations Board, and North Branch Nature Center.

Richard Campbell is a parent of a North Branch Nature Center Forest Preschooler and a Montpelier resident. He has a Master of Forestry degree from Yale University, and has worked in forests across New England and California. Born in Northern Ireland and raised in Vermont, Richard brings to the board a love of the Green Mountains and their forests, a career dedicated to land conservation and climate solutions, and a background in forest management and education.

Richard Littauer is a local birder and, surprisingly, nature enthusiast. He moved to Vermont three years ago, got involved in eBird and local theater, and never left. He runs a tech consultancy which gives him free time to romp around the woods, and some of that time he donates back as a board member. He lives in Montpelier, is in his mid-thirties, and wears a beard most days. He has an MA in Linguistics from Edinburgh University, and an MSc in Computational Linguistics from Germany. He spent most of his twenties abroad, and was raised in Connecticut. He's the one who tries to record birds using a bucket on the roof of the nature center during most migration seasons, if he can manage the tech for it.