Kris Herbst

My photo is taken in my front yard where we replaced sod with a wildflower meadow. When the local housing inspectors threatened to fine me for not cutting the grass, I had to get them talking with the county's environmental department, which encourages this sort of thing to reduce eroding, polluting run-off and use of lawn chemicals. A sign from the National Wildlife Federation designating our yard a wildlife habitat also helped. I love outdoor activities - hiking, backpacking, etc. - and studying natural history. I have been helping develop the Changemakers.net website since it was founded in 1998. And I am active in the Mankind Project, a global organization for men to develop as leaders, partners, fathers, and elders in order to offer their deepest gifts in service to the world.

I am fond of walking in the woods of my own watershed, in northern Virginia on the Potomac River. My favorite local place for backpacking, hiking, and cross country skiing is the Dolly Sods Wilderness in West Virginia and adjacent Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge. It sits on the highest plateau of its type east of the Mississippi River, where it catches more than 100 inches of snow in the winter and gives rise to the Potomac and the Monongahela/Ohio Rivers.

People forming small, communal affinity groups to take actions that support their passions and values, linking-up globally to accelerate change toward a sustainable, healthy world.

Kris managed the Changemakers.net website from its launch in the spring of 1998. As the Changemakers team has grown he has focused on creating content and community on the site. Prior to working for Ashoka, he had been developing Web sites since 1993, managing the launch of sites for clients including the National Press Club and the Biotechnology Industry Organization. He has been Assistant Editor of the Saturday Review magazine and contributing editor of BioCentury newsletter. He has worked throughout the world as a Washington-based freelance journalist and television news producer for clients including the Nippon TV Network and NHK Television of Japan, and a wide range of print publications including Emerging Markets, The World & I, Japan Times Weekly, and New Scientist. He covered the early evolution of the web for publications such as Internet World, Network World, CommunicationsWeek, Datamation, ComputerWorld and ComputerWorld Japan, MacWeek and Macintosh Today, and Computer Graphics World. After receiving a Masters in City and Regional Planning from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, Kris worked for the Ft. Collins, Colorado, City Manager's Office and the Boston Housing Authority's Economic Development Office.