Ellen Stein, Former MSI Executive Director, 2002-2006

From June 2002 to December 2006, Ellen served as the first executive director of the Mountain Studies Institute.  She brought to the organization a suite of non-profit management, environmental conservation and rural development skills from her past work in the non-profit sector. 
Ellen came to MSI from Steamboat Springs where she served two years as the first executive director of the Community Agriculture Alliance and set strategy for and built this organization.  Her additional experience includes serving as a Land Stewardship and Fundraising Consultant to the Western Governors’ Association; and as a Program Associate with the Ford Foundation’s Community and Resource Development unit of the Asset-Building and Community Development program.  Ellen served in the United States Peace Corps as an Agriculture Extension Agent/Rural Development Volunteer from 1988-90 in Mali, West Africa. In 1996, she received an M.A. in Public Policy, with an Environmental and Natural Resources Policy concentration, from Tufts University; and in 1987, a B.A. from The Colorado College in Studio Art.
From 2004 - 2007, Ellen was a member of the Bureau of Land Management’s Southwest Resource Advisory Council. She is a founding board member of KSJC: Silverton Community Radio. Since February 2007 Ellen has served as Development Director at KDUR-FM: Durango Community Radio at Fort Lewis College.  She lives with Earl, her full-of-moxie Jack Russell Terrier, along the Animas River in Durango, Colorado.