Samuel Cuthell is the Network Coordinator for the Golden Gate Biosphere Network (GGBN) based in the Bay Area of California. Prior to his appointment to his position with GGBN, Sam spent 8 years working for various Federal (NPS & USFS), State, & City governments, building and maintaining trail systems across the West. He received his BS in Parks and Conservation Management from Paul Smith’s College in the Adirondacks of New York State along with an AS in Culinary Arts from Johnson & Wales University in Providence, RI.
Following a trip to study Biosphere Reserve governance in South Africa and recognizing a lack of meaningful youth engagement and successional planning, Sam founded and chaired the USBN’s Youth Board of Directors (YB) to address these gaps. The YB focuses on increasing meaningful youth participation in conservation governance while providing project-based professional development for its members and improving inter-generational communication. Sam sits on the Steering Committee for the USBN as the youth representative and participates in EuroMAB Youth as the American representative.
In his role for the GGBN, Sam focuses on developing and encouraging collaboration between the myriad of land managing agencies that fall within the boundaries of the biosphere. This landscape-level conservation effort is positioned to aggregate the work being done by our partner agencies into projects that combat climate change and improve regional biodiversity while providing socio-economic benefits to our society.