Team

Dr. Raquel Pinderhughes is the Founder and Executive Director of the Roots of Success Environmental Literacy and Job Training Apprenticeship Program and a Professor of Urban Studies and Planning at San Francisco State University. Raquel is an internationally recognized expert on green jobs and workforce development. She conducted the landmark study “Green Collar Jobs for Individuals with Barriers to Employment.” She co-authored the Federal Department of Corrections report “The Greening of Corrections: Creating a Sustainable System.” Her work informed the Obama Administration’s ARRA “Pathways Out of Poverty” program. She was the Director of the Delancy Street Foundations College Program for over a decade. She is currently the city of Ithaca’s workforce development consultant.

Douglas Pentland is the Program Manager with Roots of Success and is responsible for supervising program partners throughout the United States that offer the Roots of Success Apprenticeship and Pre-Apprenticeship program in community and carceral settings. Douglas earned his BA from Occidental College where he majored in Critical Theory and Social Justice and minored in Spanish. Before working with Roots of Success he taught horticulture at Rikers Island jail in NYC, worked as a community organizer and facilitated reentry creative writing classes with the LA based organization Inside Out Writers, and worked as a public school bilingual / dual language classroom teacher.

     Amber Snow is Operations Manager with Roots of Success. Before working with Roots of Success, Amber was Manager of Human Resources and Operations with Annies Annuals and Perennials. Previous to this she worked as a Financial Analyst with Arcadian Health Plan in Oakland. 

Josie Phoenix is Special Projects Manager at Roots of Success. Before joining the Roots of Success team, they worked in the foodservice and hospitality industry for over fifteen years. They are actively involved in community activities and advocacy efforts to increase food and housing security, support mutual aid, and provide harm reduction services. Josie holds a B.A. degree in Urban Studies and Planning from San Francisco State University.

 Taylor Jackson is a certified Roots of Success instructor. She holds a M.A. in Ethnic Studies from San Francisco State University and a B.A. Sociology from U.C. Santa Barbara.

Cesar Garcia is a certified Roots of Success instructor. He holds a B.A. in Sociology from UC Berkeley with a specialization in Law and Public Policy.

Roots of Success Interns

Valerie Xiong 

Kristen Maggard

Enobi Choi is an undergraduate student studying statistics at Mount Holyoke College. She enjoys sweet matcha lattes and watching sports!

Faith Santiago is majoring in Public Health with a Concentration in Population Data Science at San Jose State University. She is interested in addressing health disparities through data analysis.

  Huaxiao Luo (Maggie) is pursuing a degree in Data Science at the University of California, Berkeley.

Marko Simon is a graduate student at Miami University pursuing an MSc in Statistics, with 5 years of experience as a researcher, data analyst, and teacher. Marko has developed two R Shiny websites that visualize world freedom data and the gender gap in financial inclusion in Sub-Saharan African countries. 

Natasha Mauro is a fourth-year statistics and data science major at UCLA. Natasha is grateful for the opportunity to work with the other interns and excited to present the data we have been working on for Roots of Success this summer!