Sophie joined the National Recreation Foundation in 2014 after spending 25 years in the nonprofit sector. She served as the executive director of Brushwood Center at Ryerson Woods in Riverwoods, Illinois for over ten years. There she identified which segments of the community were not users of public open space, and then launched a series of successful programs to engage these populations with the outdoors, thereby affording access to the myriad of health benefits derived by time in nature. Prior to that, she managed international conservation programs for The Field Museum in Chicago and served as assistant director of the Lake Michigan Federation, today’s Alliance for the Great Lakes.
Active in her community, she serves on several nonprofit boards and advisory committees. Sophie is a member of the Lake County Health Department’s Live Well Lake County Steering Committee and the Woman’s Board of the Chicago Horticultural Society. She serves as the Vice Chair (Water) on the Garden Club of America’s Conservation and National Affairs & Legislation Committees.
Sophie graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania with a Bachelor of Arts in Cultural Anthropology. She earned her law degree with honors from the Chicago-Kent College of Law with a certificate in Environmental & Energy Law.