Staff

Susan Witt was the Executive Director of the E. F. Schumacher Society, seeing through its June 2010 transition to the New Economics Institute which she now serves as Interim Director. She helped found the Society in 1980 and led the development of its highly regarded publication, library, seminar, and other educational programs while at the same time remaining deeply committed to implementing Schumacher’s economic ideas in her home region of the Berkshires. She helped found the Community Land Trust in the Southern Berkshires in 1980 and has been responsible for many of the innovative financing and contracting methods that the Land Trust uses to create more affordable access to land. In 2006 she co-founded the BerkShares local currency program that has won unprecedented international media attention as a model for other regions. She created and administered the SHARE micro-credit program, the precursor of BerkShares, and in 1985 helped Robyn VanEn form the first Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm in this country at Indian Line Farm. Susan Witt writes and speaks on the theory and practice of building sustainable local economies. Once an Executive Director is appointed for the New Economics Institute, Ms Witt will become the Institute's Education Director. Detailed biography of Susan Witt Archive of Susan Witt's articles and essays Article about Susan Witt from The Women's Times (PDF)

Stefan Apse Community Land Trust Coordinator Stefan comes to the Schumacher Society after working in Natural Building in both Vermont and Colorado. He came to the Berkshires because of his interests in local and sustainable economies. Stefan began working at the Schumacher Society in the summer of 2008.

 

Kate Poole Education and Media Coordinator Kate is a recent graduate of Princeton University, where she studied contemporary Buddhist reform in both Thailand and China. Her senior thesis explored the intersection of religion and economic sociology, examining a radical communal Buddhist sect in Thailand. Kate has been with the Society since August 2009.

 

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