Staff 2
Staff and Partners
James Corwin
is Co-Director of the RI School Recycling Project. Jim’s career spans decades in both radio and marketing. In partnership with the RI Department of Environmental Management, he coordinated numerous Earth Day cleanups, promotions and concerts. Along with Chris, Jim launched the RI School Recycling Project (formerly Club) in 2001. Jim has a BA degree from Union College, and in addition to managing radio stations, served on the board of AS220 for 10 years and is a member of the Wood-Pawcatuck River Association. In 2019, with a grant from The RI Attorney General’s Office, he led a project to measure food waste in RI schools, and so began a passion to divert it with “Get Food Smart, RI.”
Warren Heyman
is Organizing Director of the RI School Recycling Project. Warren is a recent retiree from UniteHere, the North American union for food service and hospitality workers. While employed at UniteHere, he trained workers to organize unions, negotiate union agreements, and work with local community and political leaders. Prior to that, he was a VISTA volunteer in Worcester and Chelsea, Massachusetts where he organized low-income neighborhoods and trained neighborhood leaders to fight for and win improvements. He is also currently a member of the Cranston Neighborhood Tree Group and the Edgewood/Pawtuxet Village Wildflower group. He has been married since the early 1980s with two grown children and a dog, and loves riding his bike in his free time.
Kelly DeAngelis holds a M.A. in International Relations and Environmental Policy from Boston University and B.A. in History from the University of Rhode Island. In her early career in demand response, Kelly worked with both electric utilities and commercial and industrial clients to reduce peak demand on the electrical grid, avoiding blackouts and reliance on emergency fossil fuel power plants.
After six years in the energy industry in Boston, Kelly returned to Rhode Island to focus on sustainability through the school nutrition program in Providence. She supported the district’s Health and Wellness Committee and Farm to School initiatives. Highlights included bringing indoor garden carts to 18 schools in the city, running a summer sustainability job program for high schoolers, and building a school garden with students. Before joining, Kelly worked with Jim and Warren on sorting stations and eventually to implement composting in all 40 school kitchens in Providence .
As the mother of two young children, Kelly loves working with students of all ages. She spends her spare time in the garden and with family and friends. Kelly believes the magic of the program is in the collaboration and positive action. She has always enjoyed working with people to create a brighter, more sustainable future.
Kendra Gay
is a Facilitator for the RI School Recycling Project. Kendra has a BS in Business Management from the University of Hartford. She worked in local radio and television for 10 years before taking a break to raise her 2 children. Upon returning to work, Kendra became the office manager for a thriving bakery in Providence and still holds that position today. Kendra is a 2023 graduate of URI’s Food Recover course, where she was introduced to the Get Food Smart, RI program and began volunteering. In February of 2024, Kendra became a facilitator for RISRP and has launched six schools to date and is on track to launch another 6 before the end of the 2024-2025 school year. In her spare time, Kendra is a commissioner on the Lincoln Conservation Commission and is a board member of the Northern RI Food Pantry. Kendra finds that working at RISRP is not like work at all, it is time spent doing good for the school communities and the environment.
Gail Meisner
is a Facilitator for the RI School Recycling Project. Gail has a B.S. from the University of Michigan in Environmental and Social Biology and an MA from URI in Marine Affairs, with a focus on Coastal Zone Management and Environment Impact Analysis
Gail’s career was focused on data analytics and program evaluation, primarily looking at public health initiatives at the state level. Not surprisingly, the physical environment and access to clean, healthy outdoor spaces are a consistent and key determinant of health outcomes. Gail’s experience also includes database design, and she has co-authored two trade books on database theory. Recently Gail became a “Food Smart” Facilitator working with public schools to establish and enhance their recycling and composting programs, a role about which she says, “This hands-on experience is providing a new and fascinating perspective on sustainable practices in educational institutions. It is especially meaningful to be sharing a commitment to recycling and composting with the next generation.”
Our Partners
The RI Department of Environmental Management is a partner in the Get Food Smart, RI project. They incorporate the RI Food Strategy to improve local food development initiatives, support programs to eliminate food insecurity, and to reduce food waste. Our partners, Senior Environmental Scientist Michele McCaughey and Sustainable Materials Management Engineer Alyson Brunelli, are leaders in environmental protection in the area of Food Waste Diversion. We are fortunate to have such distinguished experts guiding us in our mission.
The Center for Eco Technology is all about solutions to the problem of wasted food – and they’ve been at it for more than 20 years. CET implemented some of the first composting programs in the country. Their over-arching goal is to show that managing wasted food is critical to address climate change, feed more hungry people, and grow the economy. This national leader in food waste reduction continues to support our mission by “spotlighting” our schools’ successes diverting, recovering and reducing food waste.
The Environmental Council of Rhode Island Education Fund was incorporated in 1991 as a separate 501(c)(3) recognized non-profit organization to sponsor research and education to accomplish its mission: Enhancing the Long-Term Stewardship of Rhode Island’s Natural Resources. The goal of the Fund is to create materials and programs designed to educate Rhode Island’s citizens about environmental health and natural resource protection and restoration. We are fortunate to have had the support of ECRI in our recycling initiatives for almost two decades.
Rhode Island Resource Recovery Corporation handles trash and recycling for the entire state. Their 1,040-acre facility in Johnston is home to five operations that process it all, from recyclables to yard debris to household hazardous waste to the trash that fills the landfill. They are happy to give your school a presentation on Food Waste Prevention, as well as a tour of the Materials Recycling Facility and landfill. You might be surprised at how fascinating a place this is!
Slaying waste since 2011, Bootstrap Compost is a leading compost pickup service operating throughout Boston, Providence and Worcester. Partnering with local farms, Bootstrap diverts thousands of pounds of organic material from landfills every day. Our farms benefit from our compost in the production of crops while each Bootstrap customer receives a portion of black gold for their own gardening projects. In addition to hauling food scraps from RI schools, Bootstrap’s team conducts “How to Compost” workshops for student Green Teams.
Black Earth Compost is a leading food scrap collection and composting company in Eastern MA & RI. They take compostables that were once destined for either incinerators or landfills and compost the material themselves, returning it to customers and selling it in garden centers. Black Earth Compost is ready to work with Rhode Island schools to haul food scraps away from the Central Landfill and do their part to protect, heal and strengthen our environment for future generations.
