After spending both her undergraduate and graduate years at California Institute of the Arts, she moved to northwest lower Michigan where she has worked as a designer, writing teacher and nonprofit administrator. It is here that she began making cheese, canning vegetables, raising chickens and learning what it means to be part of a community. Amanda is also Co-Chair of the Northern Michigan Small Farm Conference, which works to build a local vibrant agricultural community.
Brad Kik’s life has been a jumbled mess of film study, environmental activism, graphic design, community organizing, woodworking, chicken raising, music, ecology and permaculture. In 2005, Brad found slightly more focus by falling in love with his partner Amanda and, with her, co-founding and now co-directing the Institute for Sustainable Living, Art & Natural Design (ISLAND), an arts, ecology and agriculture program in Northwest Lower Michigan. Brad's role with ISLAND involves developing the 10 acre property, writing for and designing ISLAND's public face, and spending way too much time on the computer.
Yvonne Stephens studied plants and fungi as an undergraduate at Michigan State University, dabbling in poetry and pottery. She worked as a lab assistant in Detroit, and more recently as a Charlevoix-Emmet Intermediate School District AmeriCorps Member. Yvonne joined ISLAND as an intern in 2009, organizing a beekeeping workshop, a community canning party and the Fungi and Fermentation Skill Swap. She joined us as a staff member in September 2009, and will act as the ISLAND event coordinator.
Mary Brower grew up out west, but has spent much of her life chasing geography. Her past is littered with partial careers in teaching, farming, writing, and cooking. Pleased to be setting down permanent roots in this part of the world, Mary’s favorite means of procrastination involve winter gardening, food preservation, and making supper for her husband and little boy.
After dappling in the industrial design world, Jen Schaap found the life-changing powers of dirt and began a second life working on, supporting, and promoting the small farm. On the side, she likes to sew, sing, and eat real food. Jen serves as the Administrative Coordinator of the annual Small Farm Conference, engages food communities through events like ISLAND’s From Farm to Frame photo contest, and is working to strengthen the network of small farms and local foods in northern Michigan.
Aaron Allen has a background in social activism and community organizing. He holds a B.A. in Political Theory and Constitutional Democracy, as well as a Juris Doctor from Michigan State University College of Law. He is currently employed full time as a public interest attorney, and has volunteered for organizations including Refugee Services, Lansing Voters Matter, Citizens for Alternatives to Chemical Contamination, the American Civil Liberties Union, and others. In the little free time that he has, Aaron enjoys acting, songwriting, camping and travel.
Michelle Ferrarese is originally from the Great Lakes State; though she has lived on the east and west coasts and in between, she always returns to Michigan - she loves the lakes! Michelle studied botany and ecology in college and worked in outdoor and environmental education for several years. In 1998 she had the good fortune of volunteering at the Community Farm of Ann Arbor (the first CSA farm in Michigan) where she got hooked on CSA. Michelle went on to intern at farms in Massachusetts and Michigan, and helped to start and manage the 
Growing up within the Great Lakes Watershed in Northern Michigan certainly helped form Ricʼs early passions for a clean and thriving environment. His college years inspired further studies in watersheds, ecosystems, energy and sustainability while obtaining his Bachelor of Science from Michigan State University. After studies abroad, lots of traveling and several various employment 'hats,' Ric was drawn to the building trades and building sciences, which eventually lead to him starting 
Nick Carlson was attracted to Traverse City, Michigan five years ago through an opportunity to be involved in the start-up of Pleasanton Brick Oven Bakery as an active community craftsman, baking sourdough bread in this village bakery. Through this position at the heart of Traverse City’s growing local, artisan economy, Nick fell into a community of supportive, active, social entrepreneurs like no other. Despite catching several temporary travel bugs over the last five years taking him away for months at a time, Nick has come home to Traverse City to live and work amongst a community of people who have aligned their life’s work with the real human needs and responsibilities, like growing whole foods, and incorporating sustainability and justice into our daily work.
Born in New York City and raised in Traverse City, Lillie Wolff earned a BA in Human Development and Social Relations from Kalamazoo College. She brings with her experience in community organizing and coalition building, and a commitment to working toward ecological and social justice. Lillie has spent most of her non-profit career working for farmworker and immigrant rights, and currently serves as the Advocacy Coordinator for the Michigan Immigrant Rights Center in Kalamazoo. She is also a successful entrepreneur and artist, as well as registered yoga teacher and dedicated practitioner. Lillie has spent significant time in Ecuador and India, and offers a global view on culture, place, community, tradition, and the creative and healing arts. In her spare time Lillie loves to grow food, cook, and dance.
Heather Miller grew up in a close, extended family surrounded by apple orchards and strawberry fields in rural, southern New Hampshire. As a child, she and her sisters spent their summer days picking strawberries and green beans at a local farm, and she still shudders at the thought of the huge tomato worms they encountered. Excited to see more of the world, she left NH to attend Alma College, traveling to France for a year to study, and returning to receive a B.A. in English and French in 1971. That same year she was lucky enough to find and marry Toby, who she would love forever. She and Toby raised two daughters, Kate and Rachel, who are now living with their families in the Minneapolis area. After spending time raising their family, Heather returned to school and received a Master’s Degree in Speech/Language Disorders in 1986. She worked for Traverse Bay Area Intermediate School District, primarily in Antrim County with children from birth to 18 years old, who had communication difficulties, ranging from articulation to autism. Since retiring, she has been committed to environmental activism and learning about and creating a sustainable homestead with Toby. She loves watching her grandson Eian grow and learn, as well as growing vegetables and flowers, making maple syrup, keeping bees, bicycling, hiking and enjoying nature and drawing and painting. Learning has continually been and remains an important personal goal. Heather and Toby’s goals include supporting and growing community, working toward greater energy efficiency, and growing their own or buying food grown locally.
Raised on an old country farmstead in Eaton County, Michigan, Toby Miller grew up in an area of intact family farms, most having fields of oats, wheat, corn and alfalfa, a big garden, a few pigs, chickens, and a small herd of milk cows. After graduating from Alma College in 1970 with a degree in English Literature and natural science, he got a different education working on the brutally monotonous assembly line at Oldsmobile. He met and married Heather at Alma in 1971. One of their favorite things to do was to look at copies of Organic Gardening and Farming and dream about the piece of land they would buy and homestead together. They lived and worked in a variety of small Midwest towns and had two wonderful daughters together. As they raised their kids, Toby worked first as a teacher and then a principal, retiring from Elk Rapids Schools in 2007. Throughout their lives, Toby and Heather have worked to be better stewards of our world and have started or joined groups ranging from climate action initiatives to smaller focused topic groups on sustainability. In 1987, Toby and Heather fell in love with 73 acres of hilly ground near Alden that is more beautiful than fertile, and in 2006, they built their home there together. They continue to work on improving the thin Kalkaska sandy loam to grow fruits and vegetables. Other than leaning on a shovel, Toby’s favorite activities include cutting wood for the wood stove, gardening, learning about ways to balance the natural world and human culture in a more sustainable way, hiking, wilderness canoeing, bicycling, cross-country skiing, making jewelry, meditation, and reading. 
Stephanie Mills is an author, lecturer and longtime bioregionalist. Her books include Tough Little Beauties, Epicurean Simplicity, and In Service of the Wild.
Caitlin Strokosch has 10 years of arts management experience in marketing,
development, communications, and program management. Most notably, she
served as General Manager of Bella Voce, one of the country’s premiere
professional chamber choirs, and as Executive Director of CUBE, a new
music ensemble based in Chicago. Strokosch has lectured at Columbia
College Chicago, Roosevelt University, Brown University, Roger Williams
University, and the Rhode Island School of Design on a range of topics,
from grantwriting to contemporary music to intersections of art and
architecture. She holds a Bachelor’s Degree in music performance from
Columbia College Chicago and a Master’s in musicology from Roosevelt
University, where her research focused on music as a tool for building
communities of resistance and social dissent. She moved to Rhode Island
in 2002 as a PhD candidate in Ethnomusicology at Brown University. She
continues her creative work as a songwriter, poet and writer, and in
2005 she was an artist-in-residence at the Ucross Foundation.
Holly Wren Spaulding received degrees from the University of Michigan and from Trinity College (Dublin) where she was a fellow at the Oscar Wilde Center for Irish Writing. Her work has appeared in The Nation, The Ecologist, Clamor, Earth First! Journal, Z Magazine, 
Corie Pierce was born in New Hampshire and began vegetable farming as a teenager. On this farm she developed and deepened her reverence for the land and our environment and where our healthy food comes from. She fell in love with growing food and teaching others how to grow food. After attending Middlebury College in Vermont where she studied Biology and Environmental Education, she moved to California where she worked teaching and developing curriculum. In the meantime, she maintained her connection to growing food and farming and worked on various farms and gardens and completed the farming and gardening apprenticeship in Agroecology at the UC Santa Cruz. In 2005 she became the co-Farm manager at the Student Organic Farm at Michigan State University and laundhed a new year-long farmer training program – the Organic Farming Certificate Program at MSU. Now she is the Garden Manager and Sustainable Agriculture faculty at Sterling College in Craftsbury Common, Vermont.
Susan Fawcett works full-time as an artist and musician. She is a member of
the 
Marty has committed the past ten years of his life to building sustainable, community-based food systems in Michigan. A product of a traditional farming community in southeast Michigan, Marty broke away from his agrarian roots to pursue a BS in chemical engineering from Michigan State and a PhD, also in chemical engineering, at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Disillusioned by the pharmaceutical biotechnology industry he was trained to join, he traveled to India in 1998 and used some of that biotechnology training to support campaigns against genetic engineering in agriculture. Marty has managed a few CSA farms, and spent the 2006 growing season on a bicycle tour of CSA farms in Michigan and created a ISLAND began because of Brad and Amanda Kik‘s strong and shared belief that the arts and sustainable living are intertwined and essential to an enriching community.
Amanda spent both her undergraduate and graduate years at California Institute of the Arts and as an active participant in the art community in Los Angeles before moving to Northern Michigan. She quickly learned that art is a vital part of any community, no matter the size or cultural composition. Amanda’s strong desire to contribute to the cultural community of Northern Michigan, coupled with her commitment to the development of new work, led her to the beginnings of ISLAND.
Brad worked for five years as a community organizer both during and after college at Michigan State University. Through his work organizing communities in four states around environmental and consumer rights policy, he learned two important lessons: first, that there is deep and widespread concern (amongst what many consider an apathetic public) about the state of our communities and our place in the world; and second, that policy shift battles are necessary but cannot effect real change without the cultural shift that creates them.
After leaving that work Brad spent seven months in New Zealand working with a rainforest sanctuary and sustainable living organization, and saw the power of intensive individual experience. Realizing that design is the province of everyone, not just architects and other professionals, and understanding the power of attraction of pastoral, rural living, Brad sought to combine the two.
Brad and Amanda met on the fourth of July, 2004, and realized that each was complementary to the other, not only in their vision for an energetic new non-profit organization, but in life. They began ISLAND in May and were married in August of 2005.
The information about our residency program now has its own page