Melissa is a co-founder of Working Food, a non-profit organization based in Gainesville, Florida. Her background and passion for wildlife and wild places, has brought depth of knowledge and understanding to her current non-profit work tackling food systems. She has 10 years of experience in non-profit start up and management, community organizing, food systems, seed stewardship, gardening, farming, education and outreach.

Her work focuses on making seed stewardship and youth education accessible and community-oriented, with the ultimate goal of sharing regionally adapted seed. Her efforts to promote agricultural biodiversity through seed stewardship and outreach focus primarily on working with family farmers, under- privileged youth, and adults with disabilities.