About Will Parish
Biography
Will Parish (Peter William Parish) is a credentialed public high school science educator with a 38-year record of innovative accomplishments in the environmental and educational fields. He has dedicated his career to ensuring that high-quality, environment-based education is integrated into public schools.
His formal education includes earning a BA in Political Economy from Williams College in 1975 and a law degree from the University of Detroit School of Law in 1980.
Will’s career journey has been diverse, spanning law, aviation, energy development, high school teaching, and statewide educational advocacy. Prior to his work in education, he was an attorney in a major San Francisco law firm, a certified flight instructor, and the CEO of a company that developed $110,000,000 worth of alternative energy projects in the 1980s and 1990s. He also served as a pilot for an environmental organization, utilizing the aerial perspective to expose land-use abuses.
Following his teaching tenure, Will founded Ten Strands, a nonprofit organization established to support California’s efforts to achieve the statewide integration of high-quality environment-based education into all public K–12 schools.
He also previously served as Executive Director of Friends of Environmental Education, formed to support quality environmental education for all K-12 students in California, specifically promoting access to the Education and the Environment Initiative Curriculum.
His commitment to education culminated in his teaching career at Gateway High School in San Francisco, where he taught environmental science and civics for ten years, from 2002 to 2012.
During this time (age 50 to 60), he worked more than full time as a credentialed public high school science teacher while being paid half time. He later served on Gateway High School’s board of trustees/directors.
Statement of Purpose
Advocacy, Arts, and Stewardship
Will’s advocacy extends to his significant state-level service, including his appointment by the California State Board of Education to the Instructional Quality Commission (IQC).
Beyond professional advocacy, Will has pursued creative outlets, notably his passion for performance and writing. It took until he approached age 40 in 1992 to re-engage with performing, when he secretly learned Hip Hop, performing a rap and dance detailing his life story at his 40th birthday celebration. Over the next ten years, he performed over twenty different raps for various organizations, including the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Defense Fund. During his time at Gateway High School, he created the teaching character Earthy Man, who performed the "Eco Spirit Rap" every Earth Day.
Will has also written two books: a young adult novel, Captain LightHawk, and the Death Dust (self-published), and, with traveling partner Perk Perkins, Around the World in a Jeep (published 2008), documenting their two-year journey across 35 countries and six oceans from 1975 to 1977.
Will and his wife, Julie, are the current stewards of 1,000 acres of land south of the Bohemian Grove, in partnership with the nonprofit LandPaths. Their stewardship efforts include planting 3,000 redwood trees and 2,000 willows, oaks, and maples, using best practices in forest management for resiliency and fire-readiness. This land, known as the Bohemia Ecological Preserve, is used as an outdoor education destination (Owl Camp) for marginalized communities, for animal tracking, and for providing healing experiences through an organization called Ecology of Awakening.
Will lives in San Francisco with his wife, Julie, where they raised two boys and have now two grandchildren.
“The planetary emergency unfolding around us is, first and foremost a crisis of thought, values, perception, ideas, and judgment. In other words, it is a crisis of mind, which makes it a crisis of those institutions which purport to improve minds.”
— David Orr, Writer