Cafeteria Culture (CafCu) Team
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Atsuko Quirk, Digital Media Producer and Cafeteria Ranger Program Director, is a documentary filmmaker, environmental advocate, and a 21st generation Samurai family member from northern Japan. living in New York City. She is the Director and Producer of Microplastic Madness, Cafeteria Culture's feature documentary, with additional credits as cinematographer and editor. Her documentary, "Its Everybody’s Ocean" won Best Documentary Short at NYC International Film Festival (2014) and has been screened in film festivals in ten cities around the world. “School Lunch in Japan - It’s not just about eating" (2010), her short documentary, has over 25 million views on YouTube! The movie conveys the importance of quality school mealtime and has inspired international audiences of students, educators, and school food leaders, as well as Cafcu’s own zero waste cafeteria programs. (more about Atsuko ->) |
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Debby Lee Cohen, Executive Director and Founder, is a multi-disciplinary artist, educator, and Zero Waste activist. She is the Director and Producer of Microplastic Madness, Cafeteria Culture's feature documentary. She has designed scenery, puppets, and animation for theater, parades, film and television, including design for HBO shows, "Classical Baby" and "Saving My Tomorrow.” In partnership with parents, students and NYC school food directors, she led the Styrofoam Out of Schools campaign, resulting in the elimination of half a billion plastic styrofoam trays per year from landfills, incinerators and students meals in NYC and 9 other cities. Debby Lee received a Proclamation from Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer (2018) for her zero waste efforts and is a board member of Manhattan Solid Waste Advisory Board MSWAB and Plastic Free Waters Partnership NY/NJ. (more about Debby Lee ->) |
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Rhonda Keyser, Education and Outreach Director, is an expert school cafeteria waste reduction leader and an actress. Before working with the CafCu team., she lead Brooklyn's PS 29 Green Committee and the PTA. Under her leadership, PS 29 won the competitive 2014 NYC Golden Apple Award! In addition she helped facilitate the Green Team Leaders work to win National Wildlife Federation’s Eco-Schools Green Flag award. At PS 29, Rhonda helped to divert over 65,000 pounds of food waste and 7200 pounds of metal, glass, and plastic recycling from the landfill, She helped the faculty, staff and students reduce 7 bags of lunch garbage per day to 2 bins of food scraps, 2 bags of recycling and 2 small bags of trash. Rhonda relishes the opportunity to work with Cafeteria Culture, reaching new communities and expanding zero waste, educational tools to all NYC Public Schools and beyond. (more about Rhonda ->) |
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Daniel Ramos, Multi-media Assistant and Lead Animator /Visual Effects Designer for Microplastic Madness, is a Brooklyn native, born and raised in the neighborhood of Williamsburg. Since childhood, he has had a passion for computer and digital technology, having constructed his own computer as a teenager. This led him to the field of film and media, earning a BFA in Radio and Television production at the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT), broadening his interest in visual effects and animation. Currently, his many roles at Cafeteria Culture include filming, editing, and creating animation and digital effects for the Microplastic Madness movie and resources. Daniel is excited to continue developing his After Effects and animation skills with the goal to become a motion graphics animator expert. |
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Anna Nixon, CafCu Lead Science Teacher, recently received her Master of Science degree in Biology from New York University, Graduate School of Arts and Sciences. She graduated from Penn State with a B.S. in Genetic and Developmental Biology. Anna also co-teaches the Science Class at Lower East Side Girls Club (in partnership with CafeteriaCulture) and enjoys sharing her love for science. She’s passionate about advocating for diversity in science and is happy she gets to teach and inspire kids to be scientists like her. Anna's original podcast, Annadmia, intersects race and STEM with survival tips and tricks from a perspective of a black woman in STEM. |
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Marjorie Duverge, CafCu Administrative Assistant and a born and raised Queens native, has always been fascinated with film as a means of sharing interesting and thought-provoking stories. Growing up, she loved immersing herself in the worlds of a Disney or Ghibli film, with their engaging and lovable characters, from the comfort of her couch. Years later, Marjorie earned her Bachelor's in Media Studies from Queens College, and soon after interned with Insignia Films, an esteemed documentary company. At the moment, she is using her administrative and writing skills to help Cafeteria Culture set up screenings of their award-winning film, Microplastic Madness , to schools and organizations across the country and around the world. Having already done and learned so much during her time with the CafCu team, Marjorie is eager to see what comes next!
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Andreya D. Matthew, CafCu Media Assistant, is an up and coming Cinematographer. She's shot two short films, Too Much Love and Humanity, and has been 2nd Camera on the short film A Prelude to. She uses these skills to capture students from in the Cafeteria Culture programs in the classroom and community. She is also editing promo videos and was and assisted with editing on CafCu's feature documentary, Microplastic Madness. Through this she is able to continue to learn the craft and develop her creative eye. |
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Kelsey Wooddell, CafCu Special Projects Coordinator, attained her Master’s in Public Administration and a focus in Environmental Science and Policy from Columbia’s School of International and Public Affairs. She graduated from Rice University with a B.A. in Environmental Engineering, Policy Studies, and Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and went on to join the Peace Corps, where she served as a Community Environmental Manager in Peru. After graduating from Columbia, she was the Assistant Director of Columbia’s Earth Institute Center for Environmental Sustainability. She cares deeply about advocating for science-based policy to address issues of environmental justice, sustainability, conservation, and education. |
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Yuko Takeda, CafCu Japan Special Projects Coordinator, was born in Tochigi, Japan and moved to the U.S after receiving a BA in English literature. She studied Fashion Business at F.I.T and worked for a Japanese apparel trading firm in New York, then launched her own marketing company with her partners. After moving to New Jersey and parenting twin children, she witnessed how much single use plastics are being used in schools & communities and was frustrated by the lack of action for fixing the problem.. Her introduction to the work of Cafeteria Culture totally changed her of thinking, concluding that "all of us can start our own environmental movement today in order to make this world a better place before it's too late!" Yuko is currently promoting “Microplastic Madness” film screenings and Q&A sessions in Japan with tremendous success! Her mission is to make this film a must-watch documentary from elementary kids to senior citizens all over Japan and beyond and to build a sustainable society. |
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Jenny Davies, CafCu Public and Environmental Health Director, lives in Portland, Oregon. She received a political science degree from Duke University (1981), an MD and an MPH from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (1990), and a JD in environmental law from Lewis & Clark Law School (2021). She loves to plant trees, hike, run in the forest, and learn new stuff to inspire kids (and grown-ups) everywhere to create a more just, sustainable, and healthy world. |
The CafCu Team filming at New York City Hall, L to R: Daniel Ramos, NYC Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso (former NYC Council Member) , Debby Lee Cohen, Atsuko Quirk, and Andreya Matthew
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CafCu INTERNS!
Interested in interning with Cafeteria Culture?
Contact us ->
Contact us ->
CafCu High School INTERNS!
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Amina Castronovo is a rising senior at Beacon High School, NYC. She is an intern with Cafeteria Culture, a Field Advisor for Our Climate, a member of the Climate and Resilience Education Task Force’s Youth Steering Committee, and a co-leader of Beacon’s environmental justice club. She is helping to organize the NYC climate strike with Fridays For Future and build a green team mentorship program with the NYC DOE Department of Sustainability and the Youth at the Center program at Columbia Teachers College Center for Sustainable Futures. Amina is also a lobby lead with New York Youth Climate Leaders and part of New York Renews’ Media Strike Team. She is a mentee at Girls Write Now, and she has been published in multiple publications.
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Gauri Rastogi is a 16-year old high school student from Rochester, Michigan. Her interest in the environment emerged upon learning about the science behind climate change at the age of 12, and ever since then, she has decided to dedicate herself to efforts to preserve the environment. During her internship with CafCu, Gauri created a detailed guide for students all over the country to eliminate styrofoam lunch trays from their school based on her own experiences.
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CafCu VOLUNTEERS!
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Maria Molloy is a software engineer and a former New York City public school student. She has been volunteering with Cafeteria Culture since she was in middle school. She has been involved with many CafCu projects from carrying foam tray puppets at marches and rallies to teaching kids about game design and coding. She has also worked with Girls Who Code to teach teenage girls how to code. Maria hopes to continue teaching computer science to girls and youth of color and to use her skills to reduce inequality in the field.
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Daniel Simpson, born in Venezuela and raised in Miami, is a graduate of Marist College, with a BS in Information Technology and was on Marist's D1 swim team. Daniel began volunteering with CafCu in early 2020, teaching game design principles to students at PS 188 M, providing remote technical support, and participating in CafCu's Youth Advocates program. Daniel hopes to continue to use lessons learned from his volunteering to assist in the development of historically underrepresented communities.
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Jay Schlossberg-Cohen (left)
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CafCu Team Alumni
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Lena Greenberg is a devoted systems thinker and advocate of youth participation in urbanism. She put these passions to work through developing and teaching curriculum at CafCu's partner schools. Lena is a Brooklynite and graduate of The New School, and can usually be found traversing the city by bike or processing food scraps at her community garden.
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Naimah Hakim is a graduate of Princeton University where she studied anthropology, gender, and critical race studies. Following years volunteering at a soup kitchen and working at a student-run sustainability food co-op, Naimah joined the Cafeteria Culture Team to promote community organizing around food justice, diversity, and access to arts-based education.
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Josh Snow studied Urban Design at Parsons The New School. He is devoted to compost advocacy, urban farming, and self-sustaining cities. Designing a better future through hands-on projects, Josh finds that creativity is the number one solution to today's most challenging obstacles.
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Israh Moore worked as Youth Media+Arts for Trash Free Waters, - Film Production and Technical Assistant,. She is a graduate of New York Institute of Technology—New York, NY.
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Diana Biagioli played a critical role in the development and piloting CafCu's Zero Waste Cafeterias program in our early years.
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Thank you to our Intern Alums!
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Rebeca Sabnam, 18 year old, Columbia University Freshman and Cafeteria Culture Youth Advocate, delivered a powerful speech about the intersection of the Climate Crisis and Human Rights at the Youth Climate Strike NYC on 9/20/19, attended by 250,000 people. Her speech focused on the intersection of the climate emergency, racial injustice and poverty and how Bangladeshi women are extremely vulnerable to post- displacement trafficking, magnified by the Climate Crisis. Born in NYC, Rebeca spent her early childhood in Bangladesh, a frontline community of the climate crisis. She has marched with trash puppets around NYC”s Lower East Side, rallied at New York City Hall, delivered testimony to NYC Council, helped to get styrofoam banned in public schools and citywide, and advocated with her middle school classmates to get the NYC bag fee bill passed. Rebeca started her CafCu internship during the summer of 2020, hosting and helping to launch the CafCu Youth Advocates Teen Activist Cafe Podcast and led the planning and design of a community mural project.
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Megan Ortiz, 18 year old from Harlem, New York City, recent graduate of Brooklyn Latin School, and Cafcu Youth Advocate, started her CafCu internship during the summer of 2020,. She co-hosted the CafCu Youth Advocates "Teen Activists Cafe" Podcast and developed a poetry book and film project on the topic of the climate crisis as part of her internship.
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Maybelle Keyser-Butson, 16-year old junior at Bard High School Early College Queens., was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York. She has always been environmentally conscious, learning from her family, and bringing the consciousness to her school and friendships. She is currently taking Judith Enck's class "Beyond Plastic Pollution" at Bennington College and will share information from that class with Cafeteria Culture, whether it is brought in social media posts, video lessons, or blog posts. Maybelle hopes to become a writer, editor, or history professor in the future and will remain a lifelong environment activist.
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Bennington College Interns (2019-2022)
2022 - Sawyer London, Endeavor Foundation Environmental Action Fellow 2021 - Ava Renz, Endeavor Foundation Environmental Action Fellow 2020 - Elmina David and Mrunal Khadke 2019 - Clara Schiller, Gwen Asher , Aidan Murphy , and Allie Fredette. |
Bennington College Visiting Professor and Senior Fellow, Judith Enck (center) with Field Work Term Interns (2019), L to R: Clara Schiller, Gwen Asher , Aidan Murphy , and Allie Fredette.
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Lydia Diebel, native New Yorker with a BA in psychology from Macalester College in St. Paul, interned with Cafeteria Culture as a teaching assistant, and also assisted with designing curriculum, conducting cafeteria waste audits, and with the production of the MICROPLASTIC MADNESS documentary,
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Shane Araujo, Bowdoin College junior, interned with CafCu during the summer of 2019, hand-painting beautiful graphics for our feature documentary, MICROPLASTIC MADNESS.
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Jacob Kowalick-Allen, a senior at Duke University, interned with CafCu in 2019, assisting with MICROPLASTC MADNESS community screenings, school and Youth Advocate programs, and Spanish translations.
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Allison Seaman interned with Cafcu as a freshman at Baruch College,, majoring in Art. She is a graduate of LaGuardia High School and previously interned with Arts Connection school and studied at the Arts Students League.
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Georgeanne Dinan, University of Pennsylvania graduate, interned with CafCu interned during her senior year at Hunter College High School in New York City.
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Deborah Buzuayehu interned with CafCu as a Parsons School of Design senior, where she studied integrated design, communication design, and creative coding.
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Brianna Maury - Hunter College
Yue Fang Bank Street College of Education
Christine Valezquez Herman, Brooklyn College
Aija Suuta, Parsons The New School
Shannon Baum, Parsons The New School
Sandy Yoon, Parsons The New School
Yue Fang Bank Street College of Education
Christine Valezquez Herman, Brooklyn College
Aija Suuta, Parsons The New School
Shannon Baum, Parsons The New School
Sandy Yoon, Parsons The New School
High School Volunteers
Hunter High School volunteers, Nora Mattson, Geargeanne Dinan, Olivia McKay, and Maria Molloy -
at the March For Science, April 2017
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