Karam Sheban is the Director of Sustainable Forestry at Rural Action. He served first as an AmeriCorps member with Rural Action’s Sustainable Forestry program from 2015 to 2017, and as a staff member with the program in 2018. During that time, he worked with the Appalachian Beginning Forest Farmer Coalition to launch their regionwide initiative, helped to boost wood products sales at the Chesterhill Produce Auction, and worked with the Environmental Education team to launch the Appalachian Stewards program.

After three years with Rural Action, Karam returned to school and received a Master’s in Forestry from the Yale School of Forestry in New Haven, Connecticut. There, he conducted agroforestry research and worked with a broad range of forest stakeholders across New England. He never took the Rural Action bumper sticker off his car.

Karam is a graduate of The Ohio State University and has family throughout the state. He is happy to be back in the rolling hills of Appalachian Ohio!