Mentorship & Advice
Because the intersection of business and the environment is a relatively new space, there is a lot of room for new ideas to take root.
CBEY supports students interested in the creation of new nonprofit and commercial organizations, business models, or other innovations that address pressing environmental challenges.
Various CBEY staff are available for office hours or one-on-one coaching sessions about your venture, innovative idea, career path and beyond. Members of the Yale community can schedule time with one of our fellows, experts, and mentors below.
CBEY Resident Fellows
fellows - overview
CBEY Fellows have an extended presence on campus and work closely with students to accelerate innovative environmental action across campus via office hours, small group discussions and programming.
peter boyd - text
Peter Boyd is a Lecturer at Yale School of the Environment and Resident Fellow at the Yale Center for Business and the Environment. Outside Yale he is Founder & CEO of Time4Good, helping Leaders and their teams build purpose-driven paths to maximum impact. He also serves as an Advisor to REDD.plus and Chair of ‘Sustainable Westport’ in his hometown of Connecticut.
Tagan Engel - text
Tagan Engel has over 25 years of experience in leading critical work to reshape local and regional food systems, developing digital communications, inspiring community organization and engagement, and innovating beyond traditional business models. Tagan is leading CBEY's new discussion group Power & Race in Community, Business, and the Environment. She's excited to connect with students in the areas of food systems, environmental justice, entrepreneurship, equity and inclusion in organizations & businesses, working with New Haven communities.
Namrita Kapur - Bio
Namrita Kapur is a Lecturer in the Practice at Yale School of Management and a Resident Fellow at Yale Center for Business and the Environment. Namrita combines a unique mix of traditional finance skills from her time in investment banking with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) impact assessment experience as a senior leader in the nonprofit space. Currently, she is an Adjunct Lecturer & Fellow at the Yale School of Management; advises the National Geographic Society on its philanthropic impact investing strategy; and, consults to several philanthropists, including founders of one of the oldest venture capital firms and of a Fortune 500 company.
Jen Molnar Bio
Jen Molnar is Lead Scientist at The Nature Conservancy and managing director of TNC’s new Center for Sustainability Science. The Center seeks to scale up action and outcomes for both the environment and the economy by translating the value of nature into actionable, science-based solutions for the private and public sectors. Jen has more than 15 years of experience using science to improve decision-making. She is the science lead for the TNC-Dow Chemical Company collaboration, which led to Dow’s ground-breaking Valuing Nature Goal – a commitment to consider nature in all of their projects, aiming to generate $1B in economic value by 2025.
Vincent Stanley - Bio
Vincent Stanley is Director of Philosophy at Patagonia.
At Yale, Vincent recently served as a CBEY Fellow where he advises countless students on entrepreneurship, innovation, sustainable practices and beyond. Since spring of 2015 he has been advising the CBEY 2050 Fellows, a small cross-disciplinary group that discusses issues around sustainability, business and how we can better integrate the two and achieve a more resilient society.
Martin Wainstein - Bio
Martin Wainstein is a resident fellow at the Yale Center for Business and the Environment, where he leads the research efforts behind the Yale Open Innovation Lab. Martin held appointments at the Yale Department of Electrical Engineering, the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale, and is a research affiliate at the Digital Currency Initiative of the MIT Media Lab. He is the founder of the Open Earth Foundation, a research and deployment non-profit focusing on digital innovations and open collaborations around planetary-scale projects such as Open Climate.
Alumni Visiting Experts
Visiting Experts
Since its launch in the spring of 2018, the Yale Center for Business and Environment has connected over 200 students to Yale alumni through our Alumni Visiting Expert series. The series seeks to sponsor alumni back to campus as a resource for students. Every year, a cohort of professionals across different industries devote time to meet with students and discuss anything from industry trends, career advice and offer coursework support. Each Expert meets with students throughout the year and when possible, joins us for events on campus.
To learn more about our 2020-2021 experts, click here
Connect with the CBEY team
CBEY staff
Want to meet up with someone from CBEY to learn more about our work, talk about your idea, or just have a conversation? We'd love to meet with you! Drop into our weekly office hours or schedule a time to meet with someone individually.
To learn more about CBEY's office hours, click here
Mentor Network
Mentor Network Description
Applicants to the Climate Innovation Grant, Sobotka Seed Stage Grant, and Sabin Prize can be connected to mentors from the CBEY and Tsai CITY mentorship network to provide guidance on their business challenges.
To learn more about mentorship opportunities for entrepreneurs, contact Ben Soltoff (you can also schedule time with him here). You can also reach out directly to any of the mentors and advisors at the Tsai Center for Innovative Thinking at Yale.
