Jacqui Ver Loren van Themaat is the Director of Interpretive Programming for the Southern Nevada Conservancy at the Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area located just outside Las Vegas, Nevada. Born and raised in South Africa she completed her Masters in Drama and Theatre at the University of Pretoria. A gap year exploring Europe transformed into 12 years living in London where she had the opportunity to become a registered and licensed Drama Therapist studying her Masters in Drama and Movement Therapy at the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama. This led to her working in a top rated school in Camden for 8 years where she became a Specialist Lead in Education offering 1:1 and group sessions to children to develop their social, emotional and interaction skills; offering teacher training at the school’s Development and Research Centre to teachers from across the world; collaborate in various research projects; engage in school-to-school support to develop best practice and innovation in teaching; and facilitate professional learning communities. Professional learning communities and their capacity for creating spaces to learn from each other’s experience and expertise became the topic of her dissertation for her Masters in Teaching SEND at the Institute of Education in London. At the end of 2019 she relocated to Riverside in Southern California with her husband, cats and bunnies. The pandemic gave the opportunity for personal reflection and redirecting her passion for working with children but to do so outdoors, enabling children to learn more about themselves while out in nature, learning about our fascinating ecosystems and inspiring the next generation of land stewards. Jacqui is a University of California Climate Steward and California Naturalist, Nevada Naturalist, and Certified Interpretive Guide with the National Association for Interpretation. She was also the acting Director of the NAI’s Western region in 2022. She volunteers as a Xerces Society Ambassador where she gets to talk to more people about one of her favorite topics – native bees and pollinators and how we can all provide pollinator friendly habitats to support their conservation. She creates conservation art sharing the stories of various animals, their conservation challenges, role in the ecosystem, and ways we can protect them. Her art has been exhibited at the Art in Nature Festival at the Oak Glen Preserve, the San Diego Climate Summit, the Wild & Scenic Film Festival, the Breytenbach Gallery and in various private collections in America, Great Brittain and Australia. When she’s not providing interpretive or environmental education programs, she enjoys hiking with her dogs, and travelling and exploring this beautiful world with her husband.