James Jiler
James Jiler is Director of the GreenHouse Project, a renowned horticultural job-training program for inmates at New York City's Rikers Island jail system. He provides instruction in horticulture and greenhouse management integrated with a math, science and English literacy curriculum. Jiler also oversees job placement and after-care services for released inmates as manager of the GreenTeam. He lectures on prison horticulture nationwide. James is Director of Community Services for The Horticultural Society of New York, which runs the GreenHouse Project.
James was previously Consultant Forester, Ahmedabad Green Partnership Project, run by USAID in Ahmedabad, India. Through it he advised a citywide community forestry project that targeted low-income groups.
He has also been a Community Forester and Consultant for the City of New Haven CT and The Urban Resources Initiative (URI) of New Haven as part of an urban revitalization program. While there he developed urban forestry programs and an ecology curriculum for middle school students. James has additionally worked with URI in Baltimore, designing and establishing parks, nurseries, and community gardens on abandoned city lots. With URI, he also created comprehensive open space plans that addressed inner city issues such as housing, drug abuse, employment and education, and he organized resource management programs for inner-city youth.
James began his career with the Institute for Sustainable Agriculture in Kathmandu, Nepal. He earned a Master of Forestry degree from Yale University and a BA in English from the University of Oregon.