BOXERWOOD RISING: Meet Maya DeHart, Sustainability Engineer

In 2018, Maya DeHart biked across the country from Virginia to Oregon. Thinking back on the trip, she notes that pedaling thousands of miles of terrain – as opposed to flying thousands of miles above it – strengthened her relationship to that landscape. Now 31, Maya reflected that the journey created a strong sense of “deepening the relationship to the world, and recognizing what it feels like we need to protect.” 

Maya has been building this relationship to her environment since childhood, which was shaped in large part by her deep connection to Boxerwood. “I feel really lucky that since I was 5, I’ve lived down the road,” she explained. “It feels like Boxerwood has been my neighbor.” She attended summer camps as a kid – including spending a night at the Lodge – and was later a Boxerwood camp counselor. “It’s a community fixture, and it’s also been a fixture in my interaction with nature,” Maya said. “When I think about protecting the natural world, Boxerwood comes to mind…I’m lucky that growing up in Rockbridge, there’s so much beauty in the area. But seeing the way that Boxerwood has been cared for so intentionally feels like a special space that’s been cultivated to remind people of the joy of the natural world and that connection.”

Boxerwood can spark that feeling in many ways. For Maya, she said, “I have this very specific memory of – I think I was attending a summer camp, and we had little booklets that we were working in, and we were given the assignment to find somewhere quiet to go sit, and just write about what we were experiencing while we were sitting in silence on our own in Boxerwood.” She went on, “I remember going to sit in front of the pond, and just feeling the peace that came with that. It feels like such a natural space to have art happen because of the way that the space inspires thinking about the world and its expansiveness...observing the lilypads and the algae and the world that was there…It felt like a moment of clear peace.” 

After graduating from Rockbridge County High School in 2012, Maya continued building her relationship with the natural world at Washington University in St. Louis, where she majored in chemical engineering and minored in environmental engineering. After a few years as a chemical engineer, she pursued a new position as a sustainability specialist for a Washington, DC firm that enabled her to more directly put her Earthcare values into action. In this role, Maya works directly with manufacturing clients on their sustainability goals, while also serving as a consultant for internal engineering, architecture, and construction teams.

Of course, not every client is as passionate about mitigating climate change as Maya and her colleagues. Because of that, Maya says, she’s returned again to her value of building relationships – not only with the environment but with people. Over the years, she’s noticed “people’s general interest in solving a problem and using their brains.” Even if they’re not passionate about protecting the environment, she says, “it’s exciting to do things in a new and different way. I think that’s very human, to enjoy that kind of problem solving.” That excitement, she says, “definitely hooks people…even if they’re not bought in on being majorly concerned about climate change.” 

Maya finds connecting with clients in these ways deeply meaningful: “People who…might pooh-pooh sustainability a little bit will have a conversation with myself or our general team and realize the breadth of sustainability.” This breadth can include elements of construction that clients may not know are included under the sustainability umbrella, including employee well-being. Maya also described the value of proving that sustainability is often financially beneficial and adds risk avoidance. “That’s the most gratifying…we’re seeing more mentality shifts in the folks that we’re working with. There are fewer people that are just doing zero-carbon because they were told by their corporate bosses that they have to, and more that are realizing the impact that it has.”

Maya’s expertise working with large-scale carbon-reduction projects has necessarily given her a broader perspective on the environment since her Boxerwood days. Still, she says, “when I think about protecting the natural world, often what pops into my head is Boxerwood.” Maya believes this immediate association is due, again, to a sense of deep relationship. “[Boxerwood] allows for and facilitates connection to the natural world, and the beauty, and what nature can teach us,” she said. She added that “I’ve also felt very connected to the amazing people that have always worked and cared for Boxerwood,” specifically naming Karen (KB) Bailey, Hunter Mohring, Elise Sheffield, and Hannah West as influences. This group, she said, “are really great mentors for the humans that are learning about nature, and also how to be a human in that space.”

Despite the range of Maya’s experiences as a steward of the Earth – from homegrown Boxerwood to multi-national zero-carbon construction projects – she sees all of it as ultimately interrelated. “The impacts of climate change aren’t something you can stop on a small scale,” she said. “So it feels like all the things that we do – in the world and nation and company and every level – matter. Boxerwood feels like one of the most direct ways that that is happening.” 

Returning to a value she’s learned sitting by ponds, nestled under oak trees, embarking on cross-country bike rides, and in conversations with her clients, Maya noted once again what Boxerwood creates: “a depth of connection.”