Conservation for Natalie Kyriacou did not begin with policy papers or grant proposals, but with a tent in the backyard and an instinct to notice what was living around her. The founder of My Green World, a nonprofit that combines education and technology to promote environmental conservation, she came to the work not through a conventional route in science or government, but through persistence, improvisation, and a deep-seated fascination with the natural world. As a child in Australia, Kyriacou’s weekends alternated between camping trips and backyard expeditions in a tent pitched by her father. She trailed frogs and insects with equal parts curiosity and concern, an early attentiveness to nonhuman life that has endured. That instinct—to look closely, to care—would later underpin her work in wildlife education and conservation, even as her methods diverged from the traditional. Her early professional years were marked by rejection from paying jobs, which she met not with resignation but by volunteering for any charity that would have her. University studies in journalism and international relations were interspersed with stints in Borneo and Sri Lanka, working alongside orangutans, sun bears, and veterinary aid teams. These experiences sharpened her frustration at the marginal place of nature in political debate, education systems, and public consciousness. Kyriacou with an wombat at a wildlife rehabilitation center. The animal is under professional care and not a pet or zoo exhibit. Rather than pursue a newsroom career, Kyriacou turned to game design. She built World of the Wild, a mobile app…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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