Imagine you’re riding a galloping horse. Inside the arena, the air is thick with the musty odor of horse sweat and manure. Hooves pound the packed dirt, a thunderous vibration that sweeps you up into its insistent rhythm. You stand in the stirrups, body forward, and let the momentum of the mallet drive into the ball. As your mallet strikes the ball, your muscles tense with the pleasurable thump of contact and you hear a powerful dull thud, the telltale sign that you’ve notched the perfect hit. The ball skips across the goal line for a point. You pump your fist in excitement and cheer with your teammates.
This is polo, a sport most Americans don’t get to play or even watch on TV. But for our Grant Specialist Kyra Umrigar, who joined the Central New York Polo Club at age 15, it’s a passion. Kyra grew up in Brooktondale, NY, not far from Ithaca. Her mom was–and remains–the assistant coach on Cornell University’s polo team.
“I wasn’t the best player on my team,” she says, “so I was often trying to figure out the best way to help my teammates succeed.”
You might say that Kyra’s experience in the polo arena prepped her for her role with the Land Conservancy. As Grant Specialist, she researches funding sources, secures grants, and manages all the Land Conservancy’s reporting and compliance. She’s meticulous and extremely organized, keeping us all on track. In a very real way, her job is all about figuring out ways to help her colleagues (and her team) succeed.
Like everyone on our staff, Kyra spent a lot of time in nature as a kid. With her best friend, she frequently wandered into the forest to explore. One of their most memorable endeavors was creating a “goose restaurant.” Next to a pond, they built a small shelter out of trees and shrubs and set out cracked corn and bird seed to attract the geese, then watched with glee as the geese clambered up the bank to eat in their restaurant. She also participated in Cayuga Nature Center’s summer camps, picked wild blackberries, and took hiking trips to various preserves around the Finger Lakes.
All this was, she says, something she took for granted. “I had no idea how lucky I was to have acres and acres of woods just beyond my backyard.”
It wasn’t until the anti-fracking movement took hold in New York State that she realized nature was threatened, that the forests, fresh water, and pristine nature all around her might be stripped bare, polluted, and devastated. Along with her parents, she participated in a local advocacy group and went to rallies. She studied History and French at Cornell University, with a minor in Climate Change, but while in college she discovered that her lifelong interest in nature had created in her a deep fondness for environmental science.
This fondness led her, in 2021, to apply to our vacant executive assistant position. It was a timely and important hire–for both Kyra and the organization. As a result of her tireless efforts, she has been promoted twice and, each time, grown significantly. In her current role she has restructured our grantmaking and reporting infrastructure, paving the way for greater fundraising efficiency–and success. This kind of growth is emblematic of our organizational culture, which fosters personal and career development. We take great pride in seeing colleagues like Kyra bloom. It takes a team to succeed, after all, just as it does in the polo arena.
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