About Us

Dr. Thomas A. Green worked on tree fruit farms in Virginia and Florida early in his career, ultimately managing an apple orchard and becoming captivated by the pest management challenges faced by growers. This led to pursuit of a career in IPM, working initially in the Massachusetts Apple IPM Program. In 1980, he founded an IPM supply business subsequently purchased by GEMPLER’S, Inc., a national agricultural product supplier. He is a certified crop advisor and former USDA NRCS technical service provider and has worked directly with growers influencing practices on hundreds of thousands of acres of cropland in the US and internationally.  He co-founded the IPM Institute in 1998, and initiated the Institute’s IPM STAR, Green Shield Certified and Partnership for Ag Resource Management programs, and Public Tick IPM Working Group which has regularly convened national experts and advocates since 2014. He has served on the US EPA Pesticide Policy Dialogue Committee, chaired the International IPM Symposium Steering Committee, chaired the board of the Entomological Foundation, served as a member of the Exam Committee of the Certified Crop Advisor Program, the Stakeholder Committee for the USDA North Central IPM Center and the Maryland Pesticide Education Network. He has been recognized with awards from US EPA, USDA and the International IPM Symposium.  He continues to provide consulting services through IPM Works LLC and IPM services in Wisconsin, Minnesota and Illinois as proprietor of Green Pest and Tick Control. He also currently serves as board chair of the Heartland Health Research Alliance, as a director of Protected Harvest, and as a member of the Scientific Advisory Committee of Field to Market. Dr. Green holds a Ph.D. in Entomology from the University of Massachusetts.

Before coming to the IPM Institute Mr. Speckman received his degrees and certifications in Finance, Accounting, Management and HR. He spent 10+ years of his career in the financial sector in New York City, where he excelled in financial management of portfolios and acquisitions. While honing his financial acumen he developed an interest in the Sustainable Energy sector, where he fostered relationships with industry partners. Those relationships grew and gave Mr. Speckman insight to a gap that many businesses need: concise and deliberate financial strategies as well as clear and restorative practices in the employee management realm. Mr. Speckman then established his own consulting firm which emphasized working with business owners to help them capitalize on their missions and translate their financial goals. Mr. Speckman joined the IPM Institute in 2020, as the Mission and Vision truly spoke to his passion and interest in Sustainable Agriculture and bringing financial knowledge and resources to the sector. Mr. Speckman has been the CEO of the IPM Institute since 2021 and leads the organization with a servant leadership methodology which emphasizes business techniques that work synergistically with the company's growing vision.

Dr. Dawn H. Gouge is an urban entomologist at the University of Arizona, Maricopa Agricultural Center (MAC). At the MAC, Dr. Gouge is working to expand the current IPM in Schools and Child Care Facilities Program promoting Integrated Pest Management (IPM) in the urban environment. She is currently evaluating whether entomopathogenic nematodes are biocontrol agents of scorpion, cockroach, ant and subterranean termite pest species. Gouge also manages an urban IPM website, ag.arizona.edu/urbanipm/ and conducts regular IPM clinics.

Mr. Robert S. Kallen is president of RSK Strategies, LLC, Chicago, IL, providing expertise and capital to small growing companies in the food industry. Mr. Kallen also serves as an adjunct professor of economics at Roosevelt University, Chicago, and formerly served for nine years as vice president of Operations and General Counsel to a 900-employee private label bakery, and a member of the 1992 Clinton/Gore transition team for economics. Mr. Kallen holds a law degree and an M.A. in Economics from Washington University.