HERBalachia Faculty
Meet the teachers that make this school possible.
Michelle Bouton
A native Tennessean, Michelle was lucky enough to have a grandfather who led her on adventures such as wild mushroom hunting and making dandelion wine.
The peach doesn’t fall far from the tree!
She founded HERBalachia in 2016 and Sassyfest in 2019 and is in awe of the herbal community they have nurtured.
Michelle’s formal herbal studies include a doctorate in Chinese medicine from Daoist Traditions College of Chinese Medicine in Asheville, NC, where she served as herbal faculty and medicinal garden manager.
She maintains a private practice of acupuncture and herbal medicine in beautiful downtown Erwin, TN.
Julia Thie
Julia has had a love affair with the plant world since childhood.
Master Gardener and formally trained in both eastern and western plant medicines, she brings her bio-medical knowledge and blends it with historical understanding.
Julia holds a Bachelor of Science in Human Performance from Southern Connecticut State University and a four-year Master’s Degree in Traditional Oriental Medicine from Yo San University in Los Angeles.
Retired from medical practice, Julia offers clinical hypnotherapy and contemplation practices to bolster resiliency and radiance in mind and body. She shares her knowledge of herbal energetics and its practical application with HERBalalchia students with great delight!
Kat Hayes
Is the Facilitator for several of our student program series as well as Director of the Sassafras Moon Herbal Festival.
She has completed a variety of online herbal programs and is an Herbalist Lifestyle Program graduate. She has a lifelong herbal passion that stemmed from her first sip of herbal tea as a child.
Kat lives on a solar powered homestead on the edge of the Cherokee forest in Greene county where she cares for a variety of plants and animals.
Tim McDowell
Dr. McDowell is a specialist in the plant family Rubiaceae and is a retired Professor of Eastern Tennessee State University (ETSU), where he taught plant biology, taxonomy (scientific naming and classification, and phylogeny.
He served as curator of the John C. Warden Herbarium and as Director of the ETSU Arboretum.
His career included a year and a half with the Smithsonian Institution Museum of Natural History as a field botanist. A major project he accomplished was the digitization of the 20,000+ specimens in the ETSU Herbarium, in collaboration with the Tenneesse Network of Curators. He will be teaching the fundamentals of Taxonomy and Morphology and we could not be more excited!
Lori Collins Jenkins
Lori began her journey over a decade ago, creating herbal concoctions and magic in her kitchen for friends and family. She attended local herbal classes and conferences but decided to dive deeper with Rosemary Gladstar’s Science and Art of Herbalism course in 2021.
She is also a graduate of Chestnut School of Herbal Medicine’s Foraging Course.
She has also taken One Willow Apothecary’s Intuitive Plant Medicine Course and currently enrolled in Anni Daulter’s Wyld Women group.
These old stones and plant spirits sing in her heart, and it is her hope that she can translate the wisdom of Appalachia into her medicine and food!
Cindi Quay
Cindi is a traditional Herbalist, descendent of the Menominee Nation, and founder of Cindi’s Sacred Garden. She has been practicing Native American Traditions with our plant nation for most her life. Opening herself to being a Student with Nature, Cindi has learned “hands on” to identify many herbs during all growing seasons.
Cindi went into business full-time in 1997 and has included organic and natural mind and body products.
Cindi teaches about herbs, growing, connecting and to healing oneself. Cindi maintains her deep connection with her Native Nation, learning and sharing with Medicine people the plant knowledge that needs to maintain oral traditions.
Rodney Webb
Rodney Webb is a mushroom farmer who lives on a 3 generation family farm in Marshall, NC. When the healing properties of shiitake mushrooms helped his wife recover from stage 3 Hodgkin’s lymphoma, they knew that growing shiitakes would become part of their future.
He studies, cultivates and forages other medicinal mushrooms including oyster, reishi, chaga, and mukitake.
He is the owner of Appalachia Fungorum where he cultivates mushrooms as well as seasonal vegetables.
Rodney conducts workshops at the Organic Growers School and sells his mushrooms and farm crops at the Jonesborough farmers market, and Madison Farms.
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Jessica Durivage
Deeply rooted in service to collective liberation, Jessica facilitates transformational leadership and wellness development experiences at the intersection of centering indigenous wisdom, nature, social justice and community care. She is an intuitive leader who focuses on relationship-centered strategies to inspire folks from the inside out to work together towards a common vision and goals.
She is a certified yoga teacher, Qoya teacher and teacher trainer, yoga nidra facilitator, and co-founder of Passion for the Possible. Jessica has spent over 20 years in the wellness industry.
Recently moving to the mountains, she is currently the associate director for online programming for Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health and joins HERBalachia to share her experience and knowedge of creating ceremony to create meaning and beauty in our lives.
Marcy Parks
Marcy is a self-taught artist and writer living in Northeast Tennessee. She began practicing yoga in 2011, and it was through her yoga practice that she was introduced to Ayurveda, an ancient holistic healing system originating from India. It was in Ayurveda that Marcy found the marriage of all the things she is passionate about: yoga, meditation, herbal medicine, and healing. Most importantly, in Ayurveda she found an individual-focused healing tradition that emphasizes harmony with the natural world as being the key to overall wellness.
Marcy became a certified Ayurvedic Wellness Counselor at the Asheville School of Massage and Yoga. She has since continued her Ayurveda and Yoga practice working with individuals one-on-one.
Joe Hollis
..::In Memoriam::..
Our dear friend and teacher, Joe Hollis, passed away November 2023 after a period of illness.
He was a primary teacher for Michelle in her Chinese Medicine herbal studies and ongoing mentor and friend.
Joe hosted HERBalachia cohorts at his home for many years and spoke regularly at the Sassafras Moon Herbal Festival.
His life work, Mountain Gardens, is a botanical garden of useful plants featuring the largest collection of native Appalachian and Chinese medicinal herbs in the Eastern US
His lifelong dedication to the deep wisdom found in nature will continue to be a huge source of inspiration.
Joe will be greatly missed.