THE HUMAN PATH FACULTY

Over the past 25 years, Sam has not only taught survival for military and civilian students, but also has focused on post-disaster and remote-medicine using primarily (if not exclusively) plant medicine. He has worked as a clinical herbalist on his own and in conjunction with functional medicine doctors (M.D. and D.O.) for chronic as well as acute illness and injury. Sam has been highly focused on bio-regional plant medicine for infection, injury and illness most commonly encountered in a post-disaster, remote or underserved environment when there is no higher definitive medical care.
Sam has taught wilderness first aid certification, remote and post-disaster herbal medicine, urban and primitive survival skills and self-defense for over two decades. He is co-founder of the non-profit organization – Herbal Medics – that travels to remote areas in Nicaragua as well as medically underserved urban areas in the USA, providing herbal medicine clinics, off-grid and salvage-based engineering solutions (water purification, sustainable power, sustainable agriculture, etc.).

She has a degree in Fine Arts Photography and studied journalism, worked as a neuromuscular massage therapist for a decade, received her Permaculture Design Certificate from Geoffrey Lawton in 2015, and helps to organize and manage apothecary operations in clinics and classes.
Suchil teaches homesteading courses at the school and helped to develop The Apothecarist program, an intermediate medicine making course that she helps to instruct with two others.

James’ passion as a bladesmith centers around salvaging old, worn, or otherwise discarded pieces of high carbon steel (i.e. automobile leaf and coil springs, bearing races, worn out saw blades and files, broken plowshares, etc…) and giving them new life on the anvil. He specializes in Scandinavian-style bushcraft knives, EDC’s, and hunters.
James has also led our team of off-grid blacksmiths to the jungles of Nicaragua to teach the Rama tribe forging skills for making their own spears, arrows and tools. He teaches a series of blacksmithing and blademaking courses for The Human Path that center around using reclaimed, recycled and found materials, with an emphasis on off grid techniques.

As a midwifery educator, Katia has trained countless birth assistants and midwives through Maternidad La Luz Birth Center and School.Katia is our lead instructor for the Family Herbalist Program that includes doula certification, pediatric herbal medicine, womens’ reproductive herbal health and emergency childbirth training.

David is also part of a trio of instructors that teach The Apothecarist Program, an herbal medicine making program for intermediate herbalist students.

She gratefully learned her woods skills from the wise women of Appalachia and her homesteading experience as a mother in West Virginia.

Dr. Pehrson has been a licensed practicing physician since 1986. He attended a family medicine residency in Wisconsin. Steve is also board eligible in emergency medicine and spent much of his early career in that field. He was awarded the State of Utah EMS Physician of the year award in 1994, and the State of Utah Emergency Physician of the Year award in 1995.
Dr. Pehrson is active in instructing wilderness and prolonged pre-hospital care. He developed a 350-hour curriculum for prolonged pre-hospital care which was approved and adopted by the State of Utah for advanced EMT’s and paramedics.
He retired from the Indian Health Service in 2013 as a GS-15 with his last assignment being the Clinical Director for the Ft. Duchesne Indian Health Center on the Uintah and Ouray Indian Reservation, a position he held for seven years.

Given her passion to find and treat the root cause of illnesses, Dr. Helm obtained training in integrative and complementary interventions to augment her traditional medical education. She used these techniques to manage complex medical conditions such as chronic pain and fibromyalgia, and obtained her Board Certification in Pain Medicine in 2004.
Dr. Helm became Board Certified in Functional and Restorative Medicine in 2011 and completed her Advanced Fellowship in Restorative Medicine the same year. Dr. Helm uses an integrative functional medicine approach to provide comprehensive, individualized healthcare to her patients. She has provided these services to adults and children with great success.
Dr. Helm has traveled extensively with her husband who is a career US Army officer. She and her family recently moved from the Texas Hill Country to South Dakota.

Mel facilitates trainings both state-side and internationally for birth workers, as well as disaster relief workers and others in need of emergency birth skills. Mel is also the founder of Wellness Within, providing personalized wellness guidance to individuals during pregnancy and birth, and nurturing new families.

Carol believes in promoting self-sufficiency and fostering people’s connection with the natural world through teaching others how to use locally abundant plants for food and medicine.
Carol began studying with The Human Path in 2011 to improve her skills as an herbal clinician in daily and post-disaster scenarios. She assists and teaches courses for the Herbal Clinician Program, and mentors student clinicians participating in the Tele-Clinic Program.

He earned his BA in Latin American Studies with a minor in Spanish at Alliant International University, Mexico City and has been studying plant medicine and clinical herbalism for over twenty five years.
Michael has been working with The Human Path for over five years and recently has started teaching bioregional plant identification and botany for herbalists courses.
Michael and Suchil have also developed a clinical Spanish language program specifically targeted to health care professionals and herbalists, bringing clinical Spanish language aptitude into the skill-set for practitioners.

Rick grew up primitive camping in the Sonoran Desert with his family and lived off-grid with his grandparents in south-east Idaho during high school. He brings that background, professional intelligence training, and over a decade of studying Ninjutsu and other martial disciplines to the Scout curriculum.

After earning her BA in photography in Louisiana, Beth set out to Texas to pursue and earn her MFA in photography. During her studies, she fell in love with the city having finally found resources for all the studies she ever wanted like energy work and herbalism. Fate brought her to The Human Path a few years ago and she’s been a part of the team since as part of our local Herbal Medics chapter and teaching in our onsite Apothecarist intensives.
Beth incorporates herbal medicine in her life daily as tonics, in ritual and ceremony, gardening therapy and plant friends, and potent medicinal preparations in her growing home apothecary. At the heart of her work with plant medicine is the connection to the natural world and the importance of working in right relationship with plants.

Adam’s most common interests and past times include Filipino Martial Arts, backyard beekeeping, and polishing his public speaking skills with Toastmasters International where he serves as a club officer and past president for his city’s club. He also enjoys making mead, walks through the woods with his canine friend, and has a mild obsession with kettlebells.

Rockie is a proud alumni of Soul Fire Farm’s farmer immersion program class of 2017 and is a member of the SFF speakers collective. She presents and speaks on a myriad of topics around food, equity & herbalism. She is currently the President of the Herbal Medics chapter in San Antonio, co-chair of the food justice work group in San Antonio and founder of Sustainable G’s, a local non-profit focused on everyday sustainability, wellness, food sovereignty and regenerative practices. In addition to this, Rockie considers herself a creative, working with various mediums to tell historical and cultural stories, and has had her art exhibited across Texas and nationally.

After that, Rene left the hospital system to become the director of an Ambulatory Surgery Center.
After being diagnosed with 3 auto-immune diseases in 2012, and receiving no viable answers/options from western medicine, she left that career to find my own answers. This led her to functional medicine, and eventually to herbalism.
Obsessions: Helping others find “the root cause” of any health issue that has thus far gone undetected by doctors they’ve seen. That means solid referrals, constant research and education, and talking about lifestyle, diet, and herbalism to anyone that will listen!
Passions: teaching (anyone- from baby to grown up); growing herbs and medicinal plants; spending time in nature; spending time with her husband of 40 years, her dogs and pasture-raised, organically fed chickens, children and grandchildren; and of course, making medicine (as the current Manager and Lead Apothecarist for Herbal Medics Academy and Herbal First Aid Gear store).

Thomas has built numerous aquaponics systems, operated a small scale commercial landscape nursery, spent years remediating the pastures at his property and has run a working farm producing both animal and plant products for two decades.
He has studied herbs with the Human Path for years and has completed the Family Health, Emergent Responder, Apothecarist, and is in the final stages of the Clinical program. Thomas has also taught numerous classes with the Human Path and is the Off-grid and Emergency communications instructor.