My name is Rick Raymond. I'm an educator, personal and business coach, mentor to entrepreneurs, seeker of spiritual wisdom, contemplative photographer, advocate for elderhood, husband and father.

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I've been teaching all my adult life. I taught scuba diving as an undergraduate at the University of Scranton. I conducted teacher-education workshops for the New York State Sea Grant Program and a leadership-training workshop for the New York State Legislative Commission on Science and Technology. I ran workshops at the New England Aquarium in Boston, and for the New York State Marine Education Association where I was a founding member and the first executive director.

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I graduated from Humboldt State University in Northern California with an M.S. in Natural Resource Management with an emphasis in oceanography. For many years I worked for various concerns that had an environmental focus. I was a Peace Corp Volunteer in Chile where I helped develop their fisheries industry. I worked on maritime issues for the New York State Legislative Commission on Science and Technology. For ten years I was a contractor for the New York City Department of Environmental Protection as a liaison between the city and the communities where work was being done.

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Over the years, though, I began to see that I preferred working with people rather than fish. I found inspiration in helping people achieve their goals. And I realized that I missed teaching. One day I met a man whose profession was a match for my slowly realized occupational preferences.

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This man was a personal coach. He suggested I explore training as a coach as a way of realizing my emerging aspirations. While continuing to work under a contract with New York City’s Department of Environmental Protection, I completed a five-year program in personal and executive coaching. I've now been coaching individuals, entrepreneurs, and family businesses on leadership and business growth for over 20 years.

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I returned to classroom teaching by way of NYU where I designed and taught Ecological Principles of Business Management and Environmental Ethics. At Baruch College, The City University of New York, I taught entrepreneurship and family business management; and recently I started teaching a summer course on entrepreneurship in China at the Shanghai University of Science and Technology.