Annual Meeting 2026
Register now for the Esplanade Association’s 25th Anniversary Annual Meeting!
April 15th, 2025
6:00 PM – 7:00 PM
(This event will be held on Zoom)
This year’s meeting will feature:
Stephanie Fletcher
Special guest: Stephanie Fletcher presenting on “25 Species for 25 Years”, highlighting 25 animal species that call the Esplanade home and her biodiversity work using the iNaturalist app.
Stephanie has had a lifelong love for nature. From a young age, she was observing insects, adopting and raising orphaned wildlife, and smelling any flower within reach. She graduated with a degree in Economics and a minor in Business Management from Syracuse University, then worked as a Sales Manager for Bloomberg’s multimedia and equity trading division in New York for 10 years.
In 2003, she became a full-time mother and dedicated volunteer for educational and nature-focused non-profits like the Learning Project and Mass Audubon. She is heavily involved with many local green space organizations, like the Esplanade Association, the Garden Club of the Back Bay, and the Friends of the Public Garden. In 2025, she became a Certified Field Naturalist through Mass Audubon and a Certified Pollinator Steward through UMass Amherst. Her discovery of the first Joro Spider in New England was featured in Scott Loarie’s TEDx Boston talk on the power of using iNaturalist as a tool to discover and log biodiversity for scientific study.
Jen Mergel, EA’s James and Audrey Foster Executive Director
Sharing 2025 highlights and achievements as well as a sneak peek at our 25th Anniversary activities and programs. She will also give an update on the construction progress on the Charles River Esplanade’s Smith Family Pavilion and Charlesbank campus, and news on its forthcoming opening late in 2026.
Agenda
- Welcome and appreciation: 25th anniversary reflections
- Executive Director Report and Annual Business
- Guest Speaker: Stephanie Fletcher, “25 Species for 25 Years”
- Q&A

