Facing the COVID-19 Crisis as a College Student

Written by Abbey Kolf

Adjusting to the New Reality

It seems like just yesterday I was celebrating the new year with my family on vacation, my only cares in the world being about seemingly trivial things now: my spring break trip with friends in a few months, my resolution to use less single waste plastic that I swore would stick this time, and the Wisconsin Badgers (my parents alma mater) winning the Rose Bowl football game the next day (I should have known where 2020 was headed when they ended up losing). Little did I know, half way through the second semester of my sophomore year at college I would have to pack up everything and finish out the year back in my hometown of Salt Lake City, Utah along with the rest of my family of five due to the COVID-19 outbreak.

At first, the complete absurdity and newness of being a college student from home was not so bad, and maybe even a bit exciting. I got to spend some rare time with my whole family, have home cooked meals every night, and have an excuse to not leave the house all day (a dream for an introvert like me). This mindset soon faded once it became apparent that having three young adults trying to attend school virtually and a parent working from home all under one roof was going to be quite the challenge and would last longer than anticipated. While wifi issues were constant and too much time together led to petty arguments, my family and I eventually adjusted to the new “normal”.

Moving Forward into more Uncertainty…

After being home for the last 5 months, I am now preparing to head back across the country to start my junior year of college on campus (shout out Villanova University). It is safe to say that it is going to be a semester unlike any other. The majority of my classes will continue to be online, social interactions and events will be sparse, and masks will (hopefully) be worn everywhere.

While I am excited to see my friends and be back on the campus that I know and love, I am also overwhelmed. I’m someone who has always hated traveling into uncharted territory. There are so many unknowns about the rest of my year: Are we going to be sent home again if things go south? Am I going to be miserable and want to kill my roommates? Will college even be fun anymore? It has been hard to stay optimistic about what’s next when unanswerable questions like these are repeatedly brought to mind.

…And Looking Back

As the time with my family in Utah during this pandemic is coming to a close, I am reflecting on how my life has changed over the past five months. While it is easy to dwell on all of the parts that the COVID-19 outbreak may have taken away, I have found that there are a lot of amazing things in my life that were made possible because of the unfortunate circumstances.

Sure, I lost a few months of making memories with my college friends and cannot look forward to having a traditional college experience this fall, but I got to spend (probably too much) time with the people that I love who I normally don’t get to see during the school year, including my pet cat whom I adore.

The places I could go and things I could do have been limited because of social distancing guidelines, but these limitations pushed me to get outside more. I fell back in love with the omnipresent natural beauty of my home state through scenic drives up the canyon, hikes in the majestic mountains, and watching the vivid sunsets from my local park. I am reminded of where my intense love for the environment and devotion to protect it started.

I missed out on a summer of working in D.C., but going virtual gave me the opportunity to join the Empowher BA Women’s Alliance where I made lasting connections with other inspiring young women. I became a trained Climate Reality Leader, furthering my knowledge of climate change and how to fight it. I even interned with CCAN, an unknown nonprofit to me when I started but which I’m now passionate about supporting.

Moral of the story, 2020 may have turned life completely upside down and taken a lot of things from us all. However, as cliche as it may sound, it is important to recognize the challenges as opportunities for growth and ask yourself: What has this year given me?

“What Are You?” – How Struggles with Multiculturalism Have Informed My Activism

By Zamir Ticknor

“What Am I?”  

Mom and me celebrating Eid

I remember wearing my bright, aqua blue Panjabi with exquisite designs on the collars– that my family bought when I was in my home country of Bangladesh– at my high school’s international night this year. While I was munching on delightful roshroshogulla, a Bangladeshi dessert, I vividly remember a tall, poised, Indian man awkwardly yet confidently strolling towards me; he then blatantly stared at my Panjabi and my light skin. I recall him posing the following question: “Are you even Bangladeshi? You’re too white to be a true Bangladeshi.” His thoughts along with my lingering enigmas in regards to my culture led me to question my identity solely because I am lighter than most Bangladeshis- this was not an enjoyable feeling then and that still remains true today.

When discussing the racial, ethnic, and cultural identity of individuals, it is professedly dormant for people to assume that identity can be summed up in one word: Black, white, Latinx, Jewish, Muslim, Bangladeshi, American, etc. The concept of identity is much more complex than that. In today’s world, people immigrate and move around quite often whether it’s because of economic hardship or political sovereignty; the world is not as sectioned off as it has been in the past. With advancements in technology, specifically in modes of transportation, the world has unquestionably become more accessible. With more diversity among inhabitants in certain areas, there will subsequently be a higher percentage of interracial relationships. So in future generations, there’ll be a higher percentage of multiracial individuals. According to the US Census Bureau in 2010, nine million Americans identify as two races or more, myself included. 

Reminders from Multicultural Youth  

The USA is a country where people from all over the globe come for better opportunities and seek to build a more fruitful life for themselves and their children. My mother did this to better her education from the developing country of Bangladesh. And as a biracial Bangladeshi-American, I would like to provide the reminders that this country is built on immigrants, refugees, asylees, international students, from every single corner of the world. Multicultural families create children with valid, multilayered identities, which are the future of race, and it is time that they are discussed in a serious, open-minded, and accepting manner.

My nanu and I on a rickshaw, a common mode of transportation in Bangladesh

Multiculturalist Stigmas  

Biracial or multicultural identity is something that is not discussed sufficiently. This is partially because people often aren’t properly informed on how to ask a sensitive question about cultural identity. For many multicultural people, we’re familiar with the “what are you” question. I am sure that this question, when asked, makes you feel dehumanized and objectified as if you lack a valid and worthy identity. Aside from the fact that there’s a huge distinction between asking questions out of curiosity versus ignorance, being different doesn’t give bystanders a non-expiring free pass to always ask any cultural/identity-related question that comes to mind. It is most definitely different depending on the situation and the person. I myself welcome questions the majority of the time, but others may not appreciate constant questions. The topic of racial, cultural, and ethnic identity can be a sensitive one, but it’s absolutely necessary to be well-educated on racial relations and identity issues as a person of an increasingly diverse world. 

So, let’s break the stigma. Let us spark dialogue about multicultural identity to our peers, our parents, and our society. Challenge your enigmas- question your culture in order to learn from it; this has led me to finally vocalize confidently that I am proud to be multicultural and biracial, and you should be proud of your identity. Without the tall, poised Indian man who posed a question to me, I believe that I would have never found my true self, and I would have never been able to undeniably write this message. Diverse cultural backgrounds are a gift, and though I may never wholly be a part of one culture, I get a taste of lifestyles that most people never do. 

Me with a man in the market, specifically a bangle shop. Bangles are traditional ornaments worn mostly by women from the Indian subcontinent.

As a person who identifies as multicultural, I am a bridge for cultures to cross, continuing to attempt paving my way into an American society. 

Instead of saying “I am stuck between two cultures and communities, and I feel like I don’t belong in either”, I have reframed my multiculturalism to: “I’m grateful I have the option to move between differing cultures and communities and choose values and beliefs that serve me.”

Multiculturalism in Activism   

Some might argue that it’s not important to find our identity–molding you into a norm rather than an epitome: American instead of Bangladeshi and American. But, the language we use to describe ourselves frames our reality. My multicultural identity as a Bangladeshi-American shapes my perspective on the climate crisis, as I see the effects in my home country of Bangladesh and in the United States. My multicultural identity allows me to visualize and gain a personal perspective on environmental racism apparent in pipeline routes in Virginia, and even in predominantly POC communities/countries across the globe. My cultural roots in Bangladesh give me a somewhat personalized issue of the global refugee crisis, and have informed my lesson planning to a Syrian refugee I teach English to every week. 

Being multicultural allows me to view the climate crisis in a multidimensional, personalized way. Instead of automatically boycotting fast fashion, my perspective has informed me of how the fast fashion industry may be the only way of supporting millions of people across the world, especially in my home country of Bangladesh in the huge textiles industry; if these people were to lose their jobs, where would they go? Being vegan also comes with privilege, bringing socioeconomic inequalities and cultural differences in the forefront of my mind, informed by my multicultural upbringing. 

Identity matters. If only I knew more about what mine was, and I will, someday. 

Me at a mustard farm in rural Bangladesh, where parts of my family and family friends lived

When it Comes to Climate Activism, There is No “One Lane”

We’ve received pushback for supporting Black Lives Matter and voting issues being “out of our lane.” Here’s our response.

By Courtney Dyson

My friends tell me this photo is “very Court,” whatever that means.

When it comes to fighting the climate crisis, there is not one designated lane, climate activism is the spanse of the entire highway. Or, to put it in millennial terms, climate change being a singular issue is as far from the truth as me being a Slytherin (yes, I went there and yes, I am struggling with “she who must not be named”). So, why is it then that climate activists are often told to “stay in your lane” when we use our platform to support other causes like racial justice?

Over the past few months, this has become more evident as climate organizations across the country (including yours truly) have received pushback for taking stances in support of the Black Lives Matter movement and Defund Police. Groups across the country have been told, “stay in your lane, “stop being political,” “you’re a climate group, focus on that,” and so on. I don’t agree with this mentality. And I’m not alone. The United Nations would agree! 

I’d like to show you just how intricately entwined climate change is with other realms of activism and development by taking a close look at the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

It was the year 2016…

I was pursuing my master’s degree in International Cooperation and Development at Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore in Milan (unsurprisingly substantially more affordable than a master’s in the United States, and I was working as an Au pair for three young Italian boys). I remember sitting in an ornately decorated classroom with twenty-foot ceilings in a historic Italian villa turned university, learning about the Goals along with my 23 classmates from 17 countries and 5 continents. The entire program was built around the 17 Goals and as my fellow students and I sat listening to professors tell tales about their experiences, something struck me as odd – we never specifically focused on Goal 13: Climate Action. And while every single Goal is important, in my mind, none was as important as 13.

UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals

I realized very quickly that the consequences of climate change are so far reaching, that they impact every single one of the other Goals. That if we did not achieve Goal 13, all other goals would be in jeopardy: food security, health, economy and jobs, global security, and of course environment and biodiversity. Climate change overlaps with them all, every single goal, every single lane. 

This post would be excessively long if I dug into all 17 Goals, so I will bypass the obvious ones: Affordable and Clean Energy; Decent Work and Economic Growth; Sustainable Cities and Communities; Life Below Water; and Life on Land. I will instead focus on three that are indisputably linked and relevant to some of the societal challenges we are facing today in the United States: Zero Hunger; Good Health and Well Being; and Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions.

Climate Activism is Activism to End Global Hunger

Goal #2: End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and to promote sustainable agriculture.

The climate connections here are pretty straightforward and I actually focused my studies on the climate impacts on food security and adaptive agriculture. The rapidly changing climate has a direct impact on agriculture and access to healthy and nutritious foods. Over the past decade we have seen the consequences of rising temperatures, changing precipitation patterns, increased frequency of extreme events, and the broadening of desertification.

“Each degree-Celsius increase in global mean temperature would, on average, reduce global yields of wheat by 6 percent, rice by 3.2 percent, maize by 7.4 percent, and soybean by 3.1 percent.”

If serious measures are not taken to mitigate climate change and adapt agriculture practices, staple crops will become harder and more expensive to grow, and even less nutritious, placing millions at risk of malnutrition. We will also see an increase in food deserts. Food deserts are areas with no access to a store with fresh and nutritious food options within a certain radius. In 2010, an estimated 23.5 million people in the United States lived in food deserts, more than half of whom live in low-income households – It will be interesting to see what the 2020 census shows.

What are climate activists taking action for? To reimagine the current food system, which is responsible for 21–37 percent of total greenhouse gas emissions, and to make it “climate friendly.” To maintain a stable climate and increase access to healthy food. For there to be less food deserts. To avoid a global hunger crisis.

Climate Activism is Activism for Health Rights

Goal #3: Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages.

Today, less than half the global population is covered by essential health services and 27 million Americans lack health insurance in 2020, with millions more at risk of losing it as the Affordable Care Act is currently under attack. This should be a huge warning flag for us all and is especially poignant as we are in the midst of a global pandemic.

The most severe consequences of climate change will directly impact health and well-being. Annoyed with the recent uptick in your seasonal allergies? That is just the beginning and minor compared to clean air, safe drinking water, heat exposure, sufficient food, and secure shelter.

“Between 2030 and 2050, climate change is expected to cause approximately 250,000 additional deaths per year, from malnutrition, malaria, diarrhea and heat stress.”

How are climate activists, activists for health and well being? We are working to lower global temperature rise to lessen the severity of the related health consequences. We are working to stop new fossil fuel infrastructure and to shutter existing ones. And we know the necessity of and advocate for access to affordable health care for everyone.

Climate Activism is Activism for Equal Rights 

Goal #16: Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels.

One only has to look at the recent move by the Trump Administration to “revise” NEPA to see the direct injustices that oil and gas companies have been committing for almost a century. The policy has been instrumental in communities having a say in what projects are built in their communities and has been fundamental in many pipeline lawsuits (read more on this).

Environmental degradation and the forces that have led to the climate crisis have disproportionately taken advantage of and impacted marginalized communities for over a century. Sacrificing these communities air, water, and health for profit. In the mid 2000’s approximately 68% of African Americans lived within 30 miles of coal-fired power plants. And while coal plants have been shutting down across the country in recent years, the health consequences will linger for generations and other fossil fuel infrastructure is trying to sneak in.

Likewise, the consequences of climate change will not be borne fairly, with communities of color being disproportionately impacted.

“Weather patterns caused by climate change disproportionately affect African Americans and other communities of color in the United States — which is a particularly bitter irony, given that the average African American household emits 20 percent less CO2 per year than the average white American household.”

And this is not only an American problem, it is a global one. 

“Sadly, the people at greater risk from climate hazards are the poor, the vulnerable and the marginalized who, in many cases, have been excluded from socioeconomic progress” – United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon

Climate activists are speaking up with communities to stop further fossil fuel development (see our current work on the Header Injustice Project). Climate activists are part of a movement to reduce the energy burden of low-income households and improve energy efficiency. Climate justice, environmental justice, racial justice, LGBTQ justice, intergenerational justice – they are interconnected. Because we are working together towards an equitable society, just climate solutions, and the transition from an extractive society to a regenerative one.

The failure to make progress on this goal is evident today and speaks directly to the global movement we are seeing – Black Lives Matter. For more on this, check out Emily Frias’s post “Why Climate Activists Need to Be Anti-Racist Activists.”

It’s Not Just Climate Activists

All of this is not solely true for climate activists. We are all working together, crossing into one another’s lanes, and heading in the same direction. Equal rights activists are climate activists. Healthcare activists are climate activists. Activists to end poverty are climate activists. We are working toward a common goal. Toward a society that values life over profit, equality over power, community over individualism, and the planet over consumerism. We are all one moving piece of a larger movement. Put simply, ‘we will not stay in our lane.”

P.S. I’m a Gryffindor.

With some of my peers after presenting our final projects! Those of us pictured here now work in food, climate, migration, policy, and sustainable finance.

Additional Resources:

Do the Next Right Thing: On Grief, Parenting, and Coronavirus

On Grief

I was talking to a friend recently who is living with grief – her mom is sick, she and her family have moved temporarily to be with her, and my friend is struggling with isolation-fatigue, as many/most of us are, at a time when she needs her friends the most.

Then George Floyd was murdered and grief was pouring out into the streets, on social media, and into the hearts of any decent human, and definitely into mine.

It got me thinking – grief has taught me a lot about dealing with a pandemic. In this particular piece of writing, I’m talking about COVID-19 because I can’t speak to the personal, lived experience of my Black and Brown colleagues and friends dealing every day with the pandemic of systemic racism taking Black lives. But, yes, we are living with multiple pandemics.

My mom – my emotional touchstone, who served so many roles that I needed (and still need) in my life, died in 2013 after an 8-month fight with cancer – made even more heartbreaking when she suffered a cancer-induced stroke a few months into her battle that wiped away much of her medium- and short-term memory. And, in a bittersweet turn of events, a few short weeks before she died, I found out I was going to become a mother. Thus began a long, long battle with grief.

I put off truly dealing with that grief. I didn’t want my baby’s life to begin in a womb full of depression. So I pushed through. I focused on what kind of fruit my baby was the size of in any given week (yes, there’s an app for that). I took a hypnobirthing class so I could focus on being calm. I focused on work…on moving into a new townhouse…anything but sadness. One foot in front of the other.

It would be quite some time before I learned anything relevant to this Age of COVID.

A little help from Disney

When I found out my first child was going to be a girl, my sister gifted me a DVD of “Frozen.” It would be years before my little one had the attention span for a movie, but eventually, it became her favorite. When I had my second daughter, I was pretty excited that we had a movie showcasing the love between sisters.

Say what you will about Disney – I personally have a very strong aversion to princess stories, with their unrealistic ideas of romance, manufactured definitions of beauty, and women always being saved by the men they just met.

But, I do kind of love “Frozen,” especially “Frozen 2.” I have found these movies to be helpful conversation starters with my kids – especially my eldest – about what it means to help each other, to be a strong, brave woman, to love your sister and protect and support her. What it means to care for our Earth, to grieve the loss of someone you love, to push through when life is REALLY hard.

Frozen, grief, and pandemics…oh my!

“Frozen 2” has some complex lessons that have been hard to explain to my kids at their ages (5 and 3), but I’m thankful for them nonetheless. One theme (don’t worry, no spoilers) is that when you aren’t sure what to do, or when you’re feeling sad or helpless, the one thing you can focus on is: “The Next Right Thing,” which is also the title of a heart-wrenching song in the movie that makes me cry EVERY. TIME.

The younger sister, Anna (not the one with ice powers, but my personal favorite), is the one that showcases the “next right thing” lesson. At a moment when she faces deep grief and a future that is unknown and seemingly bleak, she chooses to carry on and do what’s right (which, incidentally, turns out to be a pretty amazing lesson in reparations).

Our entire world is in a similar situation right now – on a journey into the unknown. We’re doing it with little, and in my opinion, misguided federal leadership. But so many of us are just trying to make the next right decision – staying home, wearing a mask, physical distancing, caring for our neighbors.

My mom’s death came just as I was embarking on my own journey into the unknown. I was becoming a parent, and though it was so very early in my pregnancy, I knew that my priority was keeping that baby safe. Somehow, I would have to choose to do the right thing for that embryo growing inside me despite my desire to stay buried in my covers.

There have been a two times since then that I’ve felt something very similar to that grief: Wednesday, November 9th, 2016 (did I mention I was pregnant AGAIN at that time?), and this spring as we began to make sense of our lives in a life-altering pandemic, followed swiftly by the murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and too many others. So, here’s what I’ve learned:

Lesson 1: Perspective helps 

Even in my darkest moments after my mom died, I had a rap going through my head: I am very fortunate on the whole.

Yes, I’m hurting, I’d tell myself – but, I don’t live in a war zone. I have food and shelter and people who love me. My husband, my friends, my family, my colleagues are all supportive and have given their love and food and time so generously. I can rely on that…on them…until I feel better.

It didn’t make getting out of bed any easier most days, but I was able to talk myself through some of my dark moments. It helped to remind myself how small I am in this vast universe. That wouldn’t work for everyone, but it works for me.

Don’t get me wrong – I am not writing this to tell anyone to feel fortunate. In this moment, some are clearly not. Some – more than 130,000 people as I write this – have been irreparably harmed. And, their deaths come with family, friends, and colleagues, who are grieving their loss and simply trying to get through this day. Some have sunk everything into their newly opened business that is fully reliant on patrons that cannot come. This crisis, as nearly every major crisis, is impacting Black and Brown people far more than others…on top of the systemic racism that threatens their lives and livelihoods every day. I’m not asking anyone to “get some perspective.” I’m simply sharing what’s helping me, right now, with a long period of grief as my guide.

And, yes, I’m struggling in the midst of this pandemic with fear (of getting COVID), anxiety (are my kids gonna be ok?), boredom (I miss my friends!), feelings of inadequacy (so many hats to wear!)…but, I’m able to gain some helpful perspective more quickly, more days, after practicing it through grief.

We’re healthy. We actually laugh a lot (thank goodness for these goofy little people in my life). We are learning more about each other as a family, and my girls are so very close. My spouse and I both have full-paying jobs with health insurance that allow us to put our passions to work. So, one coping mechanism I’ve put into practice is to truly take stock of what I have, to be thankful for it, and to find joy in it as often as I can.

Lesson 2: An “other side” WILL come

The strongest similarity between my experience with grief and the COVID pandemic is that it was (and is especially now as the numbers are even higher) so unclear how long it would take to get to the other side. Living with that uncertainty is bearable for me after seeing that I could get to the other side of my debilitating grief. At points in first few years that followed my mom’s death, I was positive there wasn’t another side. There was certainly no vaccine for my sadness.

There was a time when I was pretty sure I wouldn’t experience real joy again. I can now say I have. There was a time when I thought I’d never truly enjoy a holiday again. I can now say I do. There was a loooonnggg time when I thought there wouldn’t be a day I didn’t find a private moment to cry. Those quiet moments are now fewer and further between.

So, as I sit here and reflect on the fact that I’m not trying to plan my way of out this, that I’m not completely overwhelmed by anxiety (at least, most days I’m not), I think this is the lesson that has stayed with me the most. I DO NOT know when this will be “over.” And, I don’t know what life will look like in the near and medium term.

I’m sitting with our current unknowns better than I have in the past because I do have faith that it WILL be over, and I’m practicing daily patience with the fact that I have no direct control over that timeline. Life will not go back to just as it was, but I’ll move forward and find ways to adapt. And that I’ll do that by choosing to do the next right thing.

What is the Next Right Thing (for me)?

I’m looking at this question from many angles – looking at Anna’s example, I’ll start with the small (one foot in front of the other) and expand from there. 

Connection: Daily, I’m reminding myself to do the next right thing for myself and my family. I’m reading a new parenting book, because, as it turns out – I need some motivation to be a better parent when I have to practice parenting for WAY more hours each day. We’re making lots of time for play with the kids and reveling in the extra hugs. My husband and I are also taking time for ourselves on a regular basis and prioritizing exercise. We video-conference with friends and family. 

Giving back: As members of the DC community, our family is using our dollars to support our city’s most vulnerable people. We are so thankful to have full incomes at this time, so we’ve been finding ways to give more than usual. We donated most of our stimulus check to a fundraising effort by Sanctuary DMV and many other area organizations (see more information and partners here) because so many of our city’s residents got nothing in that modest stimulus package and yet are giving so much as essential workers. We’ve also paid full price for our daycare to help keep our hard-working and beloved teachers employed. And, we order takeout much more than we usually do, all from local restaurants, with an emphasis on Black-owned businesses. For our 10th wedding anniversary, we asked people to join us in making a donation to Stacey Abrams’ voter access and protection group, Fair Fight. We made our way into the streets, alone and with our kids, to support the Black Lives Matter protests throughout June. There’s more to do than we feel capable of, but we keep trying.

Continuing to act for our climate: As a parent and as a life-long climate activist, I lose sleep at night wondering if our elected leaders will be able to muster the will the do the next right thing as we emerge from this crisis. Yes, we’re experiencing a temporary decline in climate pollution. But, we know from the 2009 recession, our default is to make our way back to our cars, to our governments’ fossil fuel investments, and to our societal “need” for growth. 

At CCAN, doing the next right thing has been evolving. We started by making sure our staff had what they needed to work from home, stay safe, and take care of themselves. We also asked our volunteers what they needed from us during this time and have since put together various trainings, a comedy night to benefit DC’s largest foodbank, and continue to offer online avenues to participate in our campaigns. And, we’re also thinking ahead to (1) how our region’s governments will equitably distribute future stimulus funds, (2) ways the clean energy needs of our climate can be met in an economy-stimulating way right here in the DMV region, and (3) how we can give people avenues to fight voter suppression.

So, this is how I’m coping. Thanks for reading this overly long blog and I hope that you’re also figuring out your Next Right Thing. 

Letter from the Director

It was the worst of times. It was the worst of times. 

Or so it seems lately in our country. Covid-19. Police brutality. The recession. And, in case anyone has forgotten, the climate keeps changing faster and faster. The temperature reached nearly 101 degrees Fahrenheit in Siberia last week, inside the Arctic Circle. That just flat out scares me. 

And, like most of you, CCAN has been very busy on many fronts this spring and summer. In April, thanks to a Zoom comedy show, we raised nearly $3,000 for the Capital Area Food Bank. In June, we joined the Movement for Black Lives to fight against runaway police budgets and abuse against Black and Brown communities. And all the while we’ve maintained the fight against climate change in the Chesapeake region and nationwide while protecting our staff through work-at-home practices and safe protesting in the streets. 

But here’s the thing: The only long-term solution to all of these problems is to elect competent leaders at the polls. And, you may have heard, there’s an election coming up in November – the most important in our lives. Which is why our sister organization, CCAN Action Fund, has launched a campaign to fight voter suppression everywhere and get everyone to vote. Won’t you join us by signing the “Fight to Vote” pledge?

Meanwhile, again, we’ve been busy on the climate front. In Virginia, we worked with an incredible coalition to help pass the Clean Economy Act, a bill that sets the state on a pathway toward 100% clean electricity while mandating the shutdown of all the states dirty fossil fuel power plants. 

In Maryland, we’ve joined wind and solar advocates in asking the Public Service Commission to speed up development of offshore wind farms, land-based wind, and utility-scale solar projects. We were pleased when the PSC voted in June to approve the long-delayed Dan’s Mountain wind farm in Western Maryland. Now the commission must do more, especially for solar power.

Finally, in DC, we cheered on the filing of a historic lawsuit. On June 23rd, the Attorney General of the District of Columbia Karl Racine filed a consumer protection suit against ExxonMobil and several other oil giants. The suit demands the oil companies financially compensate DC residents for the harmful climate change impacts already underway. The flooding and heatwaves we’re seeing now were effectively created by decades of tobacco-like denial of the science on the part of the polluters. Similar cases have been filed nationwide. The tide is turning. We’ll keep you posted.

And before I go, I want to give a shout out to a new book by former CCAN employee and climate legend Ted Glick. His book “Burglar for Peace” chronicles his dramatic efforts during the Vietnam War to destroy selective service draft records, including his own draft card, and the subsequent trials and time in prison he spent for this righteous activism. It’s an amazing read with lessons for modern-day activists fighting against the violence of climate change and for the peace of clean power. Check it out. 

Meanwhile, stay safe and well. And sign the pledge to get everyone to the polls in November. 

Sincerely, 

Mike Tidwell

Add “Prison Reform” to your Climate Activist To-Do List. Yes, really.

Racial Injustice in the time of COVID-19 

As we’ve seen so often during the coronavirus crisis, we know that COVID-19 does not impact all people equally. In the United States, we have seen the virus expose the dark divisions in health and income disparities between white Americans and Black and Latinx Americans. Moreover, the ongoing protests surrounding the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Tony McDade, and countless others at the hands of police have revealed the systemic racism that keeps populations in our society unequal. Activists and educators have pointed to the statistics that show even more severe inconsistencies between Black and white Americans in the level of services accessible in the form of access to jobs, healthcare, affordable housing, and education. However, out of all populations that COVID-19 is hitting the hardest, Americans in prison are dying at a disproportionate rates and spreading COVID-19 faster than outside populations, due to the intersections of of racial injustice, poor health outcomes, and lack of basic medical care that is lacking in our prisons and jails. 

These disparities should cause alarm for anyone wishing for America to move towards a more just and equal society. For us as climate activists, we already know the data shows us that communities of color bear the brunt of fossil fuel pollution and climate impacts. We should examine how to help every community in our society have a higher chance of survival against the virus, so that we can begin to create the truly green and safe future that we strive towards. 

How does the legacy of white supremacy impact the current criminal justice system? 

In the United States, 70 percent of American prisoners are non-white – part of this has been fueled by decades of mandatory minimum sentencing for crimes that fall under the categories targeted by the “War on Drugs” or “broken windows” policing strategies. Legal scholar Michelle Alexander in her award-winning book “The New Jim Crow” argues that the U.S. criminal justice system functions as a system that upholds racism, even as it formally adheres to the principle of colorblindness. “People of color are being incarcerated at far higher rates than their counterparts, while neighborhoods that are economically or politically disenfranchised will also have an accumulation” said Barun Mathema, an epidemiologist at Columbia University. A 2016 study by the Sentencing Project found that Black Americans are incarcerated in state prisons across the country at more than five times the rate of whites, and at least ten times the rate in five states.

What does this mean during COVID-19? During the COVID-19 crisis, these inequalities are even more magnified. People in prisons are often at heightened risk of contracting COVID-19 due to close proximity, inability to practice social distancing, lack of adequate sanitation and hygiene, high incidence of underlying medical conditions, and lack of adequate medical care in prisons and jails. Even in non-pandemic times, prisons and jails fail at providing the most basic of physical and mental healthcare. And noting the earlier statistics on which groups make up the majority of prisons (Black and Brown people of color), we see that the intersections of race and COVID-19 are a death sentence for the most vulnerable populations in our country. This needs to change. 

Connecting the Dots: COVID-19, Climate, Injustice

Some of you might be asking now: Why should we work to make reforms now to the criminal justice system during COVID-19? Racial injustice has fueled this crisis in America’s prisons, and just as with calls to reform police departments because of brutality, we should also seek to reform this system for the better overall public health and sustainability of our communities. 

If it weren’t enough that prisons are pushed to extremes during a pandemic, we face the duality of knowing that climate change impacts are hitting us already, and the more extreme impacts that we know will come if fossil fuel pollution is left unchecked. If we recognize that people of color are the ones most often on the frontlines of climate change, we must also recognize that prison populations are also on the front lines of climate change. Organizer Jay Ware notes that imprisoned people also suffer from climate catastrophes, “whether this is families fleeing climate change in the Global South being detained and separated into immigrant detention facilities or other black, brown, and poor white prisoners from typically toxic neighborhoods ecologically who are held in toxic prisons.” Not only are the climate impacts experienced prior to incarceration by families and communities, but for people currently living in prison, climate impacts of intense heat, extreme cold, and flooding inflict both physical and psychological suffering: 

“Every time a large-scale hurricane approaches a coastal stretch of the United States, gruesome stories surface concerning prison officials who refuse to evacuate their prisons. The consequences of this malign neglect can be devastating, and sometimes fatal. During Hurricane Katrina, thousands of prisoners were left to rot in waist-high water; in 2017, Hurricane Harvey saw 3,000 prisoners in Texas stranded without food or water for days; in 2018, prisoners within the evacuation zone on Florida’s coast were left to fend for themselves when Hurricane Michael hit; and when Hurricane Florence rolled through South Carolina, the state declined to evacuate more than a thousand people across multiple prisons.” – Kim Kelly, “The Climate Disaster Inside America’s Prisons” 

Furthermore, with the threads of mass incarceration, health inequality, and the climate crisis seemingly intertwined – some officials look to prisons for help in fighting climate change. In California, during the unprecedented fire season in 2018 and onwards, prison labor has been used to fight wildfires. Prisoners in California’s Conservation Camp program were fighting the fires alongside civilian employees, earning just $1.45 a day for their work, significantly less than minimum wage that their counterparts earn, but carrying all of the dangerous risks that fighting fires entail. If you do not see the issues with labor exploitation during a climate crisis, the ACLU makes it clear: “We should use incarceration as a last resort to protect public safety — not to create or maintain a pool of cheap labor for the government.” 

Next Steps on Criminal Justice Reform 

So where do we go from here? What would reform look like? An immediate next step that all climate activists must take is to dedicate some of your time as activists to guarantee that the human rights of all Americans are being protected, now during the COVID-19 crisis and into the future when we know that climate impacts will arrive in our cities and communities. 

Since it has been noted that one of the main causes of COVID-19 spreading quickly throughout the prison system is due to prison overcrowding – one solution proposed is to reduce the overall number of people in prison – something that health experts and criminal justice reform advocates now agree on. Activists have been calling for this for many years, because we already know prisons are stacked with more and more individuals serving extremely long sentences for nonviolent offenses.  

Human Rights Watch, a global nonprofit organization dedicated to human rights issues, recommends releasing: 

  • those held for minor offenses
  • those nearing the end of their sentence
  • those jailed for technical violations of probation or parole
  • incarcerated children, older, and otherwise medically vulnerable people, and people who are caregivers to vulnerable people
  • detainees who have not been charged
  • detainees held in pretrial detention, unless they pose a serious and concrete risk to others

in order to best stop the rampant spread of COVID-19 and other health ailments. 

Research released in April by the ACLU found that if prison reform measures were taken, the U.S. could “save as many as 23,000 people in jail and 76,000 in the broader community if we stop arrests for all but the most serious offenses and double the rate of release for those already detained.” 

And it’s not just activists sounding the alarm on this issue either – our government must take notice and take action towards reform. On April 6, Attorney General William Barr sent a memo to federal prosecutors urging them to consider Covid-19 risks when making bail decisions. The memo cited the risk of in increasing jail populations during the pandemic, as well as concerns about risks to individuals. The memo still instructs prosecutors to detain people who pose a public safety threat, despite concerns about the virus. If the Trump Administration recognizes this as a problem, it’s clearly even more serious than they let on. 

Concluding Thoughts 

Finding solutions for all of the intersecting systems of climate justice, racial justice, and mass incarceration can feel overwhelming. But we can draw some conclusions from analyzing all of this information: The same systems that result in a fossil fuel-burning power plant located closer to a Black neighborhood is the same system that resulted in higher incarceration rates for Black Americans and ultimately higher rates of transmission of COVID-19. If we want to fix one of these problems, we actually need to solve both, because climate justice is inherently linked to rectifying racial injustice. 

If we want to create a more sustainable future with clean energy, access to family-supporting jobs, and homes safe from climate impacts of extreme heat, storms, and rising seas, we first need to work to improve the systems that keep us unequal: the unequal access to affordable healthcare and safe homes. For a truly just transition, there can be no one left behind. 

Here are some organizations that are working on this issue in the DC, Maryland, and Virginia region that I would encourage you to learn more from and support: 

If you’re confused or have more questions, I would love to talk with you more about this issue, please feel free to email me at stacy[at]chesapeakeclimate.org 

Resources for Further Reading: 

References

We support “Defund the Police.” Here’s why, and what’s next

We are at a crucial point in history for racial justice. There are no neutral actors here: Silence itself is a dangerous act. 

That’s why we at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network are raising our voices for a world where Black Lives Matter. Not just because Black and Latinx Americans care most on average about climate change. Not just because the climate fight would be nothing without a diverse movement. Not just because we need every community to join us in our fight for climate solutions for it to succeed. Not just because we need to be able to protest without entire populations fearing for their lives. 

But because the fight for a safe climate future is a fight to save lives. And millions of Americans are fighting for their lives right now.

At this critical moment, we are following the lead of Black-led organizations at the forefront of this struggle. We are signing on in support of the broad movement to reduce funding for police and reinvest in communities under the banner of “Defund the Police.”

On Tuesday night, CCAN Board of Directors voted unanimously in favor of a resolution to support this movement. Click HERE to see the resolution. 

In practical terms, here’s what that means for us at CCAN: 

  • We will support efforts spearheaded by Black-led organizations to pressure our legislators to meaningfully divest from police programs that directly or indirectly give rise to brutality, and invest in public services and other public safety measures that don’t involve police force or incarceration. This means weighing in on state and local budget hearings, and encouraging our supporters to do the same. More on that below. 
  • We pledge to not pay for police services at CCAN events — like protests and conferences — unless absolutely necessary. Often, police departments require activists to pay for police presence at public marches and rallies. Our refusal to pay such fees will force us to make sure we’re asking the right questions up front and will help us to choose venues and vendors that share our values. We expect to formalize this new policy in the coming weeks.
  • We will connect our supporters with anti-racism trainings and resources and maximize trainings for staff to ensure that racial justice is a centerpiece of our climate campaigns.
  • We will invest in voter education campaigns to help protect vulnerable communities from voter suppression efforts — and encourage all voters to support leaders who advocate for meaningfully divesting from police to better fund social programs instead. 

You may be wondering, what do we mean by “Defund the Police?” It doesn’t mean getting rid of all police overnight — or necessarily ever — and it won’t mean the same thing in every city, town, or locality. It means redistributing the hundreds of millions of dollars we spend on policing back into essential public services that have been gutted over the last few decades as police budgets ballooned. It means mental health professionals answering calls about mental health crises, and addiction experts answering calls about opioid abuse, instead of armed officers. It means tackling our social problems with tools that could help solve them rather than resorting to violence and criminalization, a system that was borne out of racism and has intentionally disrupted and devastated Black, Brown, Indigenous and poor communities since its inception centuries ago.

This effort draws parallels to the fossil fuel divestment campaign as well. We’re not proposing eliminating all forms of energy, just the dirty ones; we still need to keep the lights on and the internet flowing, now more than ever in the era of coronavirus. Similarly, we still need systems to keep our communities safe. We’re just opening our minds to what those systems look like. And we’re taking our cues from the groups, communities, and thought-leaders most impacted by the current broken system.

If you’re still skeptical, click HERE to watch a video with CCAN Board Members Terence Ellen and Reverend Lennox Yearwood Jr. discussing what “Defund the Police” means for CCAN and why it’s important for climate activists to support it.

Here at CCAN, we know that the fight for climate justice and racial justice are one in the same. People of color disproportionately bear the impacts of climate change, from extreme storms to flooding from sea level rise to heat waves to air pollution. It’s also no coincidence that fossil-fueled power plants and refineries are disproportionately located in black neighborhoods, leading to poor air quality and putting people at higher risk for coronavirus. The forces behind the climate crisis are the same forces behind racial inequality. As Eric Holthaus put it, climate change is “what happens when the lives of marginalised people and non-human species are viewed as expendable.” We have to work together for permanent and durable solutions that protect every single person of every single race — particularly the most vulnerable — now and in the future. 

That’s why we will continue to shine light on police brutality and work for solutions everywhere to this ongoing tragedy. And we ask you to do the same. Please do what you can to use your voice to demand justice. 

Here’s where to start:

The fight for justice becomes more crucial every day. We’re glad to be fighting with you. 

In solidarity, 

The entire team at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network and CCAN Action Fund

Why Climate Activists Need to Be Anti-Racist Activists

Whose apocalypse do you care about?

I was originally supposed to write this blog post about why we need the climate movement to get huge, and discuss Harvard researcher Erica Chenoweth’s discoveries about how relatively small proportions of the population are needed to overthrow tyrannical governments. This is all still true and important; I highly suggest you watch her TED talk here.*

However, today I have something even more pressing to discuss. I want to talk about why all climate activists should become anti-racist activists. If you are a white activist and recent events have stirred you to start down the path of anti-racist practice, welcome, this post is for you. 

For those of you who are people of color: Our hearts are breaking for you. If you have a story about what’s going on you’d like to share, we’d love to amplify your voice. Simply email info@chesapeakeclimate.org and we’ll work with you on this. 

I’d like to first acknowledge that I benefit from white privilege and it’s important to put my words here in that context. That isn’t to say I haven’t experienced challenges, and I have other parts of myself that are not fully liberated in this country (notably, I’m a woman, queer and neurodivergent). Many of my family members have experienced poverty for generations and still continue to experience it today. But yet even with all of that being true, I still very much benefit from a history of white supremacy. And *all* of the challenges I face are made easier for having white skin. This is a foundational principle of intersectionality (a term coined by a black woman): no struggle is faced in a vacuum That is why we will never truly win on a single issue that is “good for everyone” without specifically addressing how racism undermines our movements. We’ve seen this time and time again throughout history, from black suffragists excluded from the women’s movement, to 53% of white women voting for Trump in 2016.

Francis Elen Watkins Harper, an intellectual and poet who spoke out about exclusionary practices in the women’s suffrage movement

Anti-racist practice is the constant examination of the way that race interplays with every aspect of life, and at every stage demanding differently. Scholar Ibram Kendi compares racism to the cancer he lives with; unexamined, it metastasizes through the whole body. The treatment is to remove tumors (racist policies) and medicate the entire system (commit to anti-racist education). 

How do we move forward from here?

So if you are white, how do you go about educating yourself and others about race?

Step one: Always trust black and brown people’s authority on this subject first.

Seriously, don’t just take my word for it. No matter how woke you get, or how much you are connected to black people in your personal life, if you are white you will not understand what it is to personally be subject to racism and wake up black every day (this poem by Candace Williams helped me to understand this emotionally). Black and brown people have been doing this work intergenerationally. Another analogy here – doing anti-racist work is like doing calculus in a burning building, where people of color are the experts and white people have not started learning basic addition. If you’re just coming into this understanding, there is a lot of learning and listening to do. This means frequently passing up the microphone, and committing deeply to self-work.

Now, important caveat here: You should absolutely read resources authored by people of color and listen when they are speaking, but do your best not to come with too many questions to individual people of color. A constant state of rehashing basic principles and convincing people of your humanity is exhausting. Research shows that this is the number one reason for burn out among anti-racist acitivists of color (more tips for avoiding this contained in the link).

This is one of many reasons step two is very important: White people need to talk to other white people about anti-racism.

To Kendi’s point, these ideas need to permeate the whole system. If you are a white person, you have access to white spaces and ears that black and brown people do not. Be that person and bring up this issue everywhere you go, from the policy table to the dinner table. As you progress on your journey, you will also learn how to speak to other white people at different levels of understanding (back to that calculus analogy – this is like forming a study group). You have the opportunity to leverage your relationships and position strategically. While big visible protests can be really important, we would not need them if we committed to doing this work full time. This is -really- hard. I’m certainly not an expert, but groups like Showing Up for Racial Justice (SURJ) work on this effort constantly.

Whiteness in the climate movement

Now with all of that given, let’s talk for a moment about whiteness in the climate movement specifically. First, let’s establish that if you truly care about the principle of a stable climate, you should absolutely care about racial justice. Think of all the grief and post apocalyptic imagery that we understand so well in the climate movement. Do those images involve terror, conflict, lack of access to safe water and food? We have seen constantly in the news that many people in this country are already living that reality for being black. Native activists have also written about already living in a post-apocalyptic world. So the apocalypse is already here, it just might not have touched you yet. And climate change will absolutely make all of these problems worse for people already facing extreme living conditions. 

Meanwhile, the environmental movement has centered white voices and priorities for decades and is overwhelmingly white. A 2014 study conducted by environmental expert Dorceta Taylor examined the composition of environmental groups and found what we can see anecdotally; through and through white faces dominate at events and on staff. This research also examined some of the reason that might be the case, including a lack of funding dedicated to this cause and a lack of transparency about the state of diversity in our movement (here at CCAN we are working on understanding the composition of our own base; you can take a survey here). Not understanding this has significantly cost progress, and as we move into a “majority minority” composition in this country, we will suffer for it if we don’t quickly adapt. Even more disturbing is the fact that white supremacist groups have begun co-opting environmentalist messaging. Allowing this to sit unexamined will become a truly deadly cancer indeed. We need to make sure that at every turn we are denouncing racist practices, in our spheres of influence and especially in ourselves. This is why it is so important to listen to POC community leaders and incorporate their policy demands into our climate policy. 

We always have the opportunity to do differently. We can each decide to change our own mindset and start learning that calculus with urgency. In addition to the many resources I have linked throughout this post, I have also linked below a compilation of resources I have found helpful. The best time to start is now; the building truly is on fire. I would be happy to study with you. 

Resources

**(also, please note that while Chenoweth’s research shows that non-violent movements are ultimately easier to carry out and are often more effective in the long run, she does not condemn rioting when there are no other options left. Many black scholars, including Martin Luther King, have written about why rioting occurs and should be understood in context)

During coronavirus, Flint residents still do not have access to clean water. Photo by Karla Ann Cote/NurPhoto via Getty Images

George Floyd


The recent brutal murder in Minneapolis has forced all of us at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network to confront the injustice that runs rampant throughout our country. Our hearts and thoughts are with the families and communities of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Ahmaud Arbery, Tony McDade, and countless others.

Lives have been senselessly taken, and that can’t be undone. But we can work to shine a light on police brutality, and join justice advocacy organizations to find solutions to this ongoing tragedy. 

Systemic racism permeates nearly everything — from brutal police killings to COVID-19’s disproportionate mortality rate among African Americans to the fact that people of color are disproportionately affected by runaway climate change. We have to work together for permanent and durable solutions that protect every single person of every single race — particularly the most vulnerable — now and in the future.

As an immediate step, we encourage everyone to donate generously to organizations promoting racial justice and raising funds for those affected by this crisis. A few recommendations: 

We also condemn all statements that condone or incite violence against those who are exercising their First Amendment rights to protest this and other recent deaths of African Americans across our country.

The right to protest is a cornerstone of our democracy. We at CCAN have participated in dozens of demonstrations that have been essential for growing momentum for climate solutions. Yet, too often, African Americans are disproportionately targeted at these protests. When CCAN Board Member and frequent climate justice advocate Reverend Lennox Yearwood Jr. participated in the March for Science, he was targeted and assaulted by the police. When we joined with the #ShutdownDC Coalition to temporarily block traffic around the nation’s capitol to draw attention to the climate crisis, our largely white group was able to block off several intersections without trouble from the police — while the Black Lives Matter blockade was immediately targeted for arrests during the protest and hassled afterwards. 

Everyone should have a right to protest without fearing being killed. Everyone should have a right to walk down a street or sleep in their own bed without fearing being killed. 

For those of you reading this who are white, we encourage you to take this opportunity to learn as much as you can about institutional racism and privilege: 

For those of you who are people of color: Our hearts are breaking for you. If you have a story about what’s going on you’d like to share, we’d love to amplify your voice. Simply respond to this email and we’ll work with you on this. 

There is no climate justice without racial justice. 

In solidarity forever, 

The entire team at the Chesapeake Climate Action Network 

Graduate student life in a pandemic

Written by Joanne Sims, Virginia Commonwealth University

Good Bye Spring Break, hello social distancing

It was a rare occasion that the news was on in the middle of my spring break. The first COVID-19 cases had just spread to Virginia.  Suddenly the post-midterm peace was pushed aside for a pandemic. 

About a week into “stay at home” my socials became littered with “the earth is resetting itself” type posts about how the oceans and sky were cleaner now that we all stayed inside and it made me a little fearful. Climate change, an issue you can’t see, was still happening whether I went outside or not. Suddenly all my classes were discussing COVID-19 impacts on sustainability practices and public health. 

Jack of all trades! How I became a student, teacher, and caretaker all at once.

I had already planned to go back to my mom’s house for part of the break so I just headed there with way fewer clothes than would eventually be required. My spring break got extended to two weeks when the stay at place order and school cancellations were announced. Thankful for my mother free child care was delivered right at her doorsteps (Me!).

I have two younger siblings, one in pre-school and one in high school. My new role became part time-grad student and substitute teacher. My day consisted of waking up, doing pre-K worksheets, prepping breakfast and lunches, and organizing a schedule of daily classwork for my high school sibling. 

This was my first semester in graduate school, studying sustainable planning. Switching to an online format was… WEIRD. I’ve only done 1 class online before and hated every second of it. Writing memos on environmental impact assessments with Peppa Pig blasting in the background is far from ideal. 

Thankfully most of my professors were pretty chill and the amount of work required this semester was reduced and altered to better fit an online format.  The worst part of virtual learning is honestly discussions on zoom. I used my phone for the first couple weeks because my laptop broke just in time for online classes. Trying to find a time to interject when you can only see a quarter of the class and it feels like your professor is looking right at you is an introvert’s nightmare. 

We had a discussion in my environmental policy and planning class about whether this prolonged isolation will cause a surge in suburban living. The resources strain of urban spawn is less than ideal environmentally, but the idea of having space at a time when parks and other public green spaces are closed is appealing. 

Being at my mother’s house where we have a yard and the ability to not run into anyone was nice at first but something about being able to see and hear people from your 2nd-floor window has a kind of peace to it as well. It is my hope that we’ll see a rise in tiny green spaces, more apartments with courtyards and balconies at least.

I’ve been really thankful that my family has been safe and pretty fortunate so far. My mom’s job actually decreased her hours in order to limit the number of people in the building. They even gave masks to all the employees and their family members. 

I definitely think being in the house with my family, who I normally see a couple of times a month, has been very stressful. Homework and babysitting don’t always agree with each other. I took a short oasis to my apartment to work on the finals. This increase in family time has made me value my peaceful one bedroom. 

One of my biggest concerns during the pandemic has been my grandmother. She doesn’t drive and relies mainly on carpools and public transportation and the majority of her time was spent at church in large group settings. 

I’ve been in charge of ordering all her groceries and working as tech support so she can video call family. Grocery delivery is super easy but she isn’t very adept with technology so a lot of my free time has been occupied with opening facebook’s lives of her pastor. 

My next goal is to get her to figure out how to open Netflix or at least send her some DVDs so she’ll stop impulse buying from catalogs out of boredom. She called asking if I could send her a VHS player so I got my work cut out for me. 

Looking into the future

Prior to the pandemic, I was feeling wishy-washy about my future. I was thinking about leaving graduate school but the state of the economy is making a Masters degree look more appealing. I’ve only been on the job/internship hunt for a couple of months and since COVID I’ve noticed a significant drop in job opportunities. I’m still hopeful but I’m definitely expanding my net to things that weren’t necessarily interesting to me. 

I have a bachelor’s in Environmental Studies and I’m not sure how a lot of the non-profit work I’m interested in will be fairing during a recession. An economic downturn won’t help already disinterested people care about the topic of climate change but it should. 

The speed of how quickly things turned from bad to worse with the pandemic can happen with our environment. It also gave me hope, seeing how quickly we’ve adapted to things like social distancing.

Hopefully, this shows people that fast-pace advancements for the health of our country are feasible and that we are resilient when it comes to change.