My primary takeaways from this course— while the enormity of the political ecology of death can be overwhelming and panic-inducing to contemplate, through community and following visionary paths, we can build a path forward for a future that includes all of us, starting with the communities most impacted by climate catastrophe. 

My group’s action project was monitoring the Institutional Climate Action (ICA)’s Divest from Fossil Fuels campaign for the UW.  The ICA’s divestment campaign was created after years of student-led efforts to push the UW Board of Regents and the UW Investment Management Company (UWINCO) to divest UW’s endowment from fossil fuels investment. For this project, I reviewed all of the financial documents made available through the Board of Regents agenda notes for the past year’s meetings, and made extensive notes, which were used to draft an email to the Board of Regents and UWINCO for further clarifications on their intentions for divestment following the passage of the ICA’s resolution by the Board. Medha and I were also responsible for the creation of the Decolonizing Climate Justice project, and I created the social media posts, included in the presentation recording.  As for the question— Are you inspired about the work you did? — I would say yes, but with the caveat that it is not really about me. I am proud of my creations, especially the social media posts about water conditions in Flint and currently, in Jackson, Mississippi, because it speaks to the urgency— what is conspicuously absent in mainstream conversations in the global north— about access to clean drinking water and plastic sustainability in this country. We need to apply a systems-thinking approach to this issue. Jackson is happening right now, and the only people I see talking about it online are those who are directly impacted, and they are Black and brown. The media neglect is another glaring piece of evidence that the organized abandonment of poor Black and brown communities in the U.S. is not only at the hands of the fiscal state, but also from the so-called movements for climate equity. Of course, my contribution is only a very small one. But I hope that future students can understand the importance and urgency of carving out spaces for these conversations, even if it means going against the grain of the academic culture they find themselves in. 

Systems thinking- From The Hunger Project. What if we applied this more holistically, to the water crisis in Jackson?

JACKSON, MS