Climate Adaptation, Community & Environmental Justice, Education & Awareness

As Diversity Committee Co-Chair for the Association of Environmental Studies & Sciences (AESS), I engage in efforts to increase access and inclusion for people of all backgrounds. Although AESS is cognizant of the lack of racial diversity in the organization and has taken critical first steps to address the challenge, the group still struggles with limited participation of racial and ethnic minorities and discussions of environmental equity. AESS has listed various strategies for enhancing diversity without developing explicit plans for achieving these goals or being very intentional about infusing them into the association's structure, functions, processes, and operations.

I seek to remedy this issue by addressing the limited representation of diverse persons and discussions of environmental equity by expanding the number of DEI programs at the AESS conferences. Eventually, I hope to propose more DEI conference events in the future so that issues like environmental equity and climate justice become central at AESS.

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Last year, we succeeded in having one Diversity Panel at the 2021 AESS Conference, followed by a thorough survey of conference attendees, and making the AESS Diversity Committee an official committee. This year, my goal is to increase the DEI programs at the 2022 AESS Conference from a single event to multiple events over the course of the conference. In particular, I seek to create the following events: 1) Thinking BEYOND Diversity in ESS (Track: Building Community in ESS); 2) 2) Diverse Schools of Thought (Track: Building Community in ESS). Eventually, I hope to propose more DEI conference events in the future so that issues like environmental equity and climate justice become central at AESS.

Currently, the second round of the project is in progress. I have worked with my co-Chair to submit our proposed 2022 AESS Conference events: 1) Thinking BEYOND Diversity in ESS (Track: Building Community in ESS); 2) 2) Diverse Schools of Thought (Track: Building Community in ESS). 

Successes: We recruited several critical members of AESS to the Diversity Committee for their expertise and experience.
 

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Workshop & Roundtable Events

https://aessonline.org/diversity-committee/#!directory/ord=lnm