ENVS 295: Environmental Engagement
Lewis & Clark College | Spring 2020
Mia Babasyan
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Course Summary
ENVS 295 is a course centered around working with other students, stakeholders, and organizations to learn about and participate in environmental engagement. Through opportunities to engage in discussions, field trips, readings, and projects, the course allows students to learn not only the various ways in which we can communicate with others, but why and how to do so. So far in the course, we have accomplished implementing the notions of post-truth, engaging across difference, and engaging as dialogue. Additionally, learning about effective action and the role engagement plays in it has added to the interdisciplinary approach we have been given throughout the course. I have learned that there are always many sides to a story and issue, even when each stakeholder ultimately wants the same result or outcome. The processes for approaching issues can be controversial, even when people are on the same “side”. I think learning this proved to be very beneficial on why communication and engagement are so crucial to efficiency in change.Engagement Partnership
One important part of ENVS 295 is an environmental engagement partnership with a Portland-area organization. The page linked above offers information and resources I helped compile for my organizational partner this semester.Engagement Project
Building on the engagement partnership above, our team developed a related engagement project in collaboration with the partner. The page linked above offers details on our engagement project.My Course Posts
I've done a series of posts throughout the semester related to readings, our partnership, our project, and my thoughts on environmental engagement. See below for all posts I've published, in reverse order by date.
Feedback to date Green Empowerment staff representative and Program Coordinator: Daniel Schollaert April 2020 Don’t focus on attracting volunteers, as their service learning program has ended. “Fundraising and Friendraising” efforts are most valuable. Green Empowerment has an interesting history and start that we could share through our video project. Due […]
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Access to affordable and reliable energy is a vital element for sustainable development. In the off-grid and rural areas of developing countries, energy solutions have received an increasing amount of attention due to their contributions to reducing poverty. However, most of the rural population in many developing countries still has […]
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Introduction Green Empowerment works with rural partners and communities around the globe to improve and create systems and projects designed to ensure long-term economic and environmental sustainability. These projects help communities, individuals and families pave their own pathway to prosperity through the partnerships with local partnerships. In order to support […]
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Introduction: Studying Environmental Studies in a school and city that generally does not contest to the typical consensus of the environmental issues we are facing, can allow for a bubble to block the outside world and opinions. However, classes that focus on environmental engagement prevents this bubble from encompassing us […]
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What + Who = How Our What’s are the controversy surrounding solar energy and other renewable energy sources that Green Empowerment helps implement in rural communities. Our Who is our Green Empowerment partners, as well as, Green Empowerment itself. One possible How approach that connects our What to our Who […]
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Our Focused Readings The Hidden Tribes study consists of a number of questions on your views about the world and places you into one of the seven profiles (Progressive Activists, Traditional Liberals, Passive Liberals, Politically Disengaged, Moderates, Traditional Conservatives, Devoted Conservatives). The Passive Liberals tribe is the largest as 26% […]
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With technology playing a part in many of our everyday lives, it can feel overwhelming to constantly be alerted by notifications, messages, and daily news from around the world. Technology delivers information at such a constant rate, that this absorption is reflected into how we respond to much of what […]
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Effective Action The Introduction to Effective Altruism reading from Tuesday went into detail about the three criteria for effective action: great in scale (effects as many people as possible), highly neglected (few other people are working to address the problem), and highly solvable (additional resources will do a great deal […]
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Introduction Our Environmental Engagement class, ENVS 295, went on a reconnaissance trip to encounter various environmental conflicts in Oregon that represent opportunities for inclusive engagement across differences. One of the presentations we experienced on the trip involved The Hood River Forest Collaborative (HRFC). The group presented in the form of […]
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