Wawa Gatheru on the Campbell Conversations

Campbell Conversations

Wawa Gatheru

Program transcript:

Grant Reeher: Welcome to the Campbell Conversations, I'm Grant Reeher. My guest today is Wawa Gatheru. Ms. Gatheru is the founder of Black Girl Environmentalist, a national organization dedicated to empowering black girls, women and nonbinary people across the climate sector. In 2019, she was named the first black person in history to receive the prestigious Rhodes, Truman and Udall scholarships, all three of them. Since then, she's received a number of young leadership recognitions and awards. Ms. Gatheru, welcome to the program.

Wawa Gatheru: Thank you for having me. I'm excited to talk with you today.

GR: Well, we're excited to have you. Let me just start with one thing, we know already that you're very smart, I think I just proved that. Where did you win all these scholarships? Where was your undergraduate experience?

WG: Yeah, so I'm a proud alum of the illustrious University of Connecticut, Storrs. That's where I did my undergrad.

GR: Excellent, okay. And you did the Rhodes Scholarship, was the one you chose, which makes perfect sense. And I think the Truman was one that you get sort of while you're an undergraduate, is that right? You were able to receive that scholarship at Connecticut, right?

WG: Yes. So the Truman Scholarship is a public service scholarship so it's awarded to undergraduate juniors that have shown exceptional promise in the space of public service and have a track record and hopefully will continue to carry that on throughout the rest of their career.

GR: All right. So the Rhodes is the one everyone's heard of. And what did you study at Oxford?

WG: So I studied major society and environmental governance. So that was a masters where we really focused on environmental governance and have the opportunity to understand what that looks like from a global perspective, it’s very insightful.

GR: Well, perfect for what you're doing, so great, okay. So, briefly tell me how and why you started this organization, Black Girl Environmentalist.

WG: Yeah. So the idea of BGE, Black Girl Environmentalist, was definitely seeded throughout my experience in the environmental space. I was 15 when I really knew in my heart that I had found my calling and I knew that I wanted to dedicate my life to climate solutions. And throughout my time as a young person navigating the climate sector, I had an incredible experience obviously, I'm still here. But there were many instances that reminded me of the leadership crisis that our space really suffers from and even though people of color make up nearly, I think, 40% of the U.S. population, we rarely see a 12 to 16% green ceiling of representation and that is definitely seen and felt when you're in environmental or climate rooms. And so I kept asking myself the question, if we know that communities of color, people of color and women of color in particular, are experiencing the brunt of environmental injustices in our country and abroad, why is it that we're not adequately represented in climate leadership? Why is it that the next generation of climate leaders don't look like a representation of the United States? And so that was a big tension point throughout my journey. And when I completed my master's at Oxford and fall of 2022, I was confronted with the possibility of spending a year turning what, at that point was an Instagram page and Instagram community, into a functioning, fully operational nonprofit that could attempt to address this very unique pipeline and pathway issue in the climate sector. And so I decided to, instead of accepting a job offer that would have provided me financial security, spend a year dedicated to spreading the word on BGE, building out our programing and fundraising. And I told myself that if I wasn't able to fundraise enough to hire myself, then at least two people full time within a year, I would essentially go back crawling to whoever would take me for a job, and I'd keep the organization as an Instagram page. And somehow we were able to do that and we're still going strong with full time staff.

GR: That's great. So, a follow up question on that, but just to underline something that you said at the beginning about the field being dominated by white people. You know, I've had a number of folks on the program in the years that I've been doing it to talk about environmental issues and you prompted me to go back really quickly and think, and they were all white. So you are the first person of color to be on this program to be talking about environmental issues. So it just kind of underlines your point there. You said that people of color bear the heavier brunt of environmental injustices and problems. Could you say a little bit more about that because when I think of some of the environmental concerns, you know, global warming and everything, I don't necessarily think of them in those terms, so help me better understand that.

WG: Yeah, so I mean, there's so many different ways that we can look at this. The origins of the climate crisis in a formal environmental course, we really look at the industrial revolution as being the starting point of the climate crisis particularly, and the rapid increase of greenhouse gases and the way that we really see our economy industrialized in this very specific way and how that launched the US in particular into an era of wealth and really solidified it as one of the most wealthy nations in the world, if not the most wealthy. But I would say, if we took from a historical perspective, the climate crisis did not begin there, right? The Industrial Revolution didn't pay for itself. We think about the abolishment of slavery and what a tectonic economic shift it was. It required the US to really launch itself into a new economic system that did not remove itself from a system of exploitation. So we went from a system of exploiting black and brown bodies to continuing to exploit black and brown bodies, not in the same way, but still doing so while also exploiting the land and our resources at a level that we have not been able to keep up with. And a lot of environmental strands can really trace the legacy of chattel slavery, colonialism, imperialism as being huge, grounding fundamental systems that have led us into this crisis. And because those systems are born out of exploitation, the climate crisis and staying true to its origins and roots, does not impact us all the same. I often say the climate crisis, even though we're all in the same storm that is a climate crisis we aren't all in the same boat, meaning that the climate crisis is a threat multiplier. It does create a lot of new problems for people, and it certainly impacts all different types of people. But depending on your social status, socio-economic status, race, gender, et cetera, your relationship with it is different. We often talk about climate change as being a threat multiplier. And, you know, when we dive into that term, it really means that the climate crisis intensifies all existing social threats. So even if the climate crisis wasn't in the picture, right, we understand that there are communities that tend to be poor. There are communities that have been targeted by systemic inequalities. There are communities that are more likely to experience poverty, and then when you bring the climate crisis on top of that, those issues grow larger. And the gaps between those with and those without continues to grow. And so people of color tend to be on the end of the have-nots when the climate crisis is brought into the mix, again that gap continues to grow larger. A really good example is heat. Right now, we're still in a heat wave. It's kind of crazy to think about, right? We're at day six, I think, to summer. And we are already seeing headlines of people losing their lives to heat. But the thing is with heat, heat does not impact us all equally, right? When we think about the very real legacy of redlining even though redlining is illegal, we still are living out the ramifications of these racist policies. There is research that shows that previously redlined communities that are still predominantly black and brown and low income are actually hotter than communities that weren't previously redlined. And that's because redlined communities were designated for a lot of concrete infrastructure. Warehouses highways, lack of green space. And then if you look at communities that weren't previously redlined and were able to access investment, there's a lot of green space. There is a lot of canopy cover, there's a lot of infrastructure that mitigates extreme heat. And because of that, we can quite literally see that a neighborhood that was previously redlined just a couple of blocks from a predominantly white community that wasn't previously redlined, people are experiencing heat very differently. And that's just like a real tangible example. But, you know, even if we bring in pregnant people into the mix, right? We already have a black maternal health crisis, we already know that black mothers and their babies are disproportionately impacted by our broken health care system. But heat really, really impacts pregnant and birthing people and their babies. And so if you add that on top of the mix, right, a black mother and a black baby in a community that was previously redlined, that is low income, that is hotter, is going to experience that heat differently than a white mother in a neighborhood that wasn't previously redlined, has canopy and tree cover to mitigate extreme heat and likely also has better access to health care in ways that the black mother doesn't have.

GR: Yeah, I could see how the threat multiplier there comes into it. And my mind went to something further back in time when you were talking about this, which was the differential impact of Hurricane Katrina.

WG: Right.

GR: You're listening to the Campbell Conversations on WRVO Public Media. I'm Grant Reeher and I'm speaking with Wawa Gatheru, the founder of Black Girl Environmentalist. So, what would you regard as your organization's biggest success so far, other than building it, obviously, which was a challenge. But now, you know, now that it's built, what's the thing that you would point to with the most pride?

WG: The thing that I would point to with the most pride is, you know, building it, I would say. And the reason why is I don't think people realize how dire philanthropy is for the climate space. Climate is the least funded issue item out there, which is really scary when we think about organizations, groups that are leading on climate solutions that are simply not able to scale and don't have the capacity to do so because of funding. And youth climate organizations are in a really, really interesting predicament and which constantly, we're told, you are the future, you're going to save us from ourselves. And then simultaneously we receive .76 percent of climate philanthropy of the very little there is, we receive .76, and most of that funding is located within the United States. So, we are an organization that is primarily focused in the United States, right? And even then, there's a disparity where my fellow brothers and sisters that are leading incredible work elsewhere are really not getting any funding. So the fact that we were able to raise enough capital to have full time staff and to be able to lead programing, in and of itself is great, but it certainly has been a burden in navigating. But very specifically, I would see our Hazel and Johnson Fellowship program is something that I'm very, very proud of. It initially launched just a couple of months ago. It's a summer program where we have placed 14 current college students or recent graduates at leading environmental organizations for the summer where they are receiving financial support, mentorship and professional development at a scale that really isn't normal in our space. Unpaid internships are thankfully becoming less and less popular, but there is still an issue around college students or recent graduates being able to access these internships or summer opportunities that are really, really critical and being able to obtain your first early career job. Because, A, if they are paid, they don't always tend to be able to correlate with the high costs of living. Two, if you have to relocate, many of the places that are very popular for internships are very expensive already. And the other issue is that students may not know how to really leverage the experience if they're in there. So with our fellowship, all the partner organizations are paying our fellows at least $18 an hour, and only one fellow is actually receiving that, most of them are receiving at least $20 an hour, up to $25 an hour. On top of that, Black Girl Environmentalists, our organization has equipped the bills with a $5,000 living wage stipend to support those fees as well. We are providing them weekly professional development, 3 hours a week, where we get to introduce them to different topics that are pertinent to where they are in the early career journey, and then also expose them to other things that could help them as they develop, as well as partnering each of the fellows up with the mentor. And we're finishing up the summer with an in-person retreat in Washington State, where we'll be able to really share about the experiences that folks had over the summer. Folks will get to connect in person or be able to plan ahead for how our alumni program can continue to support these individuals. It's been a really, really incredible journey to see the program start from an idea into this pipeline that is being recognized and where folks are participating from all over the country. We have HBCU students, we have state school students, we have Ivy League students, students that are utilizing this platform to really get their foot in the door. And our partner organizations are just incredible. We have everyone from Bloomberg Philanthropies, Beyond Petrochemicals Campaign, Harvard's Salata Institute, The Climate Trust, WWF, Rare (Environmental), across disciplines from renewable energy to environmental justice to policy. And we really wanted for folks to be able to have a wide selection of what type of discipline they wanted to get into, as well as start off in a place that can really help bring them to the next level.

GR: You're listening to the Campbell Conversations on WRVO Public Media. I'm Grant Reeher and I'm talking with Wawa Gatheru. She’s the founder of Black Girl Environmentalist, a national organization dedicated to empowering black girls, women and nonbinary people across the climate (spectrum). I just wanted to mention before the break you were talking about your fellowship program, and I just want to give you compliments here because I run an internship program at Syracuse University, but the way you've thought this through, inserting the mentoring into it and the big meeting afterward where people can compare their experiences, that's really nicely done. I just want to say good work on that.

WG: Thank you.

GR: What's been your biggest challenge so far outside of building the organization? I wonder whether it was getting people of color more interested in this or what's been the thing that's been toughest to get around for you?

WG: Yeah, you know, it hasn't been that last point. And it's so interesting because I think there is this narrative around people of color that sometimes we believe as well, like as people of color where it's like, oh, like, black folks don't go outside or don't go camping or don't care about the environment, or people of color don't do those things, when in reality it's not true. Like, we have polling that shows that people of color overwhelmingly do care about climate action, do care about how, for example, political candidates are talking about climate change. Actually, more than our white counterparts. In fact, Latin communities are the most concerned about environmental protection than any demographic. So it's always so interesting that when we think about environmentalism, it typically isn't that communities of color that again, arguably do care the most. I find that the issue or the biggest burden that I've had to face in the past several years with BGE and then overall is combating that narrative. And then also really combating that narrative and really asserting why an organization like this is so important. I tend to get a lot of questions about why I focus on what I focus on. People ask, why women? Why black women? Why black girls? Why not stick it to the tree? That's one I get a lot. You know, like race has nothing to do with climate action or climate protection, why exactly are you being divisive? And so I find that a lot of my job is to, specifically when it comes to overcoming narratives, is to really provide a historical grounding into the ways in which people of color have always been involved in our stewardship, have always been environmentalists, and remind folks of that continuing legacy. And then also to share that history with other folks of color and other black folks, because it's always been, again, this moment of a feeling of tension that I have experienced. But as I continue to meet more and more and more black girl environmentalists, I hear the same thing back. Where so many other people also have this lived experience of being like, this is so strange, like at home, we always recycle and like we always talked about how important it was to take care of the planet, we always understood that protecting the planet always meant protecting people, too. But the prevailing narrative has left us out. And so it's been a burden, but then it's also been an opportunity to connect with other people and build community over the fact that so many of us have been exposed to this narrative and yet, in the midst of it, have continued to persevere and continue to really take up space and really show the movement at large that in order for the climate movement to be successful, we need a movement made in the image of all of us and one that speaks to everyone.

GR: If you've just joined us, you're listening to the Campbell Conversations on WRVO Public Media, and my guest is Wawa Gatheru. She's an environmentalist and she founded the organization, Black Girl Environmentalist. Now, your constituency, as you listed on your website and elsewhere, is black girls, black women, but then also nonbinary people. So I just wanted to ask you why that was part of your focus. Do you see some sort of natural connection between the issues of bringing those first two groups into this conversation and the last one, nonbinary?

WG: Yeah, ultimately, right? Marginalized groups, folks that are made marginalized by our prevailing systems, we experience not just the climate crisis, but a lot of other issues differently than other groups, right? And it's really interesting because if you look at data or information that we have around gender, it very clearly points the fact that women of any race experience climate change with disproportionate severity because enforced gender inequality makes us more susceptible to escalating environmental stressors. At the same time, we know that women, when women are in positions of leadership in the environmental space or at large, we see better conservation outcomes when women are taking up space in national parliaments. We actually see more robust climate policies come through. So that's very, very clear in the research. But what's so interesting is that gender expansive nonbinary folks aren't even included in the research. There is a huge gap in the literature around how gender expansive and nonbinary folks and other gender minorities are experiencing the climate crisis and environmental hazards. And that in and of itself says everything that I need to know, right? If folks aren't even being included in the research, in the metrics, aren't being validated as a demographic, then of course, you know, of course, they're experiencing these things at disproportionate levels because they're not even being understood as people with lived experiences that need to be recognized. And so Black Girl Environmentalist as an organization, we are trying to make sure that black folks that have been left out, black gender minorities that have been left out of environmental leadership, out of environmental narratives, out of being understood as leaders of today and tomorrow, we are reconfiguring what that is. We're saying no, that we are leaders were leaders today we are leaders tomorrow, and we are creating opportunities for these folks to be seen, to be invested in, to build community. So for me, it's a very natural progression and it's a very natural part of our community.

GR: I get a sense of what your organization does and you mentioned the fellowship program and developing leadership and focusing on these groups. What's your long term hope or vision for this movement or organization?

WG: Well, to be honest, my long term hope / vision is that we won't have to exist (laughter). Like ultimately, right? All of us in the climate space, no matter who you are, no matter what your race is, we are trying to solve the climate crisis, right? So a long term goal is that we solve the climate crisis and that folks that have dedicated their life to climate solutions can focus on something else. My dream, if I wasn't in climate, I would have been a jazz singer, that's what I wanted to do my whole life. But, yeah, the climate crisis kind of got in the way of that dream. So maybe one day you'll find me out in some smoky bar singing Amy Winehouse, because we solved the climate crisis. As an organization, right, the goal is that we have a climate movement made in the image of all of us. I want for a black girl to be able to look at the climate space as a viable option for them and not to be deterred because they are going into workspaces or going into rooms that don't look like them and don't recognize how the climate crisis is impacting their communities most directly. And so if we get to that point, then I'd be happy to close the doors on BGE and have us focus on other things, but we're not there yet. And ultimately, our goal now really is to continue to create these pipelines to continue to cultivate communities and ecosystems of care for our members to build alongside each other, to build community, and for folks to know that the green economy space, that climate space is for them, and that there is room for them and that they are needed for the viability of our movement.

GR: I don't want to sound too pessimistic, but I'm going to guess that the climate problem and environmental issues are going to remain challenges beyond my lifetime for sure, but also probably throughout yours. So I don't know whether you're going to get to the jazz singing or not (laughter).

WG: You know, I think maybe there's some future I can do both. But for now…

GR: Okay. I have to ask you this question as a young leader. You may not like it, but I'm going to ask it anyway. President Biden, he's instituted some policies that environmentalists have applauded, and they've involved some fights. At the same time, though, among young people, his age is creating unease and lack of enthusiasm. And of course, that, you know, obviously came to a head with a debate performance. What do you, as a young leader make of the age issue in this regard?

WG: That's such an interesting question. And the way that you posed it…

GR: ...You’ve got to answer quick, I'm sorry.

WG: Ah, it's a big question, right? Because I think there is this narrative around young climate organizers or activists feeling some sort of resentment towards older generations. And I think that is a totally incorrect narrative. It does not speak to how movements work, right? Like, I am in this movement because of older people that have taken me under their wing and have quite literally paved the path for me and I'm on their shoulders. I think this question about President Biden and his age and his performance, I think it's a valid one for people to have. I personally am not focusing on his age when it comes down to me being someone that would vote for him. I'm voting off of climate and reproductive justice and so that's where my vote is. Again, I do think that while it's a valid conversation around the lack of representation of young people in our political system and the energy that we bring, oftentimes because of our youth, I do feel like are some ageist narratives that are going about that, take us away from the issues that we should be focusing on. There are things that we can critique for sure, and age can be one of them. Personally, that’s not my number one deterrent right now.

GR: Okay, we’ll have to leave it there. That was Wawa Gatheru and again, her organization is Black Girl Environmentalist. Ms. Gatheru, thanks so much for taking the time to talk with me, I really enjoyed the conversation.

WG: Thank you for having me.

GR: You’ve been listening to the Campbell Conversations on WRVO Public Media, conversations in the public interest.