It’s Earth Month, good people. A designated time to pause, reflect and take action to save our only home. It’s also spring in the northern hemisphere, the forsythia, irises, crocus, and lungwort are beginning to bloom. The season of growth is upon us. I’ve been thinking about growth a lot lately. Growth as an economic indicator that centers consumerism. Growth as a measure of organizational – nonprofit and for profit – success. Except that growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of a cancer cell, and equating growth with success and economic health has led us to a planet whose ocean’s ar ..read more

With Earth month just around the corner, here are eleven ways to take action for a just and abundant world. Check out these inspiring and upcoming ways to get involved: TEACH about climate change You don’t need to be a teacher to educate others about climate change. Most people know climate change is a problem, and our goal is to get them hopeful and excited enough to take collective and individual action. Host a movie night that is inspiring or host a presentation night where everyone talks about one thing they do for the climate. If you are a teacher, sign up for the Summer Institute! Conn ..read more

How do I become a youth activist? Two lessons learned and five ways to get started! Two former Youth Environmental Activists have come back to join the Climate Generation Team. We took some time to ask them what lessons they learned as youth organizers and how others can get started. Zoe Redfern-Hall How did you become a youth activist? I was always passionate about environmental and food systems at school, and I started looking for groups to get involved with – that’s when I found YEA! (Youth Environmental Activists). Being in the YEA program changed the trajectory of my life – it showed me h ..read more

Several years ago, at our annual family reunion, while tucking my seven-year-old granddaughter Hawith into bed, I laid down next to her for a goodnight grammy chat. She leaned close to me and intently said, “Grammy, I want to do adventures with you!” Immediately I responded, “Hawith, you do not have to ask me twice.” That was it! The early seeds of “Get Outside with Grammy” were sown, and my responsibility as an elder to step up my game to care for the earth was heightened. I am reminded of my elders who cared for the earth so that I and others can enjoy, share, and be good stewards of the ear ..read more

When I think about climate change nowadays, I think about how the places I consider home have changed, are changing, and will continue to change. I think about how the things I enjoy can cease to exist. As someone who immigrated to Canada from the Philippines, I call those two countries my home; both have honed me into who I am today– from the culture I grew up with to the community I belong to. Given climate change’s dire impacts, I can’t help but feel anxious about how those places are also rapidly changing. I can see it right before my eyes: from the warmer summers and more intense typhoons ..read more

With Earth month just around the corner, here are eleven ways to take action for a just and abundant world. Check out these inspiring and upcoming ways to get involved: TEACH about climate change You don’t need to be a teacher to educate others about climate change. Most people know climate change is a problem, and our goal is to get them hopeful and excited enough to take collective and individual action. Host a movie night that is inspiring or host a presentation night where everyone talks about one thing they do for the climate. If you are a teacher, sign up for the Summer Institute! Conn ..read more

Is it spring? It feels like it. Normally, here in Minnesota we’d still be slogging through the snow. Usually, we would see a snowstorm in April. If this were a normal winter,  we would call the balmy temperatures ‘false spring’. There is nothing normal or usual about the extreme weather we are experiencing; it is surreal and frightening.   And for just today I want to revel in the returning bird songs, find delight in the blooming snowdrops and budding pussy willows, turn my face towards the warmth of the sun and ground myself in the promise that is spring. This promise that we ..read more

In Savoonga’s realm, where ice once reigned, Whispers weave a haunting tale, an Arctic refrain. “No sea ice this year,” the villagers cried, Their ancestral Yupik traditions, in climate’s grip, denied. Savoonga’s heartbeat, a subsistence song, Yet this year, the sea ice is gone. Siberian Yupik, whispers on the wind, A tale of struggle, of a way of life, like ice, now thinned. Sea ice, a cradle for whales and walrus galore, For thousands of years, now lost, and less abundant than before.  Elders speak of walrus on the ice, Whales, seals, seabirds, a hunter’s paradise. But the climate shift ..read more

Current events have me thinking back to my time as an undergraduate student and being a part of the divest from South Africa movement. I learned well at that time that money talks the loudest, and the scale of the divestment movement against apartheid in South Africa was brilliant: entertainers and athletes refusing to play there, college students convincing their institutions to divest, individuals and families choosing not to buy products exported from South Africa. And ultimately, it led to the toppling of the apartheid regime. I wish we could mobilize on this scale right now. Over the year ..read more

How does one come to care about a place, about a community? Is it a straightforward path of experiences and relationships and memories, or is it a winding road of growing, of learning what is important to you, what you care about and what you cherish? Learning to value the community I now live in and the importance of sharing my climate story took some time, but I think I am on the right path. My first steps on that path started in northern Minnesota: sledding in the winter, spending summers near the water, and exploring the trails and woods behind my house. The trail was pretty straightforwar ..read more