Chapter eleven
Every profession has its own competences
In Chapters 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, and 12, I tell the stories of people who have shown that they possess competences you would like to see in all professionals regardless of their education or expertise, their profession or discipline, or the level at which they work. In addition, there are all kinds of sustainability competences that differ for each profession. Every job requires its own special skills. The present chapter is dedicated to such disciplinary competences as I announced at the beginning of Chapter 2; see Figure 11.1.
A complete enumeration of all disciplinary sustainability competences is impossible. Thousands of different professions and disciplines exist, each with its own specific needs for expertise and experiences. So, I have selected a limited number of professions. For each of them, I present one or more examples of roles that may be fulfilled and of achievements that may be delivered to contribute to sustainable development. In a number of cases, this will be about social sustainability, in others about economic or ecological sustainability. Together, the stories will form a colorful collection showing in a kaleidoscopic way a range of aspects belonging to professionals who contribute to sustainability.
The manager
Context:
Be Green Packaging
Role:
Director of Eco-Social Initiatives
Achievement:
Making an impact by educating consumers and businesses on sustainable packaging and helping to create a zero-waste facility
As a sophomore at UC–Santa Barbara, Eva Van Wingerden first read Cradle to Cradle, the seminal work on regenerative product design by William McDonough and Michael Braungart. Eva was not yet thinking about what career she wanted to pursue. She just loved learning about the environment and the ways human beings could impact it, she says. “That’s when the reality dawned on me that every action and every choice we make has an impact on not just our immediate surroundings, but on the entire global environment. It was a very profound realization for me.”
For the past three and a half years, Eva has been working as Director of Eco-Social Initiatives for Be Green Packaging in California. She manages the environmental certifications, plays an active role in product testing, quality control, and facility audits, and also does consulting. She enjoys telling the story of how Be Green Packaging got started. One of the company’s original founders, Ron Blitzer, had been in the drinking straw business, she recounts. “One day, fulfilling his duties as a true Southern Californian, Blitzer noticed all of the plastic debris floating around him. He realized that he wanted to be part of the solution rather than a contributor to the problem. The idea of Be Green Packaging was born.”
Be Green Packaging, whose corporate clients include Whole Foods Market and Gillette, produces sustainable consumer and food packaging that is Cradle to Cradle CertifiedTM. The raw materials, Eva explains, are sourced from different vendors who are vetted by the supply chain team to ensure they meet the company’s standards and certification requirements. “Our products are designed to be single use and are tested (under ASTM standards) and certified to be compostable in industrial composting facilities. We have even heard from a few customers that they have successfully composted our products in their backyard compost.”
“Convenience is king,” Eva notes, “but people want to do the right thing. In a perfect world, everything would be reusable, and we wouldn’t need single use packaging. But it seems that we have a long way to go to reach that paradigm. In the meantime, Be Green Packaging’s compostable fiber products are a step on the road to a perfect world. Our manufacturing process produces little to no material that is not compostable, recyclable, or reusable. Our products offer the option for people to use a package that is convenient, single use, made from rapidly renewable fibers, and ends up in a continuous biological nutrient cycle.”
That sounds nearly perfect, but as mentioned in Chapter 6, when it comes to moving toward a circular economy, reality is often more complicated. In fact, Eva finds that educating customers about where the product goes once they are finished using it poses a challenge: “The useful life cycle of our products can be anywhere from say 15 minutes to a day or two. It is a complete waste of useful material to let these products sit in a landfill for hundreds of years in an anaerobic museum of garbage. Instead, why not avoid wasting the product and filling up our landfills by throwing it in the compost? However, if it is not easy and accessible, people will not and cannot make composting part of their thought process. Habits take a lot of time and conscious effort to change, so the easier we make it, the more people will do it.”
So how can a manager like her make an impact? Eva thinks that her biggest achievement has been working toward turning the company’s new domestic manufacturing plant in South Carolina into a zero waste facility. “It’s still a work in progress,” she cautions. The hurdles range from low tipping fees (a charge hauling facilities must pay to dispose of garbage in landfills), to lack of education and employee training about waste diversion, to non-existent industrial composting facilities, she explains. “Our team has been implementing single stream recycling, collection for special materials, composting on site, and we have even built community gardens where local students come and learn about gardening and composting and get their hands dirty. Getting involved with the local community and educating young people about environmental impact and composting is my favorite part about what I do at Be Green.”
As a young professional, Eva believes it is vital to enjoy the subject matter, ask questions, and get involved. “In academia and especially in environmental professions,” she says, “it can be easy to see the negative and get bewildered and overwhelmed with all the problems and the ways that human beings contribute to environmental degradation … I find that I am most positively effective when I am hopeful about the impact I can make. I try to read articles about people doing positive things for each other or inventing products that improve efficiency and minimize environmental effects and waste. All of these things help remind me that every choice I make can have meaningful impact.”
The financial advisor
Context:
Vancity
Role:
Guardian of the balance between people, planet, and profit
Achievement:
Advising businesses on how to balance their sustainable vision and financial goals
Brian Cade started working for Vancity, a values-based financial cooperative in Vancouver, Canada, fresh out of university ten years ago. The banking cooperative, a member of the Global Alliance for Banking on Values, adheres to the triple bottom line, putting “people before profit.” After reading on Vancity’s website that the cooperative not only seeks “the opportunity to work with organizations that are also taking significant steps to improve their social, ethical, and environmental performance,” but that it also had a reputation for being a “great employer,” Cade applied and gradually worked his way up to his current position as account manager in the community business division. His duties are evaluating loan requests and advising entrepreneurs.
“We evaluate requests not only based on the cash flow of the applicant,” Cade explains. “We take other factors into consideration when assessing the risk of lending. We also look at the potential community benefits of the business and the strength of the people behind it, their team.”
“When we work with non-profit organizations,” Brian continues, “it often means that we are willing to take different risks and be more creative, recognizing that a non-profit’s success looks different. Their goal isn’t profit. Any organization that’s operating differently than their competitors because they are, for example, more socially and environmentally progressive, needs to be evaluated based on that added value.” An example of social impact, he explains, could be offering living wages or employing individuals with mental disabilities. It could also be a business that demonstrates cooperative principles by supporting similar businesses in the community to grow and overcome barriers to entry. “In a capitalist sense, this is counterintuitive,” says Cade, “but ultimately it creates a more robust local economy and better community. From a risk perspective, these organizations may have more cash flow challenges early on but will actually be more competitive in the future as they are recognized as an industry leader. We have to factor all of this into our own credit adjudication.”
“For instance, there is a commercial organic waste disposal business that we’ve worked with for several years since their start up,” Cade adds. “They’ve had good press because they were one of the first companies offering office kitchen composting … making a positive environmental impact in the community by diverting organic waste from the landfill. They continually came to us seeking financing for their anticipated growth. We spent many coaching sessions testing their projections and helping them to better manage their growth and their capacity for debt. We are pleased that they have been able to weather the slow years and manage fluctuating gross profit margins. Had the company leveraged too heavily in the early years, they would have been unable to manage their cash flow, causing the business to falter on client contracts or debt repayment.”
“We also have to consider where industries are moving and what is considered common practice. For example, years ago it was innovative and challenging for restaurants to source any of their food from local suppliers. A commitment to do this would be considered significant. Today, this is more common and very much on trend, so we tend to look for companies to not just make the effort to buy local, but to fully commit to specific suppliers. For local producers, having consistent and reliable orders from customers is a huge advantage as they are often planting vegetables or raising livestock well in advance. Ultimately this helps to stabilize our local food economy.”
When Brian and his friends who work at traditional banks and accounting firms get together to talk shop and share stories, he notices a difference: “They’re often just judged on an hourly basis based on profitability. In contrast, we get to seek out people who want to make a difference in their community, and we’re given the extra time to get to know the client. We are allowed a longer time horizon to build and maintain an open relationship with the client and become a trusted advisor. A lot of these early-stage businesses need to be given more of a benefit of the doubt. We look at their sustainability mission and community impact and don’t force them into a box.”
To those just starting out in the field of banking, Brian suggests, “Bring your passion to your careers as it can be contagious to those around you. Don’t underestimate the power of small wins when working with organizations that are making positive social and environmental contributions. You’ll be surprised how quickly these incremental steps forward amount to big changes in the industry and your community.”
The artist
Context:
Teo Castellanos, actor/writer/director/educator
Role:
Conscience of society
Achievement:
Wake up, protest, put into perspective, involve, start dialogue, bring peace, entertain, inspire action, and make people laugh
We hear Haitian kompa music as Jitney driver argues with passenger in Kreyol. Stops to pick up another passenger (tourist)
| Jitney driver: | (To tourist) Yes, where you go? Design … Design Distwict? Whas dat? … I go stwait Northeast Second Avenue. OK come, sit in fwont I take you. Come one dolla … one dolla … Where you go? … Gallewie? … OK I know come. Come. (To argumentative passenger) Shut up! No I don turn off ma mizik. You don’t lak ma mizik? … get off, tek slowbus! |
“With NE 2nd Avenue (2003), where I play all nine characters, I wanted to give a slice of Miami and some of the issues we face here to the world. I also wanted to introduce us to ourselves to bridge cultural gaps. We live in a multicultural city; yet, we often don’t know each other. After one show, a Cuban man came up to me and said: ‘I loved the play but I didn’t understand a single word the Jamaican guy said.’ Well, I try to be authentic with the speech patterns while keeping it understandable, so I told him he needed to hang out at a Jamaican spot.”
Over vegetarian Thai curry, Teo Castellanos reflects on his role as ‘conscience’ of contemporary US society. Born in Puerto Rico, but raised in the United States, the bilingual artist understands all too well that culture is fluid and prevailing thought patterns challenge our ideas of ethical behavior. “I wanted to represent my city and to find a commonality.” When I took NE 2nd Avenue to Europe, people were wondering how the show would be received, but they got it – even if they didn’t understand every word or nuance.” The play won the First Award at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 2003, a sign that the play’s message was universal.
“The biggest challenge for any activist is changing thought patterns,” Castellanos believes. “Scratch & Burn (2005) is a pro-peace ritual influenced by hip-hop and a response to the US invasion of Iraq. It criticizes the government and the military industrial complex, but the majority of people in the audience were opposed to the war themselves. Scratch & Burn was received very well. Everyone was happy, but it was like preaching to the choir.”
On the other hand, Fat Boy, Castellanos’ dance theater play, which premiered in 2010, pointed a finger at the audience. “On a broad level, it addresses American waste and consumerism juxtaposed by world hunger and poverty,” Castellanos explains. “Fat Boy is a reflection on society, yes, and the individual.” The play deals with greed and over-consumption, but as Castellanos sees it, “Greed is really the fear of not having enough, so it made you reflect a little.” While audiences had embraced the director’s earlier productions, some people “didn’t get quite behind it (Fat Boy).” Castellanos: “I put a mirror to society, asking people to look at their own behavior and confront any disconnect between their opinions and actions. Suddenly, people had to ponder their own consumption patterns and wonder, ‘Am I afraid of donating – of sharing my resources?’ ”
| Makyo: | You know it’s a Black Friday when you get trampled to death by sheep consumed by consumption, real bullets fly in stores with toy guns and camping is done on the concrete of Best Buy sidewalks. (Fat Boy) |
Castellanos’ art is informed by his spiritual practice – Zen Buddhism. His perspective comes from “turning to ourselves and looking at someone with compassion instead of blame.” He feels that it is important to model ethical behavior, so he partnered with a food bank to donate parts of the proceeds of Fat Boy from CD sales. He eats a plant-based diet because he objects to factory farming and believes in non-violence. He also chooses to eat a meatless diet because it promotes sustainability by conserving resources. This is his conscience at work.
As an artist and activist, Castellanos always seeks to inspire through his actions. He is passionate about public transportation in urban areas, an issue that has come to the forefront in many American cities precisely because they are so congested and often lack adequate public alternatives to driving a car. “Again, to change people’s way of thinking is difficult,” Castellanos says, so to commute to a movement class he teaches at an arts college, he rides his bicycle to show that he’s doing it and “sharing that with people.” Even though he owns an economical Fiat, he also takes local buses, trains, and skateboards, and believes that it is vital to support the people in the community – “the train conductors and bus drivers.” After all, they inspire the characters in his plays:
| Jitney driver: | “My kids, my kids don lak my mizik. I have a pwobwem wid my kids; dey speak vewy good English. I don speak English so good, so dey twy to twick me. My son, my son bwing home his weport card, he tell me “F” on his weport card mean Fabulous!” (NE 2nd Ave) |
What keeps Castellanos inspired? “Working with young people,” he says. He has coached spoken word teams with local youths for several years. The performance-based poems explore a range of social justice conflicts and controversial topics such as human trafficking, child soldiers, immigration, gun violence, lost languages, as well as works addressing the “Black Lives Matter” movement.
Recently Castellanos developed and directed “Conscience Under Fire,” a set of spoken word pieces written by The Combat Hippies, four Iraq War veterans, who also perform in the play. The show, which deals with the mental wounds inflicted by combat and post-traumatic stress, was performed on September 11, an auspicious date for any American audience. Castellanos hopes that his works will wake people up, inspire action, and ultimately bring about healing and peace.
The environmental manager
Context:
EY (Ernst & Young)
Role:
Sustainability strategy developer balancing the Triple Bottom Line pillars
Achievement:
Implement an environmental strategy that addresses people, planet, and profits
Are you looking for a great way to start a conversation about the importance of sustainability? Try green nail polish! According to Leisha John, Americas Director of Environmental Sustainability for EY, it works. Many of the people she encounters remark about her polish, providing her the opportunity to explain what the color represents and why we need to address the issue of sustainability.
Thirty years ago, when Leisha John first began working for EY, financial advisors were not concerned with including environmental sustainability information and metrics in their annual reports. Now, things have changed. Today’s leading companies voluntarily report on their environmental impacts, and not only that. When clients send requests for proposals, they also want to know how the professional services firms they engage are reducing their own carbon footprint. This is where Leisha comes in.
As one of the four largest global professional services firms, EY employs 210,000 people worldwide. All these employees work in temperature controlled spaces, turn on lights, use computers, print reports, use lavatories, eat in the cafeteria, drink coffee, and travel around the globe to meet with their clients and with each other. This presents a “great opportunity for operational greening,” Leisha asserts. By encouraging telecommuting and telepresence, a sophisticated form of videoconferencing, the company has been able to reduce its non-essential business travel. And by leasing greener space and using space more efficiently, EY is able to better control real estate spending and lower its energy bills. Leisha, a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), herself works from her home office.
“Retrofitting existing spaces with energy-saving devices provides another way to save money and the environment,” Leisha notes. She goes on to describe the potential energy savings from converting all light fixtures to LEDs in an entire building in New York City. “Waste stream reductions are also crucial: reducing disposable coffee cups saves resources; going tray-free in the cafeteria reduces food waste while saving gallons of water otherwise used to rinse trays; and introducing swipe-card technology encourages mindful printing and copying, resulting in fewer trees being cut and reducing toner usage too.”
The impact of international travel on the climate and how much carbon and money can be saved when video conferencing replaces travel is also compelling. “Reducing CO2 increases the bottom line. Carbon savings and dollar savings generally go hand-in-hand,” Leisha stresses. “And if we can provide green alternatives to business travel, we can save our clients and our firm money while simultaneously reducing our carbon emissions.”
In today’s competitive global economy, companies feel a lot of pressure in terms of “brand and reputational risk” when they see “others going green,” the sustainability executive says. “If a firm wants to attract the best talent and convince clients to use its services, it has to emphasize sustainability values and demonstrate how the organization ‘walks the talk’. Likewise, clients demand transparency regarding the environmental and social impact of the operations of their suppliers.”
Leisha John is making sure that EY can model corporate responsibility and accountability by reaching out to its stakeholders to determine what they think is most material and relevant for EY to address. EY’s nearly a quarter of a million employees, the firm’s global clients, the vendors whose increasingly sustainable products EY procures, and the communities in cities around the world where EY operates: All of them play a role in helping EY reduce its environmental impact and in being transparent in reporting its progress. “And because EY also offers ‘Climate Change and Sustainability Services’ to clients, it’s crucial that the firm ‘walks the talk’ in order to be credible in the market,” Leisha John adds.
When asked about challenges, Leisha John replies that some aspects are easier than others: “Firm wide operational improvements (e.g., print management systems that require a badge swipe) are easier to implement”. But often it is much harder to alter “the little things like getting employees to green their own behaviors.” For example, when it comes to throwing recyclables into the correct bin or adjusting to a more sustainable plants-based diet, it is difficult to get people to rethink their habits. To get the results you are aiming for, you have to “know your audience,” Leisha believes.
Leisha shares her passion for sustainability in her TEDx Talk, where she reveals that green is not her only favorite color. She also champions the color white, especially when it comes in the form of white coating that can turn a dark roof into a solar-reflecting and energy-saving asset: “White roofs for green schools” she calls this “simple, cheap, and doable solution,” adding that the rebates given by utility companies can cover the cost of coating roofs white. If applied on every school’s roofs, it could save the nation’s school districts millions of dollars, savings that could then go toward funding school programs, technology upgrades, and teacher salaries. To help her spread the idea “from Georgia, to Texas, to California,” she created a website. Leisha hopes that her TEDx Talk and her passion for numbers and sustainability will continue to set a positive example for professionals in the business world and beyond.
The product designer
Context:
Ecovative
Role:
CEO and Co-Founder
Achievement:
Design products that don’t require a lot of scarce material and whose components can easily be composted and returned to the Earth
While Eben Bayer was still pursuing his double major in Mechanical Engineering and Innovation & Design at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, he started exploring how mushrooms could serve as natural glue or resin. “Nature is what inspired me to get started in sustainable design,” the CEO of Ecovative says. Having grown up on a farm in Vermont, Eben had observed how tiny white fibers, mycelium, were holding wood chips together. “I’m always looking to nature for inspiration on how we can create materials with better processes,” he adds.
With a degree in his pocket, Eben co-founded Ecovative in 2007. The company, which currently employs 75 people and whose clients include Dell, Gunlocke, and Steelcase, produces plastic alternatives for packaging, insulation, and building materials from local agricultural waste like corn stalks. During the process, mycelium is introduced, binding the loose particles together. “We grow these products inside a custom mold. The resulting materials are completely natural and home compostable,” Eben explains. It’s mushroom magic!
Of course, biological materials pose some challenges, he admits. “For instance, our materials need to be within a certain thickness range to ensure that there’s enough material for the mycelium to have robust and healthy growth, but there can’t be so much material that the mycelium doesn’t receive oxygen in the middle or bottom of the part. All of our equipment has been custom built to be compatible with our living organism, so whenever we have a new design idea, we simply need to make sure we have the compatible equipment to make it happen.”
Ecovative’s newest product, Myco BoardTM, an alternative to compressed particleboard, presents significant applications for the business, Eben says. “These engineered wood products are typically produced by using toxic chemicals to bind the timber particles together. We can replace the use of urea-formaldehyde in these products with our fire resistant, natural organism.” Based on Cradle to Cradle principles, Ecovative’s products and process have achieved a Gold level certification. To date, the company has made over one million pounds of mushroom materials that create zero waste. “We upcycle agricultural waste … and then it returns back to nature at the end of its useful life. Our products displace petroleum-based foams and urea-formaldehyde resins that are harmful to users and to the planet.”
Nature’s synergetic relationships also inform Eben Bayer’s leadership style. “I value understanding and respecting people’s varying talents, and harnessing that for the furthering of the employee and business. Encouraging people to try something new without the fear of failure is also important to me. I think collaboration is essential for the furthering of products and ideas. To keep the collaborative nature of the company, we host regularly scheduled events that allow us to share information across the organization and encourage feedback and input from our different departments.”
To Eben, becoming a sustainable professional starts by identifying a problem that needs to be solved, not just an idea that might be profitable. “Look to nature for your solutions, either by taking inspiration from nature on how to improve a man-made process, or by actually utilizing something that happens in nature. And prepare to be not just competitive with the traditional options, but to have to outperform them.”
The organic farmer
Context:
Organic Valley Co-op
Role:
Organic Dairy Farmer
Achievement:
Turn a conventional farm into an organic dairy and improve the health of livestock, soil, and people
In the early 1990’s, Gary Mosgaller nearly lost his eyesight in a work-related accident. He was about to open a chemical herbicide when the container flashed back, and the toxic liquid sprayed into his eyes. Had he not immediately reached for a nearby water hose, he would have gone blind. That day, Mosgaller, a third-generation dairy farmer from northeastern Wisconsin – or “the thumb that sticks out,” as he likes to say – had an epiphany. “This is not right!” he thought. Earlier he had also suffered from a rash as a result of being exposed to the many chemicals conventional farmers regularly have to apply to their crops. He knew something had to change, he says.
“I was looking to get out of the system,” Mosgaller remembers, referring to the hamster wheel-like dependency many modern farmers get caught up in when they use genetically-modified seeds that require specific chemicals produced exclusively by large agro-chemical companies. “You buy their seeds, and you do what they want. It’s prescription farming … That’s how farming got off track. I didn’t like what I was doing.” Mosgaller had children and “didn’t want them to be exposed to those hazards.” He also objected to the way the livestock was treated in conventional operations. However, the transition to becoming an organic farmer was not easy. “It’s a learning curve. At that time, there wasn’t so much information. I had to learn to get back into pastures.” Luckily, Mosgaller adds, one of his neighbors also decided to transition to organic farming at the same time, so they were able to support each other.
Mosgaller’s 420-acre farm was home to about 60 cows. “Being a dairy, I converted all the land on which I had previously grown corn and other crops into pasture. Now the cows graze on paddocks that are fenced off. They’re getting fresh feed every day, and it keeps you in contact with them. They come up and rub up on you.” In conventional dairy farms, this would be unthinkable, he explains.
His neighbors first gave him a hard time and questioned he would be able to make it financially. “They all thought I would fail,” he recalls. Moreover, his veterinarian told him: “You can’t farm like that. You need antibiotics.” Mosgaller turned to alternative remedies instead. Antibiotics can have side effects and their widespread use in livestock production has also been blamed for the increase in resistant bacteria. “I just wanted everything to be safe,” Mosgaller justifies his decision.
In spite of his neighbors’ dire predictions, Mosgaller could see that the new farming methods made a difference. “After I went organic, the animal health improved dramatically. The soil, the plants all got healthier.” The soil’s fertility initially posed another challenge for the organic farmer, but he soon discovered that “when there’s a need, someone will think of a solution.” In this case, it came in the form of composted chicken manure pellets that he started using. “I think that creating good food makes you feel good. As an organic farmer, you’re listening more, observing everything around you,” Mosgaller sums up his experience.
When asked what advice he would give young farmers about going the organic route, he contends: “I’d say go for it. Consumers are asking for it. Don’t get sidetracked by the numbers … as far as the future goes, organic farming has a lot to offer.” In his office, Mosgaller keeps a sign with a quote by Wes Jackson, the founder and president of The Land Institute: “It’s better to trust the wisdom of nature than the cleverness of man.” – “It’s so simple!” Mosgaller concludes.
The social worker
Context:
Merle Wexler, Miami, Florida
Role:
Champion
Achievement:
Stand up for the weak if they themselves cannot do that (sufficiently)
Merle is the “voice” of five children. After retiring from her position as a social worker at Big Brothers Big Sisters of Greater Miami, where she worked for 32 years matching children of single parents to like-minded volunteers, she now dedicates her time to the city’s Guardian ad Litem program, representing children who are in Dependency Court. These youngsters have been removed from their parents or relatives for abuse or neglect issues, and a family court judge will frequently request a guardian ad litem to become the children’s advocate.
“Children need to be heard,” Merle explains. “They are our future, and they can only learn if given opportunities for self-expression. In return, I learn a great deal from them: the ability to laugh, to be silly, and to be affectionate. Such experiences better me, and, as a result, I can give more to others.” We live in a system that often doesn’t work well, Merle thinks. Her role is to do all she can to help get the necessary services for “[her] kids.” Sometimes, she actually gets the system to reverse itself and look at the child as a person, not a number. When this happens, Merle feels delighted for the child and – to be honest – for herself, she confesses.
Having seen many children being denied the services and attention that they so desperately need from a system that is overloaded with crisis after crisis, Merle decided to put her professional expertise to use and to speak up on their behalf. “Judges and attorneys don’t have the luxury of time to investigate the back story of what is going on in a child’s life; as a Guardian ad Litem I make calls, talk to others associated with the case, and report my findings to the attorney, who will then present this information at a court hearing.”
A recent case, she says, has touched her heart deeply: C. and C., two-year-old twin girls, who were removed from their birth mother’s care when they were only three months old and have lived with their paternal grandmother ever since. Their mother has stated that she wants to be “reunified” with her girls, but the judge has expressed doubt. There are many reasons why such a reunification is a scary process. The twins suffer from sickle cell anemia, which, if not monitored consistently, can bring about lethal consequences. The mother, Merle explains, had been granted unsupervised visits, but those visits were disastrous because the mother did not look after her twin daughters well, and their medical needs were ignored.
According to Merle, the twins’ mother is a very explosive person, oppositional and a good “talker,” but her actions have not supported her words. Merle’s job has been to reach out to the other therapeutic services the mother has been assigned to and get feedback that is then presented to the judge. At times, she even personally addresses the judge. “I am very concerned about keeping these girls safe, both physically and emotionally, and I feel a sense of duty to speak for them. I am impartial and want ONLY what is best for them,” Merle explains.
When people ask Merle if dealing with “poor people” or “people who have problems” or who live “in poor neighborhoods” depresses her, she always counters that it’s quite the opposite. Rather than become depressed, she feels enriched by human differences. Without diversity, Merle tells those who question her, life would be boring. Looking back at a life-long career, Merle is as enthusiastic about her profession as ever: “There hasn’t been a day when I didn’t want to go to the office,” she says. “Many of the children in my care have gone on to become writers, dentists, chefs, and even presidents of banks.” Their love and trust have shown Merle what strength truly means, and that’s why she feels that standing up for the weak and lending them a voice is what being a social worker is all about.
The researcher
Context:
University of Florida, Division of Infectious Diseases & Global Medicine
Role:
Assistant Professor of Medicine
Achievement:
Deliver valuable, societally relevant, and applicable scientific knowledge and insights
Ideally, science is value-free, objective and independent. Ideally, science studies reality from a certain distance, without ever being involved in it itself. Such an involvement would be unacceptable; it would corrupt the purity of the academic researcher.
This is the classical image of the academic research world, but over the course of the twentieth century, it has become clear that such a view should not be maintained. Science philosophers like Stephen Toulmin, Paul Feyerabend, and Bruno Latour have stated that value-free science is impossible. New movements such as Marxist science and feminist science, which did not even want to be value-free, arose from society. Moreover, for years, large research studies have been performed or sponsored by companies with vested interests. Think about the pharmaceutical, oil, weapons, and tobacco industries. Science has also been plagued by questionable practices involving scientists creating or embellishing data. Scientists, after all, appear to be ordinary people.
However, there is another side to this. Is the neutrality and objectivity of scientific research always desirable? When you conduct research into aspects of (un)sustainability, for example, to combat climate change, poverty, or disease, you cannot deny that, as a scientist, you are trying to achieve certain desired results that will contribute to a better world.
“My strong belief is that we’re never neutral – we’re human,” Dr. Amy Yomiko Vittor says. “Furthermore, I feel the onus is on us to advocate for those we’re serving.” Dr. Vittor’s views have been shaped by years of experience in the field. While still in middle school, she became curious about the environment and humanity’s impact on it. “I was informed by the Buddhist concept of Oneness of Self and Environment instilled by my parents and mentor, Daisaku Ikeda,” remembers Professor Vittor, whose mother is Japanese. Since then, Vittor has pondered questions like: “How are we shaping the environment, and how is it shaping us?” The notion that “we are one with our environment” still guides her as a person and a professional, she contends. “Our destinies are joined, and this should inform the actions we take.”
Since her first research project in Costa Rica as an undergraduate student at the University of California at Berkeley, Dr. Vittor has traveled extensively to investigate the connection between ecology and vector-borne diseases such as malaria, dengue, and most recently the Madariaga virus. What impacts do ecological and social conditions have on diseases these days? The infectious disease specialist believes that “the slum condition presents a social injustice that makes a vulnerable population even more vulnerable.” Drinking water access, Dr. Vittor explains, can serve as an example. Unlike residents in industrialized countries, people in the developing world experience water insecurity. “We have a reliable source of water and don’t have to store water in big containers and cisterns where mosquitoes breed.” Unfortunately, many people around the globe do not enjoy this luxury.
In addition to dismal social conditions, climate change is thought to affect the spread of vector-borne illnesses. “We can say that mosquito vectors may be able to expand their ranges,” says Dr. Vittor. For instance, she adds, Gainesville, where the University of Florida is located, currently does not have Aedes aegypti, the mosquito associated with the Zika virus. That may change though.
As an involved scientist, Vittor understands that successful research depends on collaboration. On an interdisciplinary level, she regularly interacts with other experts: geographers, statisticians, entomologists, virologists, and engineers, to name a few. “Dealing with different disciplines is a little like learning foreign languages. You have to gain enough fluency to find common ground. It’s also very cross-pollinating,” she says. In addition, her work involves transdisciplinary aspects, for instance, when she communicates with government entities like the Ministry of Health in Peru, residents in affected areas, and patients. “Just this morning, we gave a congressional briefing to folks in D.C. regarding the Zika virus,” Vittor offers as an example. In short, reaching out on inter- and transdisciplinary levels is vital for sustainably competent researchers.
With regards to promoting global peace and sustainable development, Vittor hopes to inspire her students and medical residents to care deeply about their patients and the communities they research and serve. In conversations with her colleagues and students, she likes to ask: “Why do we do what we do? What’s the point if we’re not making the lives of those around us better? Yes, we need to publish and get grants, but we also need to think about the bigger picture.” Motivated by the interconnectedness of all life, she advises: “Through our own inner transformation, each of us has the capacity to create and sustain great positive change.”
It looks as though one of Amy Vittor’s own projects has finally come full circle. Fifteen years ago, she says, she spent three years in the Peruvian Amazon researching the interaction between deforestation and malaria, never knowing whether the results would ever amount to anything. Now her dedication and advocacy are about to pay off. Just the day before, Dr. Vittor says, she had “a very positive conversation with a philanthropic foundation. They are thinking about using this region as a demonstration of what can be done.” Let the transformation begin.
The teacher
Context:
Air Base K-8 Center, Homestead, Florida
Role:
Elementary school teacher
Achievement:
Raise love for nature and find a didactic approach fitting for each individual child, instill a sense of wonderment, and help students to discover and value their world while simultaneously empowering them to act sustainably
“I had to take a cold, 5-minute shower last night!” the mother of one of Hannah Purcell’s 6th grade students complained when picking up her daughter. The class had been discussing energy and water conservation methods, and many students carried that message back home, some confronting their parents directly. Since Hannah Purcell started teaching at Air Base K-8 Center, an international magnet school in Homestead, Florida, eight years ago, she has made the environment an essential part of her curriculum, spearheading a number of green initiatives that have won the school awards and even got her students invited to present at a sustainability exposition at Florida International University.
Growing up on military bases in different European countries, Purcell experienced “a lifestyle of appreciation of nature.” She felt a “huge gap” when her family returned to the United States. Suddenly everything was materialistic and there was little to no nature, she recalled. Later, as an elementary school teacher, she saw the school as “a blank canvas with lots of empty lawn.” Purcell imagined a more engaging schoolyard and created a small garden. Administrators said she was wasting her time. However, soon even the “tough” students took an interest. “What are you doing, Miss?” they asked, volunteering to help plant or pull weeds.
At her current school, the gardens are now school wide. On Beautification Days families, teachers, and volunteers build gardens, decorate walls with environmental messages, and create signage about seed germination and native species. Walking down “Milkweed Way,” one sees a shade house, a butterfly garden, an outdoor classroom, a wildflower meadow, a display of garden certifications, rain barrels, bird baths, compost and recycling bins, and a row of poles adorned with colorful painted butterflies – Purcell calls this their “learning gardens.”
In spite of obstacles, Purcell spearheaded programs and projects, securing grants from local businesses, organizing fundraisers, obtaining resources, and getting other teachers on board. “I’m a very persistent person. You’re changing a mindset, a culture, which takes time,” she said smiling. A few years ago, she proposed Deering Estate’s N.E.S.T.T. (Nurturing Environmental Stewards of Today and Tomorrow), helping it expand from a pilot of 15 students to three grade levels. Another example is the Green Education Fair, where she invites green agencies to share their expertise with everyone. She also formed the Environmental Ambassadors Club, whose members present environmental problems and solutions to other students and the community. Ms. Purcell speaks proudly of her “school family” and the amazing leadership of Principal Raul Calzadilla, Jr. – “They are the reason for our success.”
Located near a military base in a mostly rural area, the school serves culturally and ethnically diverse students, including those from military families. When Purcell’s students learned about pesticides and their effect on endangered butterflies and human health, they quickly recognized the problem. “Kids see systems and when empowered, they want to take action,” Purcell explained. Several years ago, they presented to the local mayor and city council on the importance and benefits of native plants, organic farming, and recycling. The environmental chief of Homestead Air Reserve Base was impressed and invited Purcell’s students to annually tour the base to learn how it uses solar energy, reclaims water, reduces waste, and recycles. Everyone was fascinated. Hannah Purcell believes that her students “get it” because she hears the proof in their conversations and sees it in their actions. She is hopeful they will continue being stewards of the environment and having a positive impact on sustainability issues.
At the end of the school tour, a group of girls, concerned expressions on their faces, ran up to us. “Please, Ms. Purcell, you’ve got to come. There’s an injured bird!” – “Yep, that’s part of my job,” this inspiring educator explained, wishing me a good afternoon before being pulled away by several little hands.