Join Lancaster One Water Partnership hub for a youth-focused event on Sunday March 13th 1pm-3pm. Dr. Bethany Wiggin of Penn Program in Environmental Humanities will be joining us to discuss her research project, My Climate Story. We will also hear from Soleil Yoder Salim, a local youth organizer with the Sunrise movement for climate justice. We recognize the power and importance of youth voices in the climate conversation. Our goal for this session is to empower youth voices and provide strategic tools to do so. Dr. Wiggin's presentation will be followed by facilitated discussion in small groups.

Bethany Wiggin is the Founding Director of the Penn Program in Environmental Humanities, an Associate Professor of German and member of the Graduate Groups in Comparative Literature and English at the University of Pennsylvania, and the immediate past Co-President of the Association for the Study of Literature and the Environment. Her scholarship explores histories of migration, language, and cultural translation since the Columbian exchange across the north Atlantic world; she is currently completing Utopia Found and Lost in Penn’s Woods. She holds research to be a human right and regularly leads public research projects designed to connect academic and community expertise for environmental action. These projects have been supported by the National Geographic, Whiting, and Andrew W. Mellon Foundations and include: An Ecotopian Toolkit for the Anthropocene, Data Refuge, Futures Beyond Refining, and My Climate Story. She has offered testimony about project findings to audiences ranging from school children, to the City Council of Philadelphia, the U.S. Congress, and UNESCO.

Soleil Yoder Salim is an organizer with the Sunrise movement for climate justice, and is the co-coordinator of the Lancaster High school hub. She is passionate about intersectional climate action and got involved with the Sunrise movement because of its work towards economic as well as environmental change. 

You will be able to join us for this event in three ways:

1. Virtually 

You will receive a Zoom link to watch live, followed by the opportunity for facilitated discussion in break-out rooms

2. Watch Party

Gather with your youth group or friend group or creation team at your local congregation and join us virtually via Zoom. You will be provided with a facilitated discussion guidebook to have your own conversation after the presentation is complete.

3. In-Person

Hear Dr. Wiggin present followed by time for facilitated small group discussions led by local leaders in the climate movement. We will also hear from Soleil Yoder Salim, a local youth organizer with the Sunrise movement for climate justice. The event will be held at Grandview Church, 888 Pleasure Road, Lancaster, PA. (We continue to closely monitor the situation with COVID cases in Lancaster County and may make changes to this plan given public health recommendations).

Register HERE!