Post by Calla D.

I spent 105 days of my junior fall semester in Ecuador, Morocco, and Nepal studying the politics of land, energy, and water justice with the School for International Training. We spent three months exploring how climate change is no longer a problem of science: it is inherently a political and social problem that requires us to rethink our very relationship with nature, our economy, and each other, and the deep knowledge contained within diverse cultures globally. For my final independent research project, I studied how the global solar industry is reproducing & entrenching injustices at the local, national, and global levels in Ecuador and Morocco, a topic I'm eager to continue exploring through my studies at Rice and beyond. It's hard to put into words how deeply transformative this opportunity was - a huge thank you to everyone who made this program possible, and to everyone who will continue to hear me talk about this experience nonstop for, well, the rest of my life. Read my reflections on why Ecuador, Morocco, and Nepal are so significant in the fight for climate justice globally: https://lnkd.in/guxZpQpx. I'm also eager to share my broader learnings with you all — about the world, our environment, and power, but also about travel, new conceptions of place, being in community, and realizations of a human unfolding into my twenties: https://lnkd.in/gmwgtuUy.