Posts in: Bridging Communities

In this interview with COMPASS’s Noor Jaber, Juan Perez Saez shares the life experiences that led him to conversation, advocacy, and environmental stewardship and offers some insights on what scientists should consider when thinking about how to meaningfully and ethically engage with communities....

Environmental advocate, Sandy Wynn-Stelt, has become a leading voice on contamination awareness of PFAS, long lasting, manufactured chemicals that have been linked to harmful effects in humans and animals. Her advocacy efforts have uplifted community voices and led to more widespread testing and stronger protective measures. Since 2020, she’s been an invited e...

Ethical Space is a powerful framework for transforming relationships between Indigenous peoples and western science, but ultimately, creating Ethical Space depends on the individuals’ willingness to open their minds and invite others into the process. In this episode, Dr. Leigh Welling, Park Superintendent of Wind Cave National Park, joins Sarah Sunu, Gwen Bridge...

In this conversation, our Associate Director of Trainings, Sarah Sunu talks to our partners, Gwen Bridge and James Rattling Leaf, about the practice of Ethical Space, a powerful conceptual framework designed to support the reconciliation of Indigenous and western world views. They share how our partnership came to be, why this work matters, and how you can incorpor...

One of the most challenging (and exciting!) aspects of communication is that our audience is never a blank canvas. Rather, getting to know them is more like trying to interpret a Jackson Pollock painting¹. Before we’ve even shared a single word, the person we’re looking to connect with already has a set of existing, entwined beliefs about the world, themselves...

Karen Nickel and Dawn Chapman met at an air-sampling event created in response to alarming odors in their neighborhood. “The odors were unlike anything we'd ever experienced,” Dawn explained. “They were causing our eyes to swell and burn and our noses to bleed.”  Just a week prior, in the middle of planning her daughter’s fifth birthday party, Dawn le...