by Teghan Acres

Climate change is the most pressing issue that our world is facing today. I truly believe that the world is on the brink of a complete transformation as a result. While that scares me, I know that it can be a change for the better and I want to be part of that. That is why in 2016 I switched my degree to environmental studies with the idea that I would gain the knowledge and skills needed to implement climate solutions. As a recent graduate from that program, I do believe I have gained that, but it wasn’t from what I learned in the classroom.

Don’t get me wrong - my degree was valuable and I learned a lot. However, it was not necessarily what I was hoping to learn. I expected to be taught solutions to our problems rather than only what our problems are. Class after class reviewed a legacy of growth-fuelled decision-making that left fish stocks, forests and oceans out of the equation. After one particularly depressing class, my professor looked out at the lecture hall and asked "Do you all just leave class feeling terrible every day?" There were some laughs, audible sighs and mumbles of agreement. I knew there had to be more optimism and hope out there for the state of our planet. If not, what the hell was I doing studying this stuff.

It was around this time that I joined a club working to ban the sale of plastic water bottles on campus. I needed something to put my energy towards that I felt could make a tangible, positive impact. It was then that I realized the group of passionate students I was working with struggled with the same questions as I. Through this, I also realized I was envisioning a different future for myself in the environment field than my peers. Instead, they were looking ahead to fieldwork for species management and policy formulation roles in government. I believed in their capabilities and our shared mission to leave our planet better than we found it, but nothing in my classes indicated these traditional pathways for environmental management made any true impact. It seemed there was always some more powerful interest than the planet itself, and most often the interest lied in shareholder gains. 

My focus turned outside of my university space towards groups and individuals I felt were making real change and pushing for bold measures. I was captured by the work of Naomi Klein and the clear lines she drew from capitalism to the source of climate change. I was also inspired by people all around the world who face these issues first hand including communities threatened by sea-level rise and melting ice sheets today. I found far more passion, solutions and honesty in those works than peer-reviewed papers by academics predicting climate impacts they weren’t experiencing themselves. These land protectors - Autumn Peltier, Audrey Siegl, Kanahus Manuel - drew lines from the oppression of the land to the systems in our government and society that simultaneously oppress Indigenous, Black and People of Color; especially women, and other marginalized groups. 

You will hear others say “it’s all connected” but I don’t think I truly understood until I heard that message communicated so rawly from those on the frontlines of this crisis. People who are in this fight not because they realize climate change will threaten their way of life in the future but because it is happening, and has been happening, right in front of their eyes. No matter my professors’ best efforts, they couldn’t give me that. They also weren’t able to tell me that this climate crisis is not being solved, not because we don’t know how to solve it, but because those with the power to do so refuse to take action. While it is true, you can’t necessarily fill up a whole syllabus with that simple fact. 
I had to realize for myself that where our power to make change so clearly lies is with the people. I also now understand that it’s not that people don’t care or don’t want to help, but that climate solutions have been so badly communicated to them throughout history. I, myself, am included in that group. Four years ago I thought I had to get an entire university degree to understand what needed to be done. 

Today, I’m a writer, a communicator, and most of all, I am a storyteller. I am telling my own story and sharing others that resonated with me so everyone can understand that it’s not only our planet that we’re fighting for but each other and a world where everyone is valued. I don’t think that can be taught in a classroom, it is meant to be shared through raw human connection and vulnerability about the futures we desire. In my future, I see a stable climate, equitable societies and a world where kids can go to school to learn about how we saved the planet - not just the ways we destroyed it.

What do you see?