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Planning With Empathy
I could feel the weight of how land use speculation affected the community. You have to be respectful of that."
Rachel Kinzer (Arch ’23 ’24)
The Climate Restoration Initiative gave Rachel Kinzer valuable experiences as she pursued her master’s degree—and also paved a new path for her future.
Kinzer worked with architecture professor Moira O’Neill on a team investigating the social, political, and legal nuances of implementing carbon reduction strategies in select rural and urban localities. They conducted qualitative research on the potential of several carbon-capturing land uses and practices, eventually traveling to a Wise County mountaintop removal site to meet with the community affected.
“You’re able to pick up on tone a lot better in person,” Kinzer said. “When we were there, I could feel the weight of the way that land use is speculated and how much it affected the community. The emotions were there a little bit more and you have to be respectful of that.”
Kinzer is now a regional planner for the Central Shenandoah Planning District Commission in Staunton, Virginia. Her work with CRI not only now assists her in her new career, it also encouraged her to find a job where she could bring a passion for climate solutions and decarbonization to real policy.
Environmental Storytelling in Action
“Green Fin’s mission of environmental storytelling through visual and written media was incredibly appealing to me.”
Abby Taylor (Col ’24)
Through the institute’s January term externship program, Abby Taylor took a position at Green Fin Studio, a marketing and communication firm. Today, Taylor has a full-time job with the same company and a unique portfolio in environmental communications.
An environmental thought and practice major, with a double minor in studio art and public policy, Taylor saw a rare opportunity. “Green Fin’s posting immediately caught my eye. As someone with a very niche major and minor combination in science and visual arts, Green Fin’s mission of environmental storytelling through visual and written media was incredibly appealing to me. I put in my application that very same night!”
The institute’s externship program is a job-shadow mentoring program that exposes students to career opportunities within sustainability, resilience, and environmental fields. Working with the Career Center to identify and partner with companies able to host students, the institute received 262 applications for the 2024 J-term externships.
“My externship experience with Green Fin, though brief, was incredibly helpful in jumpstarting my final semester at UVA and showing me exactly what kind of work I wanted to pursue post-graduation,” Taylor said.
Resilience in Action
"The University of Virginia has an outstanding reputation as a flagship research university and a leader in community engagement. I look forward to working with faculty and students on researching effective adaptation policies to increase communities’ resilience to climate change impacts."
Elizabeth Andrews
Elizabeth Andrews, a longtime legal and policy expert in Virginia, was the inaugural Environmental Sustainability and Resilience Practitioner Fellow at the Environmental Institute.
In this role, Andrews engaged various groups within UVA and externally to continue her work on climate resilience, connected with indigenous peoples and communities on climate resilience, provided law and policy analysis on environmental matters in Virginia, and collaborated with students and faculty at UVA.
At the end of her one-year practitioner fellowship (August 2023-2024), Andrews launched the Proactive Planning for Resilience: Protocols for Community-led Climate Adaptation in Virginia, which is intended to assist Virginia’s local elected officials, state government staff, and community leaders as they undertake resilience planning in anticipation of changing conditions in the commonwealth’s coastal communities.
Andrews is now a Distinguished Law & Policy Fellow at the Weldon Cooper Center’s Institute for Engagement & Negotiation.
Pulitzer Meets Practice
"We’ll talk about how to essentially create an identity as a communicator by which people will come to know you and remember you, so that it also might give some persuasive heft to what you’re trying to get across."
Chris Mooney
Pulitzer-Prize winning journalist Chris Mooney joined the Environmental Institute in August 2024 as Environmental Sustainability and Resilience Practitioner Fellow. He came from The Washington Post, where he wrote about energy and the environment, winning a Pulitzer, and has published four books about science, politics, and climate change.
In late 2018, he noticed that some parts of the world were warming faster than others. Fast-forward two years and Mooney and a group of environmental reporters from the Post won a Pulitzer Prize for the series “2°C: Beyond the Limit,” which identified the fastest-warming places on the planet using global temperature datasets.
Mooney taught two courses while supporting the institute’s interdisciplinary work. In the fall, he taught undergraduate and graduate students in Toolkit for Communicating Environmental Sciences. The course was geared toward students studying in any scientific or social scientific field. The goal is to help experts “step back from everything they know” and learn to convey clear messages to general audiences under a time constraint. In the spring, he taught a class on environmental data journalism. Both classes are taught in collaboration with the Departments of Environmental Sciences and Media Studies.
Steady backing for teaching entrepreneurship and ground-level change promises positive returns and possibilities for social enterprise.
Spencer Tassone’s novel research reveals heat waves—in rivers
UVA students see firsthand how impact investing is restoring hope to this changing region.
Planning with empathy
Rachel worked with architecture professor Moira O’Neill on a team investigating the legal and community implications of decarbonization strategies. Her research included site visits to mountaintop removal areas and conversations with affected community members.
Environmental storytelling in action
Abby collaborated with faculty and students to spotlight climate-focused student organizations and local action networks. She found community in Green Fin and developed stories that shaped public understanding of regional environmental challenges.
