Keynote Speaker – Christina Kwauk

Chambers Building, Room 101
6:30pm – 7:15pm

Christina is a social scientist with an interdisciplinary focus on education for climate action. She is an expert on girls’ education in developing countries, 21st century skills and youth empowerment, and the intersections of gender, education, and climate change.

 

Christina is co-editor (with Radhika Iyengar) of Curriculum and Learning for Climate Action: Toward an SDG 4.7 Roadmap for Systems Change and co-author (with Gene Sperling and Rebecca Winthrop) of What Works in Girls’ Education: Evidence for the World’s Best Investment, and has published numerous policy papers and academic articles on topics in climate change education, gender, health, and international development and education. She is a member of the Drawdown Lift Advisory Council, the Girl Rising Advisory Council, the International Jury for the UNESCO Prize for Girls’ and Women’s Education, and the Judging Academy for the World’s Best School Prizes.

 

Christina Kwauk works as an education consultant and Research Director at Unbounded Associates, Head of Climate and Education at The Education Commission, and a Future Rising Scholar in Residence at Girl Rising.

 

Previously, Christina was a Fellow at the Brookings Institution where she led the Center for Universal Education’s work on girls’ education. At Brookings she also led the Echidna Global Scholars Program, a visiting fellowship aimed at building the evidence in girls’ education while building the research capacity, leadership, and professional networks of girls’ education leaders. She also chaired the Girls CHARGE initiative, a Clinton Foundation global commitment to action, and advised the Obama Foundation’s Girls Opportunity Alliance, the UK Department for International Development’s Girls’ Education Challenge, and Save the Children UK. Formerly, Christina was also the associate director of the Monitoring and Evaluation of Climate Change Education (MECCE) Project hosted by the Sustainability and Education Policy Network at the University of Saskatchewan, and a 36×36 Transformation Fellow with the Wellbeing Economy Alliance.

 

Christina holds a PhD in Comparative and International Development Education from the University of Minnesota, a MA in Social Sciences from the University of Chicago, and a BS in Psychology from Sewanee: The University of the South.

Read more about Christina’s work:

• Towards Climate Justice: Lesson from Girls’ Education
• A New Green Agenda: Approaches to Quality Education for Climate Change

Opening Speaker – Lara Fowler

Chambers Building, Room 101
2:00pm – 3:35pm

Lara Fowler is the Interim Chief Sustainability Officer of Penn State University and Interim Director of the Sustainability Institute, as well as a Professor of Teaching at Penn State Law and Affiliate Faculty at the Penn State School of International Affairs.

Lara is an attorney and mediator whose career has focused on environmental, energy, and natural resource law, with a specific focus on water related issues. During the last ten years, her work at Penn State has focused on questions related to water (flood, drought, and water quality), agriculture, and energy. She teaches courses on water law; energy; negotiation and dispute resolution design; and mediation of environmental and public conflicts. In addition, she is a member of the Chesapeake Bay Program’s Science and Technical Advisory Committee and a juror for the Stockholm International Water Institute’s Junior Water Prize.

Prior to joining Penn State, Lara was an attorney at Gordon Thomas Honeywell LLP in Seattle, Washington, where she focused on mediation and dispute resolution of complex natural resource issues and represented clients facing regulatory hurdles in the environmental and energy fields. She has worked on issues such as who is entitled to store groundwater in the greater Los Angeles area; flooding issues in Washington State’s second largest river basin; and energy issues in the Pacific Northwest.

Before pursuing a legal career, she was a senior water resources coordinator with the Oregon Water Resources Department. She has a JD from the University of Washington School of Law and an undergraduate degree from Dartmouth College.

Concurrent Sessions Presenters:

 

Production of sustainable and biodegradable products to reduce plastic wastes

Parisa Nazemi is a Ph.D. candidate at Penn State majoring in Biological Engineering with a graduate minor in Engineering Leadership and Innovation Management (ELIM). Her current research involves the synthesis of effective, sustainable packaging films and paper coatings in order to replace plastic films and laminates. Parisa is passionate about teaching, leadership and innovation in the sustainability field.

 

 

 

 

“greenYOUthCHANGEMAKERS” project

Gabriela Mezeiova is an expert on education for sustainable development at the Slovak Centre for Scientific and Technical Information, Slovakia and founder and CEO of Slovak Eco Quality, NGO equipping people with green competencies. Her interests include the US education system, non-formal education applied to formal settings, and environmental sustainability.

 

 

 

 

Penn State’s Local Climate Action Program (LCAP)

At Penn State’s Sustainability Institute, Peter Buck connects and catalyzes faculty, staff, students, and the public for a bright and sustainable future. Whether he’s teaching rhetoric and writing for students studying abroad, mentoring fellows on human rights and policy in partnership with Project Drawdown, or revising degree programs, Peter instigates and manages change at every academic level. Currently, he co-directs the Local Climate Action Program with Brandi Robinson, a two-semester course that partners Penn State undergraduate and graduate students with Pennsylvania municipal and county governments to conduct greenhouse gas inventories and initiate climate action planning. Peter’s commits himself to leadership and service. He has served on the boards of higher
education, sustainability, and environmental NGOs, on the Ferguson Township Board of Supervisors, two intergovernmental working groups focused on solar power and climate planning, as a Director on the State College Area School District’s Board. He has communicated widely on sustainability, education, democracy, including in The Washington Post, on the blog of the Yale Cultural Cognition Project, Democracy Works, Citizen’s Climate Radio, TEDxPSU, The Journal of Environmental Studies and Sciences, The International Journal of Ethics Education, Clinics of North America, in Routledge’s Teaching Climate Change in the United States, and Utah State University’s Rhetoric and Guns. Peter holds a Ph.D. in Educational Theory and Policy and an M.A. and a B.A. in Music with a minor in Creative Writing. He lives in State College with his son Sacha and his fiancé Hilary.

 

 

Climate Change and Breast Cancer: An Overlooked Connection

Dr. Nermin Mostafa holds a PhD degree in Medicinal and Pharmaceutical Chemistry. She works with her research team on developing active pharmaceutical moieties that have potential uses as antivirals, anticancer and anti-Alzheimer. She has been awarded several research grants to fund her projects; She is a delegate of US funded TechWomen exchange program that is awarded to emerging leaders in the STEM fields. She is currently a Hubert Humphrey fellow at PSU. During her fellowship; she is exploring new opportunities to help reforming traditional Egyptian universities into entrepreneurial ones.

 

 

 

 

Turning a Global Village into a Global Nation 

Purvis is a first-generation, black woman from Niagara Falls NY. She is a Senior graduating in May 2023 with her Bachelor of Science in Biology, Vertebrate Physiology. At the Abington campus, some of Re’naijah’s most highlighted involvements include being a secretary of Lion Ambassadors, a Lion productions student worker, a new student orientation leader, a Lion guide and PSU 1 mentor for first gen and freshman students, and an honorary student speaker and panelist for the admissions office. She also has completed two years of ACURA research, one project on 3D printing and prosthetic sockets and the other on pulsars’ Collaboratory research. She is a second-year Resident Assistant on campus and is the lead of Global Village, one of the living-learning communities that are offered at Lionsgate for the students which she plans in this presentation to tell us more about. Re’naijah plans to serve in the military when she graduates and through the service, attend Medical school and become a Doctor.

 

 

 

Co-Constructing DEIB (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion, Belonging) – A Global Perspective

Anna Yinqi Zhang is a third-year Ph.D. student in Educational Psychology. Her research focuses on quantitative methods, STEM education for preservice teachers, and incorporating the theoretical framework of intersectionality in applied settings in Education and Psychology. Before attending grad school here, she earned her bachelor’s degree in Statistics at Penn State. Anna enjoys hiking, working out, and doodling when her life is not so preoccupied with grad school and work.

 

 

 

Fast Fashion: The Price of throwaway Culture and the road to Ethical Consumption

Olivia Smith was born and raised in Los Angeles, California. She received her Bachelor of Arts Degree in International Studies with a focus on Politics, Policy, and Economics and a minor in Global Health. She is a second-year graduate student in the School of International Affairs program at Penn State University, pursuing a concentration in Health and Development. She also is the Secretary of the School of International Black Student Association. Some of her global interests include exploring the impacts of foreign aid on education development with an emphasis on barriers to girls’ education, geopolitics, and global health. Development is multifaceted with many issues, especially with the growing need to reassess how the current processes are straining environmental efforts. An industry worth exploring is the fashion industry and its strains on developing countries. She hopes this session will provide an overview of the ecological challenges in the fashion industry, discuss various solutions, and rethink how the fashion industry can become more sustainable.

 

Fast Fashion: The Price of throwaway Culture and the road to Ethical Consumption

Felrette Greene was born and raised in the state of Rhode Island. They are a second-year student at Penn State pursuing a Master’s Degree in International Affairs with a concentration in Human Rights and Advocacy. They are a Global Policy Fellow of Duke University and an Alumnus of the University of Rhode Island where they majored in Political Science and minored in English. Felrette currently serves as the Vice President of the Black Student Association at Penn State, and they also work as a Graduate Assistant in the Student Success Center.
Felrette has also worked at the United Nations through the International Organization for Migration. They are very passionate about the Sustainable Development Goals, and while at IOM Felrette saw the importance of fashion in development and creating agency amongst populations. Felrette has always valued fashion. While attending the University of Rhode Island they conducted research focusing on the intersection of Black women and the limitations that affect their fashion choices enforced by institutions and workspaces. They also researched the impact of fast fashion and trends in the 21^st Century. Felrette values fashion as a form of political expression and a liberating art form. They aim to highlight the politics of fashion and how essential clothing is to the fabric of our lives.

 

Addressing Housing Crises and Informal Settlement Challenges by 3D Printing Sustainable and Affordable Residential Houses

Eden Binega is an experienced structural engineer with a demonstrated history of working in the research, consultancy, and construction industry. Her areas of expertise include motivational speaking, software development, university teaching, consulting, construction, and leadership. She has a strong educational background with a Master’s degree focused on Smart Structures and Systems (Additive Manufacturing for the Construction Industry) from the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology. And currently, she is a Ph.D. student in the Architectural Engineering department focusing on 3D printing technology for the sustainable and affordable infrastructure construction industry at the Pennsylvania State University.

 

 

The GREEN Program

My name is Aarushi, and I’m a senior at Pennsylvania State University studying Materials Science and Engineering with a minor in Astrobiology. I attended the March 2022 GREEN Program trip to Iceland and had an amazing time pushing the limits of what I could learn and do.

 

 

 

The GREEN Program

My name is Elizabeth Tofte and I am a junior at Penn State University studying Earth Science with a minor in Geography. I had the amazing opportunity to join The GREEN Program in Iceland this summer to explore renewable energy innovation. I am excited to share my TGP experience and why I love this program.

 

 

 

How Penn State Engineers Without Borders Takes Global Sustainable Action

Gabe Hiestand is a fourth-year student from York, Pennsylvania studying environmental systems engineering with a minor in watersheds and water resources in the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences and Schreyer Honors College at Penn State University Park. Gabe has been involved with the Penn State Chapter of Engineers Without Borders since his first semester, and has served as a project sub-lead, Project Lead, and is currently the organization’s President. After graduation, he plans to pursue a master’s degree in environmental engineering and complete research on the food-water-energy nexus and climate change adaptation and mitigation. Gabe fell in love with the wildlife via frequent trips to zoos and the National Aquarium in Baltimore, Maryland in elementary school and has been advocating for the planet’s protection ever since. When he’s not talking about engineering or sustainability, Gabe enjoys talking baseball, Philadelphia sports, and rock music.