Tag: Community

  • Small Acts of Kindness

    I told my mom that I was going to have a new job title by the end of this year that contains the word “Engineer” in it, and she was so happy for me, but also very confused. She thought that my volunteer work as a certified Openlands TreeKeeper® was my full-time job and that […]

  • Filipino American History Month (FAHM): A Reflection

    Each October is Filipino American History Month and this year’s theme is “Struggle, Resistance, Solidarity, and Resilience.” I attended high school at Seisen International School in Tokyo, where I studied the International Baccalaureate (IB) Degree Program in tandem with my school’s competitive GED. My interest in the history of the Philippines formalized during this time […]

  • Community Conversations

    I attended an Environmental Justice workshop, facilitated by Ayesha Qazu-Lampert and Ylanda Wilhite of Chicago Environmental Educators at the Academy for Global Citizenship at 4942 W 44th St, Chicago, IL 60638. Lupe Escárcega and Danielle Russell from Openlands is how I learned about the event. I didn’t grow up with many of the environmental career […]

  • Filipino American History Month: My Reflections as a Filipina American

    Growing up in Japan, I visited the Philippines every other Christmas and several summers. When I first moved to America for college, I experienced culture shock. I had visited the United States often and studied American history, but I had never lived—or identified—as an American until 2009. I am still learning what it means to […]

  • Urban Canopy Maps

    The things being connected are called nodes and the connections are called links. The process and patterns are highlighted through streams, while the end goal may never be achieved. When I first realized I was part of the northeast end of Little Village, I had always assumed my home was within the boundaries of West […]