Please join the Sustainable Development Institute in welcoming our newest employee, Kate Flick. Kate’s newly developed role is to serve as Sustainability Education Coordinator. Kate comes to us with a master’s degree in Forest Ecology and Management and has worked 10 years on sustainability and climate change related projects through previous employers, internships and fellowships. We are very excited to have Kate join our team with her extensive education experience and sustainability knowledge.
Here is Kate’s story about the journey that brought her here to College of Menominee Nation. Welcome, Kate!
“My brother and the neighborhood crew lived in the central sands region of Wisconsin near Rosholt. We’d spend much of our time outside-building forts, climbing white pines, playing baseball (the septic vents served as bases), swimming in the lakes, skiing, or biking to Ernie and Irene’s in the nearest town where they had gummy octopi.
In general, I thought outside was a great place to spend time and learn. This, combined with the fact that we had a cassette of the White Album in the car where the lyrics talk about the little piggies eating bacon, a very literal image for an eight-year-old, started me thinking about the where the things we use come from and our role in the world. These thoughts were just the beginning of many more to follow on a passion to living and educating others, particularly youth, on sustainability.
After high school, I went to study at UW-Madison. I had forgotten about my environmental inclinations by then, traded in for a love of books, and started College as an English major. However, once I got a job at the Center for Sustainability and the Global Environment, where I did climate change research using GIS imagery, I began to hone in, once again, on this notion of sustainability.
I was just a minion there, but even in minionhood, things started happening: “Why don’t you take this environmental studies class?” asked one of my undergrad coworkers. “I was thinking of doing this Department of Energy climate change fellowship over the summer with Oak Ridge National Lab. Could you be a reference for me?” In another current, I had started studying about people and I took a Sustainable Development class. There the professor took me under his wing and converted me into a Community and Environmental Sociology major, taught me to be critical of what the definition of sustainability meant, and helped me get a few scholarships and fellowships.
During the first pivotal fellowship, I researched grass-roots social movements on the Crandon Mine project. I had one of those “ah ha” moments when Ken Fish, a member of the Menominee Nation and opposition network redefined sustainability for me: “We spent millions in the battle. In terms of putting out millions, you know what those economic thinking people said. They said, ‘What the heck is the matter with you?’…They couldn’t comprehend it wasn’t about today. It was about 100 years from now. So we have a place to live today, what about our water quality 1,500 years from now.”
The second fellowship led me to Germany where I got my masters degree in Forest Ecology and Management. I had identified the fact that scientists by and large don’t understand the “people” side of environmental problems, and the people who understand the people, don’t understand the science. So, I was set to learn more about the science. In doing so, I came to value education.
During my masters program, I had an internship with the Central Wisconsin Environmental Station and watched kids find aquatic invertebrates for the first time or learn about their place in the food web. I also had the opportunity to travel through the Amazon where I interviewed people involved in the forestry development projects to understand why learning was not occurring in a more long-term way.
When I came back to the United States, outdoor education seemed the perfect way for me to test out my new theory about creating different learning relationships. I have since worked in various educational places and settings. I have worked as an outdoor educator and naturalist in California and served as curriculum developer and environmental educator in New York City. I increasingly see education as a tool to engage more sustainable relationships with our world. Hands-on learning and diversity of perspective are ways to discover sustainable ways of working and I am excited to continue my learning and teaching here, focusing on place-based learning.
I also enjoy walking about outside, baking and cooking, talking to people, learning, the Packers, swimming, and a bunch of other stuff.”
Welcome to College of Menominee Nation Sustainable Development Institute Kate!
