Andrea Barela

LAKESHORE EL, HOUSTON TX

Research in Kenya how Wangari Maathai and her Green Belt Movement catalyzed environmentalism to inspire similar strategies as a framework for student leaders' community action plans.

Where I've Been

  • Nairobi, Kenya

My Fellowship in Images

Visiting with the Maasai Tribe to learn about their cultural and economic way of life.
In front of the first trees (Grvellia trees) my host family, Julius and Lydia, planted in 1992.
Learning how to yield a machete to prick a root and place in its own potting tube.
Finally planting some Brachy Leana saplings on Tumutumu Hill!
Figuring out how to balance dried corn leaves and stems to hold and transport materials like Kikuyu women do.
Lucky enough to plant some Vitex Kenyenesis, Podo Carpus, and Falcatus saplings with the Tumutumu Girls High School Forestry club in their own school park!

Your Personal and Professional Growth

How have your knowledge, skills and capabilities grown?

I appreciate what I am able to do, what I am able to contribute and be able to survive off of when it comes to being a responsible citizen of the world. I know how to cultivate seedlings and saplings with minimal resources (good road network, access to water, compacted soil) and the importance of diversifying plant species for overall forest health. I now realize the magnitude of underground water systems and aerial transpiration for local and global weather patterns. I want to plant more trees!

As a result, in what ways will your instructional practice change?

The most important aspects of my instructional practice are to understand the causes of the symptoms occurring within our school community. Community empowerment can identify solutions to problems that are sustainable for all livelihoods if it is managed in my students' own words and friendship. No matter how small, there must my some 'thing' we each can do to contribute as part of a greater whole that is managed and shared together equitably. Focusing on our capabilities and capacities is vital

What is the greatest personal accomplishment of your fellowship?

Learning from the people I got to meet. Each one of them helped me understand a different aspect of how one can live, work, and view life. There are still the luxuries of the 21st century in Kenya, but many of the people I interacted with appreciate, respect, and value the simplicity of what their natural environment gives them and loves learning more about it. There's a certain freedom that comes from following your own strength and conscience to re-imagine what I have, can, and will do.

Impact on Your Classroom, School and Community

How will your experiences positively impact student learning in new ways?

Students will look at their community from a different angle: through a vision of climate justice and global citizenship that needs to be shared with our schools, families and friends. After the experience of climate crisis through Harvey, learning how to re-establish environmental responsibility and actively shaping our future by presenting their ideas, organizing planting parties, and working with the broader community are all ways in which my students gain broader access to leaving an impact

What are your plans for working collaboratively with colleagues?

My co-advisor and I are already planning out the beginning of our year with how to lay the foundation for a globally conscious leader in this year's group of AGENTS. We have contacted Plant for the Planet to determine the guidelines we need to host an academy for Climate Justice Ambassadors at our school. We are also reaching out to our district's Education Foundation to help us find like-minded businesses and organizations within our community that will support and donate their time to us.

Imagining the Future

How do you envision celebrating of your students’ new learning?

I can't wait to show them the process I went through so they can identify what aspects they will connect to and continue! Besides presenting to each other and our school community what they have internalized, they can connect with our district Education Foundation to request hosting an Academy for Climate Justice Ambassadors and work towards being a part of planting a trillion trees worldwide by 2020. The celebration will be in the planting of trees at our school once they have the framework!

Are there issues or challenges in your school, community or the greater world about which you and your students might try to make a difference?

Our school has lost two thirds of the trees that use to be on or border our campus. Additionally, there is a huge push to put more technology into students' hands instead of conserve the rapidly changing and eroding natural environment we go to school in. We would like to join the Trillion Tree Campaign to stop talking and start planting. With the resources from the Green Belt Movement and Plant for the Planet, we can empower our school and district with environmental conservation knowledge.

How would you describe to a friend or a grant funder the most fundamental ways in which your fellowship has changed your personal and/or professional perspective?

We are capable of living with so little, and yet we take so much. There is beauty and inspiration in our environment that protects and provides for our survival. Instead, we are digging our own graves by uprooting trees. Trees cycle and create water routes, balance climate patterns near and far, and give shelter and respite to all living things. The more we tend to the Earth, with patience, diligence, and respect, the more we would get back from it. Environmental consciousness is sorely needed.

FUND FOR TEACHERS ©