Jenn Summers - The Importance of Community Involvement in GIS work

In this episode, Aisha and Jenn Summers discuss the National Academies' Gulf Research Program and its focus on environmental protection and stewardship in the Gulf of Mexico region. Jenn shares her career journey and her passion for using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) as a communication tool. They also talk about imposter syndrome, the importance of cultural competency in engaging marginalized communities, and the shift towards including diverse perspectives in research. Finally, they delve into the significance of resilience and resistance in addressing the vulnerabilities of Gulf Coast communities. Tune in to learn more!

Transcript

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Hi Jen, thank you for joining us at the North Star Homecoming. This is our third annual homecoming, our first in person, so thank you for coming. And thank you to your organization, National Academies, National Academy of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. Yeah, that's a mouthful. Yes, I know, we have a lot of acronyms. I'm specifically from the Gulf Research Program, GRP, another acronym. Yes, well thank you for being here today and being a sponsor. Yes, happy, happy to support I really believe in what North Star is doing and I'm excited to be here at Howard University. It's the illustrious Howard University. Yes, yes, the Founders Library is very old school, classy. Yes, iconic. Iconic. Yes. Yeah. Okay, okay, so let's get into it, let's get into it. Jen, tell us a little bit about your career and what you do at National Academies. Yeah, so I am currently a program officer in the Gulf Research Program, and that is, just means that I, I manage programs. We do a lot of research grants and grant making at the GRP, and I also do other types of activities like convening of experts and working on consensus studies as well as fellowships. So, those are kind of our bread and butter, all focused on the Gulf of Mexico region to try to improve environmental protection and stewardship. That's my specific area of focus. But yeah, so I have my PhD. It's in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. And I I started my degree at Tulane University on the Gulf Coast. So that was sort of my Gulf introduction there. And it was also at Tulane that I did my first intensive GIS work. So I I did take a course and I didn't end up getting certified in it, but I do love working in GIS. It's a very versatile and cross cutting technology. I think it can be incredibly impactful as a communication tool, but also to demonstrate the outcomes of spatial analyses. So for me, I used it for evolutionary biology and to understand the genetic distance crossed with. Spatial distance, but in a coastal marsh plant. It was relatively simplistic based just, you know, there's obviously very complex things you can do in GIS, but I went to, I presented the, the work at a GIS conference in, in New Orleans. It was quite paltry compared to some of the other projects that LSU and, and folks were doing. But yeah, that's really stuck with me. I've, I've used QGIS, I've used Esri software. Something I appreciate as an incredibly important tool. And I really love that there's this focus from North Star on, on justice and incorporating aspects of justice into mapping. All right. Well, thank you for that. Thank you for that. Thank you for sitting down with me today. Oh yeah. Okay. I got off topic a little bit. No, no, no. It's. Perfectly all right. All right. So since we're off topic slightly, and let's talk about what it's like to enter into GIS spaces, what it's like to enter into environmental spaces where we typically don't see people who look like us. Hmm. Yes. So I guess I could say even as an undergrad, I was exposed to GIS and there's the opportunity to get into the certification and the. It's the Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences that I taught most of those classes as absolutely male dominated and it's a little intimidating for that reason, I would say. And when I got to grad school and sort of started embracing it as part of my dissertation work, um, I, I'll, I will mention too that there's these sort of administrative obstacles because we have all these silos in academia where this one department will focus on geospatial. research versus like my department, ecology and evolutionary biology. So our computer labs were separate. So I had to get access. That's separate, but I mean, in terms of, you know, marginalization, that's not really the issue, but it does create a barrier to particular collaboration. And I will say like. When I was first getting started, our professor, he was, he's a little bit gruff but he was pretty encouraging and encouraged me to submit a presentation to this conference. But it was very, I, this sticks with me. The person who was like emceeing my section after I presented was like, Maybe next time you'll bring something that's more up to snuff. Which is partially why I was so self deprecating and describing. Microaggression much? I know. I was like, all right, well, there won't be a next time. So yeah, I think there's you know, academia is super competitive. And of course. It was pretty male, but it wasn't exclusively, I will say that. Okay, so yesterday's National Geographic panel talked a little bit about the isolation that you can sometimes feel being the only one or one of a few in the room. And we talked a little bit about imposter syndrome. Sandra Aucther mentioned it. This morning, which, for a director, it's just like, you know, but talk a little bit about how you navigated the isolation and then how you navigate it and hopefully overcome, or at least live with and lean into what people call imposter syndrome. Yeah. You know, I think grad school is the perfect time to learn about imposter syndrome. I definitely. And it was you know, kind of facilitated by I had a, an advisor that was a very I would, or I would say hostile. And, and I, I ended up leaving his lab, but I, and I think. You know, that's unfortunately not very uncommon in academia, and that in itself is pretty isolating if, if you do, if you're getting so much negative feedback when you're trying to establish yourself in a field that's already very competitive and harrowing, and you got to move around a lot for postdocs and things after, after you finally get this coveted degree, and there's just stress upon stress. And you're underpaid. Anyway, so for me, all those pressures combined with this, you know, feeling ostracized really compounded my imposter syndrome. Like, I don't think I can hack this. I, so I'm actually not in academia, obviously, uh, and I'm okay. I feel better about that decision these days. But, you know, I think I have a lot of empathy for people who are currently struggling with. Grad school because, you know, the people I hear about the most are, and you know, they're, they're people who have gained a lot of power in a system that is designed to promote. Bad behavior in some cases it feels like and so I don't know. It's tough when you're in a position of relatively low power to stand up for yourself, to, to grow as a person if, if that situation is, is being, like, used to bully you, you know, so. So you're here. Yeah. How did you overcome? I left the lab and and now yeah, I, you know, I pursued policy, which throughout grad school, I wanted, you know, my science to make a difference, not, you know, just go into a journal somewhere and disappear. So I, I was excited to get into the National Academies, because that's more public facing, still a little hard to access for the average person, but I'm, you know, I'm excited within the Gulf Research Program to make science accessible and applied, like important for making decisions that affect how, you know, communities on the Gulf Coast improve their, their odds, basically, because we're fighting a lot of Compounding factors. Let's talk a little bit about the communities on the Gulf Coast. Why those areas and then what's the significance of those areas? What are we trying to restore? What are we trying to protect? Absolutely. So the GRP is charged with in the, in this we've done a lot of work on this agreement that we've made with the Department of Justice addressing offshore energy safety environmental protection and stewardship, and health and resilience, all while improving education, engagement and then analytics and impact for the program writ large. So for, for us, we are really trying to target and, and reach out to historically marginalized groups. And that's a bit of a shift from what we've done in the past 10 years or so with the GRP, which has been slightly more traditional in our approach traditional research grants and reaching out to some of the, the, R1 institutions that, that are more commonly engaged cause they have all the infrastructure, the pipeline to get the money in and the research done. And I will say though, our health and resilience board has always been really good about working with. Fence line communities raising awareness of groups like the Port Arthur in Texas, if you're familiar with them. It's a fence line community that has really high exposure to carcinogens from industry and refineries. And trying to improve our connections with these communities and our ability to make sure that our money benefits them. And we just announced the Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative, which is a very large five year project as a consortium of HBCUs, Tulane, LSU and an MSI to address the future of the lowermost Mississippi River Delta, and that's a very critical piece Both nationally and regionally because the navigation channel, the Mississippi River, passes through there. I'm going to try to stop talking about it. But one of the major objectives there is workforce diversity. We want to ensure that we create space and a welcoming and supportive environment for historically marginalized students. Grad students, postdocs, professors, early career folks and, and non academia folks as well. sO can we talk a little bit about the shift? And you mentioned something about resiliency and the vulnerabilities in those communities. Can we talk about the National Academies making this intentional shift, to include marginalized communities and then talk about the, the resilience of these communities and the vulnerabilities that you've. Yes, definitely. You know, I think this, this isn't news to probably a lot of the podcast listeners, but you know, things like various organizations have struggled to ensure that funding and a lot of federal funding, for example, goes to the communities that need it more or most because communities that have resources, like likewise have resources to apply for funding, you know? So even if it's not, necessarily intentionally only trying to give money to the well resourced communities. A lot of times it ends up happening that way. And I think in the aftermath of, you know, the George Floyd murder, the academies had a real reckoning and established an Office of Diversity and Inclusion. And the Gulf Research Program has taken that to heart as well. And I think the ethos among the staff has always been really progressive in that, in that regard. And we're trying to make sure that this is centered going forward. And that includes the fenceline communities I was talking about, but also working directly with communities when we're doing research. So we're having, for example, the Mississippi River Delta transition initiative, very easy to say, short name, has has this It's a co production piece where you work with the community and try to ingrain community needs directly into your research plan so that you can then deliver usable products for the people who are most at risk from things like sea level rise and then for example the salt wedge moving up the Mississippi River that's contaminating drinking water or risk risking drinking water. That's something that we're trying to address in a It's a very sort of holistic way with this, with the Mississippi River Delta Transition Initiative. So these are some examples but yeah, it's a process. It's ongoing. Okay, so from the programs that you've mentioned, I think ingrained in all of those are a certain degree of cultural competency. Can you tell us a little bit about how you go about engaging these communities to make sure you've got the right voices in the conversation? Yeah, I mean, I think that's something that can always be improved, but one way that we're doing that is the Academies really leans on volunteers for our committees, and historically, we have relied on quote unquote experts who are primarily from academia. And, and oftentimes members of the Academy which we know very well is, is a little bit biased. So, you know, I want to own that. It's not, that's not a secret. So what we've tried to do is one of the ways that we can get those perspectives, we obviously can't speak to everyone, but we try to pull from existing groups. Like I think what the Gulf community is really I mean, not to generalize, but there's like some really incredible community groups in the region. And I think they built like a lot of communities come together in part because they're eminently threatened by various polluting factors. So they need to advocate for themselves, but it's also just like. It is really community oriented having only lived in New Orleans for two years. I say that circumscribed, but that was my impression. So we try to get representatives from groups that are very much in touch with communities in the, in the Gulf. We rely too on our partners who have also received funds from Deepwater Horizon. For the Deepwater Horizon Settlements that are embedded more so in the Gulf because we're based in D. C., because that's where the National Academies is. And I mean, across the academies, there's been a concerted effort to, you know, re examine the definition of expertise to include lived experience. Yeah, yeah, because I think it's, there's also this, you know effort to improve traditional Ecological knowledge, which is a term that I know not everyone is a fan of because it kind of implies that it's older. But essentially, leaning on and valuing indigenous knowledge of ecosystems that have been part of their, you know, lives for far longer than the current system. So things like that are the efforts we're doing. Okay. Alright, last two questions. Resilience or resistance, or both, and why? I'll have to pick one. Or both. That's true. That's true. You did say both. I don't know why I ignored that part. Hmm. Resilience is really great, but it's also a process and you have to, you have to, it's like a muscle that you have to build. And I don't think that that gets acknowledged enough in like the world. So while that is really critical, I think it is it's, and it's a skill. I think it has to be paired with a certain resistance and awareness of the ongoing systems that are making it. Necessary for you to be resilient. Yes. Yes. See, Clinton's going to, Clinton's going to love that. He's going to love that. Oh, okay. Great. Okay. Last question. And probably the toughest question. If we were in a zombie apocalypse, how would you use? Your total career knowledge to survive. Oh, I don't know. I've thought about this before. I've pretty much decided I'm not going to survive. We're eating you? We're going to have Jen sandwiches. Yeah, I'm like the first phase of death. I've accepted. And that's my answer. No, I'm having Jen burgers. Yeah, yeah. Please, if we must turn to cannibalism, I insist. Yeah, I don't know. I've thought that, you know, I'll run to a Costco and barricade myself inside. Add, I gain experience. Well, we need you fat and healthy. We need you to fatten up because we're going to have roasted Jen on the, on the fire pit. Yes. And that's fine. I guess let me think about this. You know, in, in ecology, there's a lot of field work, so I can camp, I can start a fire. Okay. So that's a really helpful skill. Okay, I think you'll be the best first zombie. Yeah, yeah. I'm going to bite you. You're going to become the zombie. Exactly. After the And now you know where all the marginalized communities are. You're going to find them. Oh, no. No, I'm going to isolate. I'm in T. C. So I'm going to, actually, I'm south of T. C. Eat the white people first. Yes, I will. Yeah, I will try. I'll go to the woods and I'll just camp while I become a zombie and hopefully just die on my own due to starvation. Oh, well, Jen, thank you. Thank you for taking the time out to have this conversation with me. And on that note, thank you to our listeners. I want to thank the sponsors of the 2023 Homecoming Conference event, which was held on Howard University's campus. Thank you National Geographic Society, National Academy's Gulf Research Program, Mapping Black California, Hope and Heal, and Spatial GIS. We also want to give a special thanks to our guests. Thank you. for trusting us with your stories. Shannon, Sandra, Kevin, Margo, Frank, Jen, Dr. Louberts, Karee, Dr. Graham, Gloria, Michael, Eric, Sky, Nick, Dr. Yoboa Kwakun, Veronique, and Dawn. We also want to thank Howard University for allowing us to present in the iconic browsing room and to the Northstar team. Thank you. Shakonda, Raisha, Clinton. Erica, Yolanda, and our volunteers and student ambassadors. Thank you also to KMG. Audio is produced by Cherry Blossom Production, and I'm Aisha, your host and the executive producer of the inaugural season of the North Star Gaze podcast, which is based on the 2023 Homecoming conference event.