Please join us for a week-long community event for Oxy students, faculty, parents and alumni to discuss, learn, and debate the global issue of climate change.
This year’s theme, Climate Change & Environmental Justice, reflects the UN's Sustainable Development Goal #13. The SDGs are a collection of 17 global goals designed to be a "blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all". They were set in 2015 by the United Nations General Assembly and are intended to be achieved by the year 2030.
Oxy’s annual UN Week is sponsored by the William and Elizabeth Kahane United Nations Program and the Young Initiative on the Global Political Economy with the participation and co-sponsorship of Art & Art History, Biology, Diplomacy & World Affairs, Geology, Economics, Music, Physics, Urban & Environmental Policy, Center for Research & Scholarship, FEAST, and KOXY.
All Week
Climate Change Student Art Exhibition in the Academic Commons main entrance
Monday, February 10
12:00pm in Johnson Global Forum
Kahane U.N. Program in New York: Task Force on Climate Change (the Green Economy and Digital Jobs)
Kahane U.N. Program students report back on their fall 2019 experiences at the U.N., including the research they conducted on the Green Economy and Digital Jobs.
5:30pm in Booth 204
The Creation of Losing Earth
Professor Adam Schoenberg will discuss his creative process for Losing Earth, a percussion concerto inspired by climate change that recently premiered at the San Francisco Symphony.
6:30pm in Booth Courtyard
UN Week Opening Night Reception
Poster presentations by Student Coordinating Committee on U.N. week events. (Booth 208, if inclement weather)
Tuesday, February 11
11:30pm - 1pm at the Academic Quad
Quad Fair
Learn about student organizations that will bring relevant climate-change themed materials that you can take and/or interact with.
7:00pm at Oxy Arts
Climate Imaginaries
Alison Hirsch and Aroussiak Gabrielian (USC Landscape Architecture Dept) will open a conversation about how art and design can engage climate change through creative practice.
Wednesday, February 12
12:45pm in Johnson Global Forum
Climate Change for Future Presidents
Panel on the science of climate change and its policy implications
Chaired by Professor Juve Cortés (Diplomacy & World Affairs), this panel will bring together faculty from a range of disciplines talking about conundrums that their disciplines face in regard to Climate Change, and how their research can lead to policy innovations.
7:00pm in Choi Auditorium
Indigenous Climate Activism
Alberto Saldamando of the Indigenous Environmental Network will give a talk followed by a Q&A session, highlighting the disproportionate effects of climate change encountered by indigenous communities while uplifting indigenous climate activism and the important place it must hold in the current dialogue.
Thursday, February 13
11:30am in Choi Auditorium
Keynote: Water, Markets, and Peace – Environmental Justice through a Food Security Lens
Dr. Steven Were Omamo, Representative and Country Director for the UN World Food Programme (WFP) in Ethiopia, will provide perspective and insights about the UN's work on Climate Change and Environmental Justice.
7:00pm in Choi Auditorium
Los Angeles and Climate Change
Jasmin Vargas (Food and Water Watch) and Dominique Hargreaves (LA Mayor's office, Deputy Sustainability Officer) will discuss environmental activism and organizing in the Los Angeles area. Professor Michael Sardo (Politics) will serve as Commentator for this session.
Friday, February 14
12:00pm in Choi Auditorium
Student Activism & Campus Sustainability
Kaye Jenkins, Naomi Field, and Kevin Patel will open a dialogue regarding the importance of student climate activism and discuss how to get involved in driving forward campus-based sustainability efforts.
5:00pm in Lower Herrick
Community Dinner
Featuring a sustainable dinner, open mic, and film screening of “The City and the Sea” by Anabel Gullo.
