Climify

Have you ever felt helpless as an advocate for climate at your job or wondered where to find good paying jobs in climate action? If so, then this episode of Climify is for you!

Jamie Beck Alexander, from Drawdown Labs, joins Eric to kick off Season 3 of Climify where each episode is themed by one of the Drawdown Climate Solution Sectors. In this first episode, Jamie shares her journey into climate activism (and how you can follow her lead), the mission of Project Drawdown, how she helped get big businesses to support the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), and most importantly why “every job is a climate job”.

It all begins with an idea.

How important are oceans to our climate? How vital are they to our general health? Did a video of an injured turtle really change the world? Marine Biologist and educator Carissa Cabrera joins Eric and explains it all through her work in media, science, and activism. You’ll learn from this episode that indeed there is an ocean of opportunity for designers for climate action; dive in.

What is it like to be a freelance designer who cares about the climate crisis? What are the challenges? What are the best practices to thrive? Recent graduates from the Univ. of Illinois graphic design (Michelle Nguyen) and SCAD industrial design (Gianna Romero) programs share their stories of trying to “design for good” while paying the bills. They also explain what ways their design education could have better prepared them for this journey.

How well are we preparing our design students for a career? Do we talk about climate and sustainability enough or effectively? What are our design students thinking and feeling about their education and future? Marc O'Brien guest hosts and learns from four California College of the Arts (CCA) design students about their insights into those questions and ideas to improve design education in part two of this two-part series called Climate Design in the Big World.

How well are we preparing our design students for a career? Do we talk about climate and sustainability enough or effectively? What are our design students thinking and feeling about their education and future? Eric learns from two University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign design students Sadeen Allhalabi & Adam Dziaba about their insights into those questions and ideas to improve design education in part one of this two-part series called Climate Design in the Big World.

The need for effective climate communication and storytelling is paramount to reach a public tipping point on important individual and political action. Good design and communication can shape any worldview and influence change. That is the good work Brooke Havlik had done for over a decade. In this episode, Brooke shares her vast experiences working in climate communication and effective strategies designers can use to turn the tide toward a better climate future.

What media(s) could we use to tell better climate stories? What is the message that we should send to increase not only climate awareness but climate action? [John Jennings](https://www.johnjenningsstudio.com), professor, comics artist, author, and design theorist shares with Eric a brief history of social justice in comics and why he thinks they are a valuable resource and medium to inspire climate activism for all ages. This podcast is sponsored by [Dreamhost](http://wwww.dreamhost.com/climify).

Feeling down? Anxious? Stressed? Try getting your hands dirty in the soil. California-based soil expert Dr. Laney Siegner shares with Eric the amazing power of healthy soil and its fascinating story about how it can lessen the impacts of hurricanes, increase our overall health, and sequester carbon to decrease the impacts of climate change. Tune in also to learn the five principles of regenerative farming and how those can be translated for designers to create more responsibility to combat the worst of climate change.

What convinces someone to commit to climate action? Why isn’t the terrifying data enough for some? Politics? Religion? Geography? Culture? Do we need better design? All of the above. Scientist and information designer Gabrielle Mérite explains why if you want to help convince people to act on the climate you want to connect to their culture and community, and maybe not mention the word climate at all.