Catching up with the “Revolutionary Power Fellows”
We caught up with Daysia Charles and Wanjiku “Wawa” Gatheru – the amazing young women who have been working alongside Shalanda Baker (Deputy Director for Energy Justice, U.S. Department of Energy & Co-Founder and Co-Director, Initiative for Energy Justice) as her “Revolutionary Power Fellows” at the Department of Energy this summer with funding support from the Greater Boston chapter of the American Association of Blacks in Energy (AABE), NEWIEE, Bluewave Solar, FirstLight Power, and Revision Energy
These young women were already trailblazers and have been elevated to a new level of excellence while working with the Department of Energy.
How have your lives changed since learning you had been chosen for this prestigious fellowship?
Daysia:
“The transition from February when we found out we were selected to now has been a lot of beginnings and endings for me.
I was able to graduate from high school and from a bunch of the STEM programs that got me to where I am today. Although they were a bit of teary-eyed goodbyes, I have to say that I’m just so grateful that I was able to go through those programs, especially because a lot of them were four-year programs and be able to get here.
I was also able to continue a lot of my food justice work through Alternatives for Community and Environment, a Boston-based environmental justice organization. I’ve been able to give out seedlings and be able to help people in my community grow their own gardens and be able to have more access to food and increase food security.
I’ve also been able to work with NEWIEE to launch an aspiring professional’s page on the NEWIEE website. It has been awesome so far!”
Wawa:
“Like Daysia, I feel like the transition from February to now has just been so much.
In February I remember I was taking classes completely virtually. I moved to the United Kingdom last October. I came home for the holidays just to find out that I wouldn’t be allowed to go back to campus because of Covid. So, I found myself taking pretty much the remainder of my grad classes virtually – which is around the time that Daysia and I were awarded this amazing fellowship.
I’m doing a master’s and I’m almost done finishing up my dissertation in nature society and environmental governance. While I’ve had a really fantastic time, the program has been very heavy, and my heart has always been in doing the work that is directly impacting community. That has always been the thing that has drew me into environmental work and now energy work! I really felt like that was something that I was missing.
So, flashback to now and being able, even though virtually, to do work that I know is so groundbreaking in the realm of energy justice and to really be at the forefront of the federal government, doing energy justice work. That transition felt like a really great answer to a lot of the prayers that I was putting out there. I want to spend the summer doing work that’s grounded in community and the work that got me interested in this field in the first place. Being able to live that out and live that out with Shalanda, as well as Daysia, and the amazing J40 team that we work with is so inspiring. It’s been just a phenomenal experience to see and be mentored by such incredible people that we now look up to. So, it’s really been a great experience so far. “
The J40 Team
As expected, the fellows have been warmly received by the DOE and have found that their voice matters on Shalanda’s team,
“I feel like I’m just as valued as the other team members that have been there for multiple months and even a year or more,” said Wawa.
Both Daysia and Wawa have been working diligently this summer with Shalanda Baker’s J40 team and to their surprise Daysia remarked that they’ve been able to learn about every single aspect of energy justice advocacy that has been happening on the government level which is phenomenally similar to a lot of the energy justice work that she actually sees on the ground level.
The fellows have connected with people in other departments of government, companies, community stakeholders to learn how each type of group thinks about energy justice in a different way with the similar goal of needing to make sure that underserved communities have access and have more benefits when it comes to this energy transition. One of their primary functions has been ensuring these stakeholder voices are heard when it comes to making sure that benefits are provided for underserved communities.
Planning a Youth Stakeholder Forum
The fellows have also been planning a Youth Stakeholder Forum – Energy Justice: The Next Generation. This event is for college students to join DOE’s Justice40 team for a discussion on energy justice, and its significance for young climate leaders. During this event they’ll examine the causes and effects of the disproportionate energy and environmental burdens that are faced across different communities. Undoubtedly, President Biden’s historic Justice40 Initiative will be discussed. Participants will be able to learn about the Department’s current efforts, explore different facets of energy justice solutions, and offer their own ideas and experiences to help tackle injustice.
With a bright future ahead of them both, the NEWIEE family are all tuned in to see the amazing work ahead of them and wish them nothing but success on their journey.
the “Revolutionary Power Fellows”
Daysia Charles is a 2021 graduate of the Academy of the Pacific Rim Charter Public High School. She will soon begin her pursuit of an environmental engineering degree at Dartmouth College with hopes of gaining a doctorate and working for the EPA in the future.
Daysia is also an immensely passionate advocate, with focuses on climate change, food security, and energy justice. She fights to get rid of barriers that disproportionately strain low income and BIPOC communities. Daysia is also the recent winner of the AABE National Rufus Gladney scholarship of $20,000. Candidates were judged to demonstrate the most outstanding achievement and promise from scholarship applications from across the nation.
Wanjiku “Wawa” Gatheru, this 22-year-old powerhouse is an environmental justice advocate, writer and current graduate student at the University of Oxford. She is a proud Kenyan-American and the first Black person in history to receive the Rhodes, Truman and Udall scholarships. Wawa is also the founder of Black Girl Environmentalist. She has been recognized as a 2020 Young Futurist by the Root, a 2020 Grist 50 FIXER, a 2020 Glamour College Woman of the Year and has spoken at events across the country on intersectional environmentalism.
© 2024 New England Women in Energy and the Environment (NEWIEE). NEWIEE is a non-profit, tax exempt organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
