Coral Avery is an enrolled member of the Shawnee Tribe and grew up in San Diego County, California. She is a Bureau of Indian Affairs (BIA) Pathways Program Intern working closely with NW CASC Tribal Liaison Chas Jones for both the Affiliated Tribes of Northwest Indians (ATNI) and NW CASC in youth climate programming. Coral’s professional mission is to bring attention to the bridge of social and environmental sustainability.
In Coral’s previous role as a BIA Pathways Program Intern at the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians, she specialized in Tribal forestry, food sovereignty, and natural resource management. She also taught as an Education Specialist at the San Diego Zoo Safari Park where she bridged topics of ecosystem functions, wildlife conservation and K-12 art and science.
Coral will earn her BS degree from Oregon State University in the fall of 2020 in Human Dimensions of Natural Resources and Sustainability with a minor in German. She is looking forward to expanding her regional connections and bridging her experiences back home and in the Pacific Northwest.
What led you to work in the field of climate adaptation?
Growing up in southern California, the impacts of climate change became increasingly clear as drought conditions and high temperatures set records year after year. At the same time, urbanization paved over some of the nature spaces I enjoyed, further threatening our endangered chaparral habitat and wildlife while also threatening people, as gentrification began forcing people out of their homes and asthma, cancer, and other health issues worsened. In college, I began to understand the intersections of urbanization, climate change and social justice that I had observed in my hometown and decided to pursue a double degree in human dimensions of natural resources and sustainability.
What does your day-to-day work look like?
My day-to-day varies greatly by project, but I work from home with my cat Misha. At ATNI, I focus most on youth engagement, event planning, digital media design, video production, collaborative marketing and outreach and analyzing Tribal climate vulnerability assessments. I engage in a lot of conference calls, and between them, I typically work on either digital flyers, data entry or video creation.
How does your organization support climate resilience in the Northwest?
ATNI supports climate resilience by connecting Tribes to grant opportunities, offering free workshops on various topics and hosting regional and national meetings and events. Some of these opportunities include the National Tribal Leadership Climate Change Summit, the Tribal Climate Camp, and my main project this summer, the Indigenous Youth Video Contest.
What is your favorite thing about your work?
Because I’m still fairly new to my role, in which everything has been happening virtually, the best part of my job has been getting to know the people I work with and learning about the various collaborative groups that work with ATNI such as NW CASC, the National Congress of American Indians, and the Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals. At each workshop, conference call and virtual event I attend, I learn something new about these organizations, the opportunities they provide and the lessons learned of collaborative efforts.