On the Greenlandic ice sheet BH, July 2013. Photo: Leehi Yona

I first took an environmental biology class when I was sixteen – before then, I had no interest in the natural world, let alone knew what climate change even was.

So, how did I end up devoting my entire final year of my undergraduate career studying climate solutions instead of taking classes?

Once I started thinking about climate change, I couldn’t think about anything else. You see, once I learned about the intense challenges that lie ahead in a world with human-caused global warming, I was struck by how interconnected every other major political and social issue is to climate change: education, development, national security, health, jobs – you name it.

Climate change is, without a doubt, a wicked problem of monumental proportions – I felt compelled to do something about it.

The more I began studying the problem, the more I realized I didn’t know. As a young person who became acutely aware of how her future would be impacted by action (or lack thereof) on climate change, I suddenly found that climate justice demanded my attention.

I couldn’t possibly be doing anything else.