Redesigning Our Future

John and the field team collecting fish as part of a water quality research project in Bolivia A couple of years ago, Cathy Green and Dr. John Wear, the Center for the Environment’s director of operations and executive director, respectively, decided to go to a café in Durham, NC, after a long day of interviews. They were sipping on coffee when a familiar face approached them to say hello: Summit alumnus and then-Duke University student John Hare-Grogg .  John attended the National Environmental Summit in 2011, its first year, at a time when he still wasn’t sure where he saw his career going. However, he knew he was passionate about environmental issues, so upon learning about this opportunity in his home state of North Carolina, he included it in his summer plans. “I wasn’t totally sure what to expect,” he says. “It seemed like a great opportunity to go to Salisbury and learn about environmental issues and environmental leadership strategies for a few days. As it tur...

             E very summer, students travel from around the country to attend the National Environmental Summit. In 2012, Meghan Barker was the student who traveled the farthest to attend the Summit, coming all the way from her home state of Colorado. Of the traveling, Meghan says, “It was my first time in NC, so the Summit was . . . a great travel opportunity for me to engage with people who did not grow up in the same region and regional culture as me.” While on the East Coast, Meghan enjoyed discovering what North Carolina’s natural world had to offer and how it differed from her home state of Colorado. She loved spending time outside exploring the Fred Stanback, Jr. Ecological Preserve , and she liked being able to connect with other students during social times in the evening, forming relationships that she still maintains today! Meghan wanted to be a field biologist at the time of the Summit, so she chos...