Women's Environmental Leader Award
 
 
The Women's Environmental Leader award  honors a woman who is an outstanding leader in an environmental field and is a model for future generations of women environmental leaders. 

2008 Women's Environmental Leader

2007 Women's Environmental Leader  

Tonight we gather in celebration and recognition of extraordinary women. Intelligent, passionate, creative minds who dare to dream! It is my pleasure to introduce this year’s recipient of the Women’s Environmental Leader award.

I met her for a brief lunch this afternoon, and I found myself very quickly drawn into an outrageous camel trek through desert caves with Bedouin guides. Guides of what experience? This she questions for they occasionally became dangerously lost. She further told us of the ancient desert navigational method of storytelling. This means forgetting a chapter, means missing an entire nautical chart, landing at an undesirable port, leading them into sometimes hostile territory. But not to worry; this world explorer did exactly what she needed to do! DANCE!
The Women’s Environmental Leader award honors outstanding women who exemplify and support the learning success of self and scientific discovery.  I am pleased to welcome Milbry Polk into our community as this year’s award recipient.

Milbry Polk is the Co-Founder, and Executive Director of Wings Woldquest; an organization dedicated to promoting, researching, and celebrating the contributions of extraordinary women explorers, of past, present and future. She is a distinguish author and co- author of several works; dedicating her writing talent to rediscovering the lost stories and work of hundreds of remarkable women. Women like, Amelia Mary Earhart, Jane Goodall, Kathryn Sullivan, the first women to walk in space, and Nicole Maxwell an American Ethnobotnist and Amazon witch doctor’s apprentice. The collection of these women’s stories and many others is powerful and hopeful fuel of inspiration for future generations of courageous: scientists, naturalists, biologist, archeologists, conservationists, the world’s woman leaders. 

In the introduction of Women of Discovery- A Celebration of Intrepid Women Who Explore the World: Milbry writes: “My earliest dreams and strongest desired all had to do with travel and discovery…I had to serve as my own apprenticeship in discovery.” 

Milbry I believe Unity College and WE LEAD share this same attitude with you.  We too aspire to discover, and learn from our earth’s environments- Ms. Polk on behalf of Unity College, WE LEAD and all our Environmental Leaders, I would like to thank you for your contributions towards supporting the adventures, work and dream of so many remarkable women.

To quote you one last time “The voyage of exploration and discovery can happen anywhere- in a desert or jungle, or library or laboratory, because, whatever the goal may be the process is about discovering one’s self.” I thank you for this insight on reflection.

I ask you all to please join and welcome to our community Milbry Polk.

Written and presented by Julie Lachance, Adventure Education Junior

Alix Hopkins

Today, WE LEAD and Unity College proudly welcome land conservationist and author, Alix W. Hopkins, to our campus and to our community.

Alix Hopkins has spent over 20 years in various aspects of land conservation.  After working in Utah to learn about avalanche control, on a ranch in Wyoming, in a salmon cannery in Alaska, in both public relations and political organizing, as a freelance photojournalist, and finally as founding executive director of Portland Trails- it would seem obvious to any average person that it is about time for a break.  Perhaps you would vacation in the tropics, knit scarves for the whole family, or take a desk job.  However, if you happen to be Alix Hopkins, the only natural thing to do would be to embark on a nationwide journey and write an acclaimed book.  When we heard about Alix Hopkins accomplishments, we discovered quickly that we were not dealing with your average woman.

Ms. Hopkins has spent the last four years collecting the voices of land conservation from around the United States and synthesizing them into Groundswell, her latest writing.  Groundswell captures, in word and breathtaking photograph, the stories of six communities that used grassroots organizing and unlikely partnerships to achieve their environmental goals.  From a community supported agriculture program in Wisconsin, to a river restoration coalition in the Bronx, to her own experiences at Portland Trails- Alix takes the reader step by step through the challenges and triumphs of community organizing.       

In each story, there is one striking similarity: at the conclusion of the conservation work, the individuals succeed in not only transforming the physical surroundings, but in transforming as human beings.  The communities do not only save the landscape, but they save themselves, as well.

Over winter break, I had a telephone conversation with Alix in which we discussed the how people’s attitude change when they are exposed to the open air and are able to work with the land.  As founding executive director at Portland Trails, Alix experienced this firsthand.  The citizens of Portland were given a local escape from busy streets and found themselves making friends out of strangers who walked the same trails.  Even more meaningful were the connections made within the organization under Alix’s intuitive leadership.

Before I hung up with her, I asked Alix if there was anything vital to include in my welcome speech.  She replied, “Speak from your heart.”  Groundswell, as much as it is a handbook for community organizing, is a heartfelt ode to community.

As a reader, when I turned through the final pages of Groundswell, I could not help but think: What next?  The versatile, inexhaustible Alix is currently the co-president of the Pownal Land Trust, on the board of the Northern Forest Canoe Trail and the Maine Cost Heritage Trust.

So today, on behalf of WE LEAD, I warmly offer Alix yet another position: the Fourth Annual Women's Environmental Leader Award recipient.  This award honors a woman who is an outstanding leader in an environmental field and is a model for future generations of women environmental leaders.  I think we’ve found our woman.

Please join me in congratulating Alix.  Keep up the great work.

Citation written and presented by Sara Trunzo