Wildfires, water quality, weather patterns: Scripps fellows have ambitious plans for climate reporting

Joe Arney — Thu, 26 Jun 2025 22:25:22 +0000

Wildfires, water quality, weather patterns: Scripps fellows have ambitious plans for climate reporting Joe Arney Thu, 06/26/2025 - 16:25

By Sharon Waters

The 2025-26 class of Ted Scripps Fellows in Environmental Journalism at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ’s College of Communication, Media, Design and Information will explore a range of issues related to climate change, encompassing emerging infectious diseases to technology’s potential role in catching arsonists responsible for wildfires.

Part of the college’s Center for Environmental Journalism, the Scripps fellowship gives full-time journalists the opportunity to enhance their knowledge and understanding of a variety of topics, so they can more effectively report on pressing environmental issues in ways that resonate with broad audiences. Over a nine-month period, fellows attend classes, participate in weekly seminars and field trips, and meet experts as they develop independent journalistic projects related to the environment.

Established in 1993, the Scripps fellowship has been based at ��ý�Ļ��Ʒ since 1997, making this the 29th class to join the program as part of the university.

This year’s fellows are:

	Ben Cathey, meteorologist and environmental/science reporter, WLVT. Cathey will spend his fellowship pursuing a serialized set of news pieces on wildfires. With the Front Range as a backdrop, Cathey plans to predict weather patterns governing wildfires while studying the use of artificial intelligence and drones to spot fires and catch arsonists. Cathey has won Emmy and Edward R. Murrow awards, and his work has been honored by The Associated Press, Society of Professional Journalists and American Meteorological Society.
	Erin Douglas, climate reporter, The Boston Globe. As a Scripps fellow, Douglas will study the relationship between climate and emerging infectious diseases. At the Globe, Douglas covers climate adaptation and resilience, including rising sea levels, disaster recovery, inland flooding and water quality. She has also covered climate change for The Texas Tribune and energy and environment issues for the Houston Chronicle. Douglas’ work has been recognized by Investigative Reporters and Editors, Society of Environmental Journalists, and Society for Advancing Business Editing and Writing. She was part of Tribune teams honored with Murrow awards in 2022.
	Christopher Solomon, freelance journalist. A full-time freelancer since 2002, Solomon writes frequently for The New York Times. His work also has appeared in Outside Magazine, National Geographic, Wired, Travel + Leisure, Orion and other national publications. Solomon is a former staff reporter for The Seattle Times and was a contributing editor and contract writer for Outside. His work has been featured seven times in the annual Best American anthologies of notable writing from HarperCollins.
	Chris Walker, freelance journalist. During his fellowship, Walker will study corporate sustainability, with a focus on how investors, regulators and the current political climate are influencing climate actions by businesses. His environmental reporting includes stories about a Turkish town’s fight against a coal plant, rights of nature lawsuits, and climate denialism among oil and gas executives. A three-time Livingston Award finalist, Walker has been a staff writer at two alt-weeklies and an editor with 5280. His work has appeared in The Ecologist, Westword and The Lever.
	Amanda Williams, special projects editor, NPR 1A. As a fellow, Williams will explore intergenerational stories of climate change around the world, connecting family stories of environmental change to climate solutions. Williams hopes to center young people in her reporting, including her daughter, born in 2024. At NPR’s 1A, Williams manages long-term projects, including on-air series, partnerships and events, plus daily news coverage. She was a local newspaper reporter in southern Virginia and a student reporting fellow with the Pulitzer Center.

The newest class of fellows at the Center for Environmental Journalism brings experience from NPR, The New York Times, National Geographic and more.

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Designer label

Amanda J. McManus — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 20:11:50 +0000

Designer label Amanda J. McManus Wed, 02/19/2025 - 13:11

All things CMDI

��ý�Ļ��Ʒ our CMDI resources page for more on the college name and FAQs about the opportunities this change will afford to students and alumni.

By Joe Arney
Photos by Kimberly Coffin (CritMedia, StratComm'18)

Art by Cuauhtémoc Campos

A childhood trek to visit Aztec temples in Mexico was the first time Cuauhtémoc Campos thought about a future in architecture.

It wasn’t the last.

Long before the first-year landscape architecture student set foot on the University of Colorado Boulder campus, Campos helped his father design a porch and a patio area for their home. Now, in his environmental design courses, he’s refining those skills and interests to bring his visions to life, from reusing physical space on campus to a design of his name that borrowed from those Aztec ruins that inspired him.

“Most of the projects we do are hands-on and challenge us to experiment with our creativity,” Campos said. “But also, we do a lot of presentations to prepare us for when we need to talk about our work publicly.”

He said he hopes to further strengthen his communication skills once the environmental design program becomes fully integrated with the College of Media, Communication and Information. On July 1, Campos and his peers will formally become part of CMCI, at which point the college will rebrand itself as the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information, or CMDI.

“I was a little shocked when I first heard we were becoming part of CMCI,” he said. “But I feel like the resources we’ll have from being part of the college will add more to what we’re able to learn, while hopefully introducing CMCI students to what makes ENVD special.”

An important charge for Lori Bergen, founding dean of CMCI, was structuring the integration in a way that added value for ENVD students, alumni, faculty and staff without disrupting the cultures of either entity. As a department within the college, environmental design will be able to retain its identity while benefiting from enhanced and expanded services and networks.

“When we created CMCI, we had three concepts that guided our vision—think, innovate and create,” Bergen said. “Now, as we become CMDI, those principles are just as relevant to our identity. If anything, the intensely hands-on nature of an ENVD education reinforces our mission as a college that brings different, but related, disciplines together, to help us bring interdisciplinary insights to increasingly complex problems.”

Azza Kamal, right, works with a student on a project to refresh the Boulder Dushanbe Teahouse.

First forays at collaboration

Faculty and staff from environmental design became part of the college in July 2024, so some collaboration has already begun. Azza Kamal, an associate teaching professor of sustainable planning and urban design, is working with Pat Clark, an assistant professor of critical media practices, to give her students access to the college’s Immersive Media Lab later this semester.

“In my studio, we’re working on a virtual reality/augmented reality model for retrofitting neighborhoods in Denver to comply with green building codes and emission reduction bills, and we’ll use his facility so that students can work on their models, but also to explore and get hands-on with the technology,” Kamal said. “I was going to buy the equipment, but then found out Patrick had everything we needed in his lab. And he’s just amazing—he works around our schedule, students will have access to the lab 24/7, I couldn’t ask for more.”

That kind of collaboration is something Stacey Schulte hopes faculty will build on as the players begin to work together.

“No discipline exists in a vacuum,” said Schulte, director of environmental design. “I am excited to see how environmental design will collaborate with communication- and media-related disciplines, and vice versa.

“As our students continue to create impactful work, they learn how to tell the story of their projects—the problems their designs are intending to solve, and how those solutions create positive community impact—in ways that resonate with stakeholders.”

CMCI's emphasis on communication and presentation skills has Ella Seevers excited about environmental design becoming part of the college.

Kamal said she’s still learning about the players in CMCI who would be good fits for collaboration, “but there is a lot of potential where technology meets storytelling.

“Communication has always been a challenge for architecture and planning students—how to communicate in lay terms. Helping students to take technical, complex designs and be able to tell a story through them—so their clients and the public can appreciate their vision—will be incredibly helpful in their careers.”

That’s a need students recognized, as well. Sophomore Ella Seevers, a landscape architecture student, got some professional communication experience last year, when she worked on a project for the city of Boulder and was challenged to make better use of sites along its creek path. Earlier this month, she went on a site tour and presented her vision to city officials and landscape architects working on a pop-up installation for the summer. Hers is one of three student projects that will influence the final design.

“It was an amazing experience to share our ideas and see that they were actually valued by professional designers who have been doing this for decades,” said Seevers, a teaching assistant in ENVD’s design studios and a mentor to first-year students. “So, I’ve had this opportunity to work with the city already, which is very exciting, because that usually doesn’t happen with a first-year project.

“If you can’t present your design well, and tell other people what you’re thinking and how it’s going to be implemented, then you won’t be a very effective designer,” she said.

Helping students to take technical, complex designs and be able to tell a story through them—so their clients and the public can appreciate their vision—will be incredibly helpful in their careers."
Azza Kamal
Associate Teaching Professor
Environmental Design

‘The story we live in’

While both entities value hands-on learning, critical thinking and creativity, at first glance, it may not be immediately obvious how ENVD and its four majors—architecture, environmental product design, landscape architecture, and sustainable planning and urban design—fit into CMCI. However, “when you think about the stories we hear, tell and watch, environmental design becomes another dimension of the story that we live in,” said Stephanie Marchesi, president of WE Communications, a global integrated communications firm.

“Storytelling is verbal, written and visual—but through their environmental designs, these talented individuals are bringing stories to life in 3D,” said Marchesi (Jour’85), who sits on CMCI’s advisory board. “This will be something very defining for the college, because it’s taking storytelling to new dimensions—literally.”

That’s something faculty in the college are excited to explore in depth.

“My initial reaction to the news was one of intense joy and excitement over what’s possible,” said Bryan Semaan, chair of CMCI’s information science department. “Design intersects so many different spaces. Environmental design researchers are looking at many of the same problems and topics as people across CMCI and within our disciplinary communities, but they’re operating on a scale of how humans will experience and be shaped by the natural and built environments in ways that are important to a sustainable future.”

That could be anything from a database that governs an algorithmic system to the impact of a data center on the environment and people who live nearby.

Elena Sabinson, an assistant professor of environmental design, said an important part of her program’s culture is recognizing and creating things that match the needs of their users. It’s something she works on very closely as director of the Neuro D Lab, which studies how design can trigger innovations that support wellbeing and accessibility to those who are neurodivergent.

“I would say my colleagues in ENVD are interested in bridging those mismatches between the environment and the needs of a user,” she said. “And I think CMCI is already doing a lot of that in its own way, whether it’s documentary or information science or any of those spaces.”

‘Who needs to learn about argument more?’

Alumni like Christopher Bell (PhDMediaSt’09) are watching to see how the college prepares students for the kinds of challenges he sees at work. Bell, a consultant and president of CreativityPartners LLC, said he’s excited to see student and alumni collaborations going forward, such as social media managers who can raise money and awareness for life-changing products coming out of environmental design.

“People who believe they are ‘just’ technically focused are the people who need the most instruction in communication,” said Bell, also a member of CMCI’s advisory board and an instructor who teaches courses in screenwriting and cultural studies. “Those are the people who need us the most, because they are making arguments and sending messages.

“Architecture and city planning are arguments. They’re arguments about what matters, who matters and doesn’t, how we see ourselves in relation to other people, and what is important to spend resources on. So, who needs to learn about argument more than environmental designers?”

When you think about the stories we hear, tell and watch, environmental design becomes another dimension of the story that we live in.”
Stephanie Marchesi (Jour’85)
CMCI Advisory Board member

Meet the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information.

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Spring 2025

CMCI and ENVD share a tradition of hands-on learning, a thirst for innovation and a passion for solving problems in ways that move the world. Those shared values will guide them as they join together and CMCI renames itself the College of Communication, Media, Design and Information. Art by Ella Seevers.