Community Outreach Case Studies

Communicate data in a way that is salient to each site and community.

Put messaging tools in the hands of community groups and schools. Use our train-the-trainer model to scale projects and exponentially increase impact. Contact us to sponsor an installation.

Rising Waters Sea Level Rise & Climate Awareness Campaign - Florida

Broward County Florida: Climate Change & Sea Level Rise Student Summit and Community Outreach Campaign

Partners: Climate Creatives, School Board of Broward County, The Broward County Environmental Planning & Community Resilience Division

Campaign:

• Public art: Rising Waters installations at Museum of Discovery & Science, and Centennial Park, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

• Rising Waters training workshops for students at Climate Change/Sea Level Rise summit at MODS

• Webinar teacher trainings

• Student-led Rising Waters installations at 16 schools and community locations

• #Do1Thing action campaign

• Student-led community education campaigns

For more information, visit the Rising Waters website.

Rising Waters Sea Level Rise & Climate Refugee Awareness Campaign - Panama

Guna Yala (San Blas Islands), Panama: Sea Level Rise Awareness. Community installation and student art workshop.

Project: The Guna Yala people, an indigenous tribe from Panama’s mainland, have lived on the San Blas islands since 1925. The still own land in the nearby mountains where they routinely hunt for food and farm, in addition to fishing. Tribal elders recognize the need to relocate back to the mainland, but they lack funding to do so.

Susan Israel flew to these islands on the southern end of the archipelago to make these installations and bring back the story of island populations that are becoming climate refugees due to sea level rise.

Campaign:

• Rising Waters installations on low lying coral atolls made with community participation

• Art-making workshop with students

• Interviews of community elders. This is what we learned:

  • Rising water levels: each October high tide creeps up the main street

  • Many residents are aware of the need to move but ;ack funds

  • The Panamanian government is building schools on the mainland near the islands to prepare for the Guna Yala people leaving the islands

For more information, visit the page for this campaign on the Rising Waters website.

Rising Waters Storm Preparedness Campaign

Maverick Square, East Boston: Flood/Storm Preparedness Outreach Campaign

Partners: Climate Creatives, NOAH Neighborhood of Affordable Housing (NOAH), East Boston Neighborhood Health Center, MBTA, Red Cross, NeighborWorks, United Way, City of Boston Emergency Services and others

Campaign:

• Public art: Rising Waters installations in MBTA station and East Boston Neighborhood Health Center

• Teen employment program participated in making the artwork

• Public information exhibit in Health Center (photographic banners)

• Open house at the Health Center with emergency service providers & information, dance performance by local non-profit, live poetry

• Community information and listening meetings

• Household Flyer drop with flood preparedness checklist, multi-lingual

Message-in-a-Bottle

Message-in-a-Bottle is an interactive installation that invites responses to a question. This call and response piece encourages reflection & dialogue in any setting. It began as a companion piece to Rising Tides at HarborArts and has been used at the New England Campus Sustainability Forum at UMass as a table top exercise, the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Living Room Project, and festivals.

ASK

What would you ask a scientist about climate change? What do people need to know to move them to action? People often feel helpless in the face of such an enormous problem and disinformation campaigns. Our volunteers wore ASK ensembles to events to answer questions, and to distribute information and inspiration action cards. Our postcards showed how small numbers add up to big ones when everyone conserves energy and uses renewable energy.

Sponsored by the German Embassy and Transatlantic Climate Bridge and deployed in multiple cities in the US.

See more here.