Our CAPAL Intern Spotlight is Stephanie Choi, a student from the University of Arizona and one of our remote interns! She is currently placed in the Bay Area, working for the U.S. Forest Service Pacific Southwest Regional Office (R5 RO) -Sustainable Operations & Climate Change.
What are your main responsibilities at your position? What are some of your big projects?
My focus as an Intern in the R5 RO, located in Vallejo, CA, is to support the Sustainable Operations Collective and Climate Change programs. I work on projects that are both specific to the R5 region and to the entire nation. Some of my priority Regional projects include reviewing and creating reports from the Climate Change Scorecard preliminary responses. In this capacity, I assist the Regional Sustainable Operations and Climate Change Coordinators with R5 forests and unit that have yet to reach “yes” on their scorecard, showing they have made the necessary actions to mitigate climate change by the end of the fiscal year.
I also have the chance to utilize my background as an English and Literacy, Learning, and Leadership major to develop my writing and management skills to analyze documents, and create climate and sustainability reports. I manage the Leadership and Sustainable Operations (LISO) reporting process for the 2015 Sustainable Operations Microgrants, and prepare final summary reports to present to the Regional Leadership Team, in addition to collecting and reporting on sustainability projects across the region for the 4th Quarter Sustainable Operations eBulletin. I also create the “Climate Change Blast” write-ups to be published on the internal R5 Climate Change Integration Site, which helps to highlight to the other members the great projects and programs the individual forestry units are implementing.
Some of my priority National projects include assisting the Sustainable Operations Collective in reviewing and preparing communications materials with my fellow CAPAL SusOps & Climate Change Intern, Andrew Lo, for the “Net Zero” initiative. I also work on Corporate Action Priority Items, and other necessary tasks and reports to further monitor climate change directives and management throughout the nation. I am very grateful for the opportunity with CAPAL to develop skills and valuable experience which I could not have anywhere else!
How does this internship/scholarship fit with your professional and career goals?
This is my fifth week in my internship placement, and I truly believe I have experienced more personal growth than I have at any other time in my life! Understanding what I want for my future professional career is definitely one of the biggest areas of growth. Working for an agency with a cause and mission as worthy as that of the the Forest Service is truly amazing.
In addition, it is completely aligned with my personal beliefs, especially the two programs I am working for directly. My work represents my morals and passions, which makes it easy to persevere and prevail through challenges. Just in the first month, my internship has really helped me realize that even though I’m not certain of what profession I will go into, I know that my top requirement will be working for an organization whose mission and cause I believe in fully and am 100% passionate about!
What do you hope to achieve this summer through your scholarship/internship experience?
The opportunities this internship position has given me in terms of personal growth and experience have already far exceeded my expectations! I feel exhilarated both by my projects at work and all of the new skills I’m developing, as well as the personal realizations I am making. I hope that I achieve success in all of my projects and provide valuable products to my supervisors; in addition, I hope to be an all around asset to the team through my time in the position.
What does public service mean to you?
Public service means working for a cause and supporting a mission bigger than any one individual, company, or stakeholder. To me, it means working for more socially, environmentally, and economically just communities, which, ultimately, means creating a better society!
What do you consider to be the most interesting thing about you?
I have probably made over $1000 dumpster diving (pictured with some of her loot on the left)! And, although it is fun and exciting to jump in dumpsters and find stuff, every time I go, it is really hard to reconcile the uncomfortable feeling I get seeing all of the waste our society produces. For me, it is just a very real reminder of our waste culture, and inspires me to keep working for societal change in sustainability!
What are you most excited to do in Washington D.C. this summer?
I am very excited to come to Washington, D.C. for the closing ceremony and to have some time to feel out the culture of DC!
However, I am truly happy in my national placement, my internship location in the Bay Area has been an incredible experience. I absolutely love living in Berkeley and exploring all parts of the Bay, I am quickly realizing that this is a perfect place to live! I’ve especially loved the plethora of art & literary scenes all around the city and East Bay. I can’t wait to continue exploring the area, and falling more in love with this dot on the globe more and more every day!
Stephanie Choi: I’m a rising junior at the University of Arizona, studying English and Literacy, Learning, and Leadership. My two passions in life are art and the environment; I’m committed to exploring all the ways we can raise dialogue & create change around complex environmental issues through art–language/poetry, visual art, sculpture, public installations, and etc. I believe the purpose of life is to continuously work towards understanding all of the beautiful mysteries on this world. Generally, there two ways one can do this: by pursuing ideas in art/social science, or math/hard science. But, I think a truly special way to do this is by pursuing ideas that highlight the way art and science complement each other. I’m trying to focus my intentions on this way of understanding life–even with my irrational fear of numbers and spreadsheets! My natural abilities and skills lean towards social sciences & communication. I love coordinating events, communicating through social media platforms, and executing inspiring projects/programs! At school, I am involved in Residence Life and a program called Students for Sustainability. I enjoy reading, writing poetry, doing yoga, and running; but, most of the time, I am finding metaphors in strange objects, falling asleep in the middle of movies, collecting people’s words, and getting bitten by fire ants.
Meet all of our 2015 CAPAL Scholars & Interns here.
Posted by Taylor Huang-Boutelle
Taylor is an incoming Senior at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She is double majoring in World Literature and Feminist Studies, with a concentration in Law, Politics, and Social Change. Taylor is in the D.C. cohort for the Center for Asian Americans United for Self Empowerment (www.causeusa.org) and is currently a summer interns at the Conference on Asian Pacific American Leadership, where she is focusing on development and fundraising, and will be developing the blog content for this summer. Taylor is passionate about issues of representation, coalition between underserved communities, and creating spaces for strength and solidarity around injustices through community activism and public policy. taylor.boutelle [at] capal [dot] org