Major Spotlight: Environment and Sustainability; Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; Urban Teaching

We talked to Senior Anna Yokote about their experience with the Urban Teaching minor, as well as the Environment and Sustainability, and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies majors. Read on to learn about their experience balancing all three of these programs!

What is your major?

I’m joint majoring in Environment and Sustainability and Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. So essentially, I’m doing all of the regular requirements for Environment and Sustainability and then fewer Gender Studies electives than the full major. 

I’m also doing the Urban Teaching minor. This track allows you to become a certified NYS public school educator upon graduation from Barnard. So I’ve been taking a lot of pedagogy classes and also doing a lot of fieldwork in schools. This semester, I’m in school teaching half-days every day but most student teachers do full days during their final semester at Barnard. I’m a low-income student and have to work a lot outside of school, so it wasn’t feasible for me to do the full day five days a week. Luckily, the Education department professors are incredibly understanding of different students' lived experiences in the higher ed setting, so they were really accommodating to my situation. 

That’s so many different majors and programs, how are you doing that?

Well, I still have a little bit of stuff to do after I graduate. I still have to teach a little bit because I’m doing half days instead of full days. And I have to do a couple of classes to complete the teaching track. It’s not too much, but honestly, I wouldn’t recommend doing quite as many majors as I did. I really couldn’t decide on a track to follow, and then at the end, I was just like “Well I’m already almost done with all of them” so I might as well do all of them. But at the same time, I’m grateful, as studying these different subjects has really given me an interdisciplinary approach to everything. And all my majors have all given me such different perspectives. 

For example, I want to teach Environmental Science and Earth Science, so it’s cool to have a Gender Studies lens. I think a lot about the ways that the environment interacts with people, and how people interact with the environment. And even how colonialism affects the environment and how that affects people. So those are some ways that my programs give me more depth to my understanding of what “nature” and “environmental science” are. 

My interdisciplinary approach to understanding nature and the environment also impacts the way I teach topics in the classroom. For example, when I taught students about Niagara Falls last week, we also talked about Indigenous displacement and land dispossession due to conservation efforts, environmental tourism, dam building, etc. at the falls.

And Gender Studies helps me approach teaching and my pedagogy through a really radical, justice-oriented lens in other ways too. In my gender studies classes, we also talk a lot about carceral systems, and then I see those systems at play in the classroom. In my classroom, I hope to learn more about how to build a genuine community and dismantle harmful conventions in schools that uphold these systems.

So it’s helpful, all of them have been so helpful and I wouldn't have it any other way now that I’m here at the end of my four years at Barnard. But I do think my experience is a good reminder to yourself that you have so much time to learn. College is only four years, but if you want to keep learning, you can always do that. As a senior I finally started learning about graduate learning opportunities, which I had never thought about doing before… had I known this before, I would have thought more carefully about what to study and how much to put on my plate each semester. There’s always funding out there, so even if you’re a low-income student, you can 100% do graduate studies somewhere if you feel called to do that! It might require more applications, but I believe in y’all… I also have learned so much about community-based learning and knowledge sharing, and it’s helped me expand my idea of how to follow an “education”. So, with the past four years of experiencing Barnard and the stress of doing too much under my belt, I would highly, highly encourage you all to take your time and take care of yourself rather than rushing through things, missing time to be present and really sit with the material – or people, and consequently feeling exhausted all the time.

What drew you to do all these programs?

In my first year, I dabbled in a lot of different classes. At first, I thought I wanted to be a Dance major – that’s actually why I came to Barnard– to be a Dance and Environmental Science major. I grew up in a really rural town in Southern Appalachia so I was in nature a lot and really felt connected to it. And because of that connection, I felt passionate about climate justice and environmental justice. So that drew me to Environmental Science. And then I wanted to major in Dance just because I love to dance. 

But then, I realized that you can take dance classes here for no credits. And I didn’t really want to do theory or lecture classes; I just like to move my body in a creative way within a community. Taking dance at Barnard has shown me how helpful creative movement can be– it helped carry me through really difficult mental health times and helped me balance my ADHD brain. So I’ve been just taking dance classes for fun. I will say that the dance department here is absolutely fantastic, and all of the dance majors here seem to really love their experience with the major. 

And then I started hearing from upper-class folks that the Education classes were amazing. So I took Educational Foundations, and I knew that I had to study education. So I just went for it!

I’m not sure how I got started with Gender Studies. I think people in my education classes recommended those classes, and my partner is a Gender Studies major. And I was interested in understanding my identity a little bit better and becoming a warmer, kinder community member. I wanted to take space with a caring awareness, so that’s what drew me to those classes. The introductory classes really resonated with me as well, especially with my longtime interest in environmental justice.

I love the Gender Studies Department - I mean, I love all of the departments. But because the Gender studies discipline is trying to teach students how to understand people, connect with people, understand systems of power, and fight systems of power, the professors are just so understanding and they see school as a potentially oppressive space for a lot of students. Especially because I’m FGLI (first-generation low-income) they’ve all been really accommodating of my work schedule outside of school. So I would say for Gender Studies it’s the department itself, how they treat students and how they interact with students. I could actually really say the exact same thing for the Education Department, as their entire focus is on student and teacher or faculty communities, the ways systems of power exist within and shape educational spaces, and how to make education a space of liberation. So definitely on a similar wavelength, and the amount of care I feel from my professors has been so important to me. Actually, my closest relationships with professors are my relationships with Education professors. 

What are your favorite classes?

It really depends a lot on the professor. I took Educational Foundations with Erika (Dr. Erika Kitzmiller) in my first year and that’s the class that really changed how I saw education in the United States as well as in my own personal life. And because the class itself took place in an educational institution, every single student could think about the material in a genuinely critical, personalized way. All of us were experiencing the system in a diverse way, and we had been experiencing it for the majority of our life. Erika did an amazing job guiding us through the material. 

I’ve also really enjoyed some of my pedagogical classes. My cohort of other student teachers has been great, we’re all really close. And our professors, Professor Edstrom (Dr. Lisa Edstrom) and Professor Rivera (Dr. Maria Rivera Maulucci). And, a shoutout to our TA, Drew!

In the Environmental Science Department, I’ve taken so many amazing classes with great professors. I love Terryanne (Dr. Terryanne Maenza-Gmelch), and I’m taking Birds, Plants, and Land use dynamics with her now! Just in general, 11/10 professor. She also teaches Introduction to Environmental Science, which I also loved. 

I’m also taking US Imperialism Studies right now. I just started this semester, but so far I really appreciate the historical lens it gives me to the United States and the radical lens it gives me to what’s happening now. For other Gender Studies class recommendations. I really love Dr. Marisa Solomon, she teaches a lot of Gender Studies classes. I took Critical Approaches in Social and Cultural Theory with her and that was amazing. It was online but she somehow managed to make the space really, really great. 

So I would say there are just so many good classes and good professors out there… like too many, it makes it hard to decide what to do, haha!

What has your relationship with CU been like?

I have taken a lot of classes at Columbia. Not so much for Gender Studies, because that’s pretty situated at Barnard. A lot of students from Columbia will take classes at Barnard for Gender Studies and Education. But for Environmental Science, like for a lot of my earth science classes and stuff, I took maybe half and half between Barnard and Columbia. As I got to be an upper-class student, I’ve taken less at Columbia. But when I was in my first, second, and third years, I took more classes at Columbia, especially during my first two years. But I definitely like the vibe of my Barnard classes a lot because people are so aware of the space they take up. 

Do you mind explaining a little bit more about how the urban teacher’s program works?

You have to apply in your sophomore year, and it’s a pretty rigorous program. I think there are seven or eight requirements for the college – you have to take a psych class, an advanced psych class, some pedagogy courses, educational foundations, and some other courses that help you frame your teaching base and understanding of the education system. So that’s one aspect of it. 

And then there are also state requirements. So I’m doing secondary education, which is high school. So I’m specializing in teaching a specific subject, and I have to take 36 credits in that subject area. So what a lot of people will do is like, if they want to teach Chemistry, then they’ll major in Chemistry which gives them plenty of credits to apply to the state requirement. But because I did Environment and Sustainability and Gender Studies, my classes didn’t line up perfectly with the state Earth Science teaching requirements, so that’s why I have to take extra courses after graduation. So there are those two aspects, and then you have a fieldwork aspect. In your junior and senior years, you work in public schools every semester. I did fieldwork twice a week last semester and in the previous semesters, I worked once a week for a full day. Then in your senior spring, you work as a full-time student teacher, which I kind of already talked about earlier. 

I will say that it’s hard to do the teaching track if you work other jobs. On Fridays, sometimes I work all day in the public school and then go straight to the restaurant where I wait tables. Being a student teacher means you have long days, but they’re always really rewarding. I have an amazing cohort of other student teachers, and you get really close to everyone. And the professors are great. And you’re also out and about in the city more, which I do enjoy.

What are your senior requirements like?

Yeah, so there’s a capstone project in Urban Teaching that you do in your fall semester. It’s an inquiry project, so you have a question about pedagogy or classroom dynamics you’re trying to answer. My project was based on the fact that I teach at an art school, but I teach science at an art school. So I asked how student identities as an artist (or not artists?) affect their motivation in science learning. Are they forced to feel like I am this kind of student, and therefore don’t give any other subjects any other space? Especially in science it often feels like if you do it you have to be good at it. But science can be fun and explorative and really nobody actually knows anything. So I did interviews and had survey data that I analyzed and put in a presentation. 

So that was for that, and then for Environmental Science and Sustainable Development you can take both major thesis classes, but I just didn’t have time. So I am just doing my Environmental Science thesis right now, and I am writing it on militarization and colonization in Okinawa, Japan, which was originally the Ryukyu kingdom and then was violently colonized by Japan and then the US after World War 2, and then the US returned it to Japan… and now US bases take up like 10% of the land there. And they're building a new base and creating a new offshore air base in the ocean, constructing it on top of a coral reef and seagrass. So I’m trying to learn about how the habitat destruction is impacting an organism that's really special to Ryukyu people, and then more broadly, how colonialism affects the environment, or how colonizers seek to destroy the environment, and therefore destroy people's ties with the environment and the land, which are really important to communities’ lived experiences and identity. And so this process helps to destroy spirit as a means to ensure that the colonizers are dominating. My thesis is trying to investigate this violent process, help bring attention to Ryukyu's acts of resistance, and act in solidarity with people living in Okinawa.

Is there anything else to share? 

I would say, honestly, if you can choose one major, just go with it! And then you can take whatever classes you find fun on the side. I feel like I was worried about having a “major” to show that I knew something about a certain topic, but if you are worried about that, you can always just list classes that you took on your resume to show your knowledge about a certain subject. With one major, I feel like you get so much freedom because you don't have the binds of specific required classes that you have to take. There are so many cool classes at this school, almost too many classes, so it’s almost a shame to miss out on feeling excited about learning something completely different just because you had to fulfill all these requirements! Sometimes I used to wish that I had chosen one major and then just took the rest of my time to explore and relax and enjoy my time here. This school is hard and I don’t know that I took great care of myself my whole time here, and that’s so much more important than getting another major on a resume. But you know, everything happens for a reason and I honestly wouldn’t have it any other way than how it all happened. I just learned how to take care of myself and develop a healthy relationship with work or school the hard way!

And also, I really recommend finding professors that help fuel you and genuinely root for you. I have some professors that I’m really close to, that I can express what I’m going through to, and it’s been really meaningful. Not only are these professors wonderful people, but they have lots of academic advising knowledge. For me, one of those professors was someone who went to Barnard and was an FGLI student as well. I really have never felt so encouraged as I have when talking with this professor. It’s been amazing to have that support, so I deeply stress finding those professors that can relate to you and support you, because they are out there and they really do want to help you. 

Read more about the Urban Teachers program here, Environment and Sustainability here, and the Gender Studies major here.