Seminars

Brionté believes in a healthier, more vibrant future for all people and the planet. She has dedicated her career to teaching people how to self organize and building strategic partnerships that protect the environment, advance racial equity, and grow civic engagement. Brionté earned a B.S. in Public Policy from Georgia State University and minored in Spanish. In 2014, she led the Georgia Sierra Club’s involvement in the successful effort to expand MARTA to Clayton County. Brionté now serves as the Director of the Georgia Conservation Voters where she works to elect pro-environment candidates and hold elected officials accountable for their actions and votes. She also serves as Co-Chair of the Atlanta Beltline Tax Allocation District Advisory Committee and is on the board of Citizens for Progressive Transit. She is an advisor and consultant to governmental and nonprofit organizations who are looking to develop internal and external equity practices and advance public engagement campaigns. She is always looking for opportunities to shape public policy for a more sustainable and equitable future. 

Naomi Klein is a Canadian author, social activist, and filmmaker known for her political analyses and criticism of corporate globalization and of capitalism. On a three-year appointment from September 2018, she is the Gloria Steinem Chair in Media, Culture, and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University.

” What will the future reveal about our choices and attitudes toward the natural world? In his cinematic oil paintings, Alexis Rockman portrays a fermenting world shaped by human excess and environmental corruption. He depicts the future as a saturated dystopia, in which creatures struggle to survive toxic conditions and the onslaught of invasive species. In the depths of this latter-day, primordial soup, Rockman finds the survivors — feral beasts that emerge from the human era transformed and triumphant. In Rockman’s paintings, we do not see human beings. We see memories and vestiges of them in polluted canals, cascading piles of trash, crumbling monuments and mutated animals. We see their absence, and the altered landscapes they have left behind. We search for signs of hope in the post-human world and find them in Rockman’s resilient creatures, who adapt and endure, as natural order returns to traumatized environments. Rockman draws us into this vision of the future with vibrant colors and densely-packed compositions. He commands our attention with crisp details set against loose, gestural washes and hazy horizons. He blends fact and fiction, filling his dream-like landscapes with creatures, landmarks and conflicts, both real and imagined. He invites us to experience this headrush of possibility and urges us to care for our planet before it is too late. ” – Art Works For Change

Emory alumna, Yeou-Rong Jih (C’04), is the Director of Urban Initiatives at Greenlink Analytics, an environmental NGO that helps cities design clean and equitable energy plans and policies based on Greenlink’s award-winning climate analysis models.

Yeou received her undergraduate degree from Emory University in Neuroscience and Behavioral Biology and a Master of Science in Research Psychology from the University of Oxford. Post graduate school, she worked at the Sierra Club Georgia Chapter as a Volunteer Coordinator and the City of Atlanta as a Senior Manager of Resilience Policy and Programs. Her project portfolio at the City included helping create and implement the Atlanta Resilience Strategy, building the Proctor Creek Greenway Trail, managing initiatives related to the City’s alternative fueled vehicle fleet, and aiding in the creation of the City’s 100% Clean Energy Plan. Aside from work, Yeou serves on the executive board of the Georgia Conservancy’s Generation Green Young Professionals Board and is a member of the LEAD Atlanta 2020 Class.

Mr. Bropleh is the Founder and Managing Director at VestedWorld. He holds a JD from University of Chicago Law School, where he was a Donald E. Egan Scholar and the recipient of the Ann Watson Barber Outstanding Service Award. He was also a Robert T. Jones Scholar at the University of St. Andrews (Scotland), where he earned a Graduate Diploma in International Strategy and Economics. He earned his BA in International Studies from Emory University, where he was a Sonny Carter Scholar.