GREEN ROOM: LIVE WEBINAR
Summary of the Discussion
Gerod Rody is the founder of OUT for Sustainability, gave a brief history organization, its mission and challenges in the last 13 years. Also, during the session, Sophia Paul mentioned the achievements of the organization, post COVID-19 restructuring and the future engagement of the organization in helping the queer communities.
LISTEN TO PODCAST
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Gerod Rody is the founder of OUT for Sustainability
ABOUT THE MODERATOR
Dr. Jason J. McSparren is an educator, researcher, and administrator with a PhD. in Global Governance and Human Security from Massachusetts Boston.
Q&A
Jason: Greetings to our audience, thank you very much for joining us on the green room today.
I'm Jason McSparren, I'm the moderator for the green room here at the green Institute. Today, our discussion is about sustainable inclusion bridging queer identity and sustainability values. And we have two guests with us today which is really nice. We've got Gerod Rody and Sophia Paul. Please give everybody your silent applause and welcome to Gerod and Sophia.
Let me Please introduce them. Gerod Rody is the founder and former president of OUT for sustainability. Gerod has followed his passion for connecting various vision with near in action. He's animated by identity intersectionality, and where he sees fresh opportunities and spaces between established business practices and shifting cultural norms, is where he operates best, he is an innovative strategy consultant, focused on business design. He has worked with some of the largest organizations around the country and around the world, he applies his entrepreneurial creativity to benefit clients across sectors. He's worked in retail, finance, beauty and energy. And when he has a few extra minutes, his hobbies include long walks with his dog and Brooklyn, sharing meals with friends and traveling the world. Thank you very much for being here with us today Jerry. Thank you.
And I'd also like to introduce Sophia Paul. Sophia is the chair of the board at OUT for sustainability. Sophia is passionate about OUT for sustainability mission of environmental justice in climate resilient programs, created for in by LGBTQIA plus communities. Sophia has professional experience and collective processes in promoting diversity, equity and inclusion in the environmental movement. A graduate of Environmental Studies in Oberlin College, Sophia worked as a volunteer coordinator at a social service organization that focused on community engagement and food justice. Following that, they pursued a Masters of Science at the School of environment and sustainability at the University of Michigan. They focus on the studies and environmental justice in collaborative natural resource management. Currently, Sophia coordinates research and Institutional Diversity in equity in the environmental movement and plans conferences for young people, focus on equity in the environmental movement, currently living in Ohio, Sophia is employed at the trust for Public Land. Sophia spends their free time gardening, baking and training for their first marathon. Good luck with that.
Sophia: Thank you.
Jason: You're welcome, and everything else you're doing.
Sophia: Thank you.
Jason: So thank you too very much for being here. We can start our conversation by talking about what was the genesis for your program OUT for sustainability. Gerod, can you talk to us about that, please.
Gerod: Yeah, absolutely. I've been involved with the queer community for a while, and then I decided, but I also had this deep passion for sustainability. So I went to business school, the famous Graduate Institute, and I found these amazing progressive people who are actively inclusive, but a completely invisible queer community within that. So it wasn't that there weren't queer people present but there was no connection there was, it felt like I was divorced from this other part of my identity. And so, notoriously I asked around and said, is there any kind of organization that exists, kind of along these lines, so I can give a date. But it really became much more than that very quickly. So we started doing stakeholder meetings and figure out like, does the world actually need this kind of organization or is it just me and maybe a few other people. So we built a board, we started doing some programming. And, you know, the thing I wanted to leave on this one is through all of the things we've done early on this try and learn model, it showed that even if you don't really like camping, like me, you can get involved with the environmental movement and the queer community and really bring these things together and get engaged, wherever you are.
Jason: I admired your entrepreneurial spirit. It really a good quality to have in, especially you know, the world needs leaders and it's really good to see. So tell us a little bit about, were there any challenges at the beginning that you had to overcome.
Gerod: A lot of it was just focus. What is the problem that we're solving. I got a lot of feedback of like this is nice. But, you know, is this do these two things have anything in common. And the, the original example I gave was, you know, there's get running groups there's queer foods contingents out there that are doing amazing work. Sustainability is so intrinsic to who we are as people and so essential to focus on is humanity that it was, it was a logic thing, we need to give everything we've got to surviving as a species and we can't survive if we ignore this incredibly essential and dynamic part of our human race. So in that respect, I think it was ended up being proving itself out that there is a value to this kind of organization. And thankfully there are a few others now, Doing this kind of work as well. Was 15 years later or something but I mean, the point is, it's been amazing to see how many points. Sustainability crosses with the career community like food, like health, like transportation, you know, anything sustainability is everywhere, it's every part of who we are and how we operate. So, Yeah, that would be my two cents.
Jason: I just got one quick question for you until you started to say about 15 years ago. Well, doing this work.
Gerod: Yeah, 2008.
Jason: Okay.
Gerod: Yeah.
Jason: And how large is your group nowadays in terms of membership
Gerod: Yeah so we've never been, you know, I stepped down from the board right before points only right before coven for a job that was going to have me traveling like three weeks, a month. But anyway, the point is, so I'm not totally up on the numbers, Sophia you may be able to step in but it's never been in a membership organization so we don't have, you know, kind of like a roster, but in terms of engagement, before that I think for 10 year and 2018, it was like 5000 people had been touched in some way by the organization like Atlanta, I'm sure it's grown since then, so
Jason: You know that's a significant amount of people because they have friends and contacts so that's really good. Yeah, I know that that's really good spread. Yes. Actually,
Gerod: Yea,
Jason: Thank you so much Gerod. Just give us one second, I'd like to bring Sophia in, but before we do that I just want to highlight one thing and share. After this the origin story. Yes, certainly. Okay. Yes, absolutely. I've got a question about to ask Sophia. I'm curious about how Out for sustainability is emerging. So perhaps you can talk about the mission, but prior to that I just want to again, just highlight our new guests today. We've got Gerod and Sophia from We're talking about bridging queer identity and sustainability, how they work for sustainability, you can find out for sustainability out4s.org. And then one thing I like to go to the green institute website is the website.greeninstituteng.com and you can get the latest book by Adenike Akinsemolu. Adenike is the director and founder of the group. And this is a fantastic book. You can read about the principles of green and sustainability science. The book is focused on the principles of green and sustainability science, using case studies across Africa, in the world. The book contributes to the literature about environmental science by expounding on the natural systems, and the scientific aspects of sustainability. Okay. So if we go back to our screen I don't want to share, and we'll go back to ask the question to Sophia. Sophia please Can you talk to us about how Out for sustainability is emerging
Favourite Quote
“...in a world of climate crisis and wherever these natural disasters, queer people have unique vulnerabilities”
Top Comments
Don't think us inattentive, I don't have anything to ask, but it's been really interesting and inspiring so far!-Shaun Bryan
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