THE TISHMAN ENVIRONMENT AND DESIGN CENTER AT THE NEW SCHOOL AWARDED $8 MILLION BY WAVERLEY STREET FOUNDATION TO CENTER FRONTLINE COMMUNITIES IN CLIMATE AND ENERGY POLICY
New York, NY – March 20, 2025—The New School received $8 million from the Waverley Street Foundation to advance the Tishman Environment and Design Center’s efforts to educate, train, and develop the capacity of frontline communities to impact and scale climate solutions and energy policies at the local, tribal, state, and national levels. The work will also focus on supporting the state and regional efforts in Arizona, California, and New Mexico around renewable energy and regenerative agriculture.
The grant will significantly impact the Tishman Center’s role, providing infrastructure and resources for the environmental justice movement to explore disruptive design innovation, prototyping, and testing solutions at scale to advance a just transition of energy, land, and water systems. Additionally, this award also supports the Tishman Center’s ongoing efforts to build a just model of university-community partnerships with local organizations that can leverage multi-sectoral investments for just climate solutions. This work builds on the Centering Justice Symposium hosted by the Tishman Center in January 2024, with future symposiums scheduled in 2025, 2026, and 2027.
This year’s symposium will be held in Tucson, Arizona, from March 24 to 26. The CJS 2025: “Braiding Knowledges for Community Resilience” is in collaboration with the University of Arizona’s Indigenous Resilience Center (IRes). These convenings bring together climate and environmental justice leaders and organizations, allied academic institutions, and relevant philanthropists to explore how higher education can better align with movements and advance just partnerships.
“Impactful movements for climate and environmental justice and multi-sectoral partnerships are urgently needed to respond to and prepare for the intersecting challenges we face. The Tishman Center is committed to supporting this long and arduous work as a trusted partner. This grant represents a strategic alignment to accelerate climate and environmental justice priorities and critical frontline, grassroots solutions to the climate crisis.” –Dr. Ana Isabel Baptista, Tishman Center’s Director
The Tishman Center serves as a resource hub for environmental and climate justice movement partners and multi-sectoral stakeholders in higher education, the public sector, philanthropy, and beyond. The Center does this work through collaborative, action-based research with and for climate and environmental justice organizations; cultivating leadership and movement building through the Environmental Justice Disrupt Design Fellowship; and through public engagement and programming that convenes and catalyzes our university and the broader community to take action on the root causes of the climate crisis and environmental injustices.
“The ability to discover and implement the most effective responses to the ongoing climate crisis that is disproportionately impacting communities of color and low-wealth communities has to occur in partnership with the groups working at the frontline in these communities. I am grateful to have the Waverley Street Foundation’s investment in this work so the Tishman Center can act as a platform to bring these organizations together and serve as a catalyst for change to usher in a new and more just future for all communities.” – New School President Joel Towers
The Waverley Street Foundation (WSF) invests in community innovations that are igniting the next chapter of climate action from the ground up — action that starts locally and builds regionally, nationally, and globally. This grant will be pivotal to joint efforts to advance a Just Transition of clean, renewable energy at the state and national levels, as well as Indigenous-led regenerative agriculture and traditional land-based knowledge and water systems.
“We believe in the powerful and effective model of community groups and academia working together on climate solutions,” said Alexandria McBride, program officer at WSF. “This important work has also helped to connect an incredible pipeline of diverse student leaders – such as the ones at New School – with grassroots organizations, helping them gain the experience needed to be our future innovators for community-based climate action.”
For more information or to arrange an interview, contact:
Merrie Snead, Senior Communications Manager, The New School
sneadm@newschool.edu
Angelica Salazar, Communications Lead, Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School
salazara@newschool.edu
About the Tishman Environment and Design Center
The Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School is a collaborative community of practice that leverages research, policy, and design in accordance with the Jemez Principles for Democratic Organizing. Our Center brings together research and action to tackle the root causes of climate and environmental injustice and commit to changing higher education practices within and beyond The New School. Learn more at www.tishmancenter.org.
About The New School
Since its founding in 1919, The New School has redrawn and redefined the boundaries of intellectual and creative thought as a preeminent academic center through its rigorous, multidimensional approach to education that dissolves walls between disciplines and helps nurture progressive minds. Its colleges and graduate schools include Parsons School of Design, Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts, the College of Performing Arts, The New School for Social Research, the Schools of Public Engagement, and Parsons Paris.