Many times I’ve been asked to explain why environmental studies is my major. It’s simple: nature is beautiful, and I enjoy being in nature. My enjoyment of natural beauty is coupled with an ethical concern for the impacts of anthropogenic influences. I also love to work with the disabled community since I have firsthand knowledge and experience there. I want to combine these two passions.
I enjoy working with kids helping them to play sports without barriers. Over nine summers I have volunteered at Junior Wheelchair Sports Camp. There, I have seen the joy that being in sports activities has on kids who don’t have the opportunity to play conventional sports. I hope to improve the quality of life for those of the differently-abled community. Completing my service learning project at Elkhorn Slough, I found a possible career path. As noted above, I am interested in combining environmental stewardship while making recreational places in nature more accessible to different forms of mobility devices, such as wheelchairs and scooters. In addition to making natural areas more accessible for differently-abled people, this possible career path would entail that all materials used for the accessible pathways would be sustainably sourced and environmentally appropriate. In addition to my goal of making nature more accessible, I would also like to explore waste management to clean up and replace plastic items that harm the environment.
I would love to explore ways to combine my two favorite pathways: sustainable options and policies and serving the disabled community and intertwine these two topics that interest me.
Many interesting career ideas were presented in the Infrastructure class I took. Some of the jobs explained in the class were fascinating, and opportunities to build sustainability into these fields is exciting.
I am going to combine my experience in both these fields to marry my two interests. I look forward to finding new environmentally sound solutions for the local community.
Gus Albertsen 