FEATURE: These Gen Z climate activists are challenging the US government to tackle the defining issue of their generation
As seen in Business Insider, April 22, 2021
Courtney Bourgoin, 26, press secretary for the Sierra Club’s Our Wild America campaign
Courtney Bourgoin of the Sierra Club. Courtney Bourgoin
Bourgoin, who is based in Chicago, oversees communications for one of the 128-year-old organization’s public lands and waters initiative. She got her start in climate activism back in high school and studied environmental policy at Michigan State University. She began interning for the Sierra Club in college and ultimately landed a job with the organization after college, fighting for the conservation of America’s public lands and natural resources.
Though the pandemic forced the Sierra Club’s in-person activism online, Bourgoin said that the public had a new appreciation for natural parks and outdoor spaces after many group activities moved outside.
Young people are “the ones seeing the worst effects of the climate crisis growing up,” Bourgoin said. “So much of what [Biden] ran on was climate justice and climate policy. That is a result of the young activists organizing, young activists telling their stories.”
