S3 Special Episode: FieldSound in the Field at AGU24 in Washington, D.C. with Corey Garza

The UW College of the Environment connected with the global Earth and space science community and showcased the incredible work of our researchers, students and staff at the American Geophysical Union’s Annual Meeting 2024 (AGU24) in Washington, D.C., December 9-13, 2024. The annual gathering of more than 25,000 scientists from over 100 countries is the largest in the world, and gives researchers the opportunity to share their work and connect with friends and colleagues. 

Senior Marketing Communications Director John Meyer also hosted interviews for FieldSound, our official podcast. Check out John's interview with Corey Garza, Assistant Dean for Inclusive Excellence at the University of Washington College of the Environment.

https://environment.uw.edu/podcast

Transcript

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From the

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University of Washington College of the Environment.

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This is FieldSound.

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Hi everybody, my name is John Meyer and I’m the Senior Director for Marketing and

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Communications at the College in the Environment

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at the University of Washington.

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We're here with Associate Dean Corey Garza, he’s the Associate

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Dean for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at the College of the Environment.

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And we've got a few questions for him while we're here at AGU24.

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So welcome, Corey.

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Let's see, first of all, you're on the board of directors for AGU, aren't you?

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That's correct. Yep.

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And I'm curious how you chose to spend your time on that board.

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You probably have the choice of many boards that you could spend your time on.

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Why do you and what's the value of AGU to you?

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Well AGU gives me a venue for talking about my science,

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you know, just outside of the general sort of research world that I work in.

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I can also talk it in terms of the value to society more largely,

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and that was kind of

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a big career motivation for me to go on the board of one of things at AGU

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we were trying to promote, is how does our science serve society?

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And that's a large part of us spent the last four years on the board

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I helping to work on.

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Now the other area is you know I’m the Associate Dean for DEI also,

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but are we including it in science?

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How do we bring a new perspectives and new talents?

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And that's the other value of AGU.

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It lets me sort of engage with the community

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that's a lot broader than I get to just sort of reach out in Seattle.

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So that's a lot of

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I've been doing with AGU and the big value that AGU brings to me.

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Excellent, because AGU, as we know, is global in reach

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and that gets you out of the Seattle sphere.

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Are you presenting this

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year and can you give us a brief overview of what that is?

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Yes, I am presenting and facilitating this year, so I spoke on Monday

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evening about how do you sort of increase sort of engagement or recruitment

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and research opportunities from scientists of Latin-American background.

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And so what kind of engagement strategies you need for that.

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Are we also facilitated a session on creative science

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yesterday with Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Julia Parrish, talking about how

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you can actually engage local communities in impactful science at local scales.

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And that was a lot of fun to run yesterday.

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And then this morning how we ran a session on how to engage

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Hispanic scientists in the U.S.

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and their communities and climate research.

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And so that was a really great session where we can engage scientists

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from all around the U.S. Southwest.

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And they're actually talking about work they're actually doing in the Southwest.

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And we even had one scientist who was calling in live from New Zealand

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on their way down in Antarctica to do climate research down there.

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So we actually had a really great session.

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So it's been a great three days so far.

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That's really cool.

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And that's what's special about coming together

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in a place like this, because everyone's in one spot.

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So we're about halfway through AGU, was there something you were particularly

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looking forward to coming here and has that already passed?

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Are you still waiting for that to come?

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What is that that's most exciting you about this year?

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Well, I mean, the booth, clearly that was very exciting that we're in here today.

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Yeah.

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Actually on the science half of my career and I'm a coastal remote sensing person

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who works a drone so that actually remote sensing sessions this morning,

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that was a few things

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I was looking forward to outside of the DEI side of things.

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And then, you know, it's Thursday and Friday.

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I usually just leave open just to see what's out there.

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I often just like to go to a session in an area of science that's nowhere near

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what I work on, just to see kind of what's new and cool out there.

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And that's actually what I'm looking forward to on Thursday and Friday.

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Very cool. A little flexibility.

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Do you have any advice for newcomers to AGU?

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This might be their first conference.

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How do you advise they approach it?

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Well, one, pace yourself. It's a long conference.

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There's a lot that goes on, ah two, I talk about that, I sometimes

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go into sessions that aren't actually in my field of study.

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I go and take a look, explore.

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You might find something that you think you're interested in.

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I might find a whole new field for yourself in there as well.

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Um the other thing I’d

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tell, you know, first timers to do, ah don't be afraid to introduce yourself.

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You know, we're here in the exhibit hall.

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This is a great place just to talk to people,

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what their institutions are like, what their jobs are like,

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actually what the career fields are like in there.

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And so, you know, be a little bold when you're here.

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is what I would say.

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And don't be afraid to introduce yourself.

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But those would be kind of my pieces of advice for for newcomers.

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So excellent.

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One last question for you.

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For people unfamiliar with the College of the Environment

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at the University of Washington, what are you most proud of?

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What do you think we do really well?

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I think we.

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What we do really well is we do a lot of different types of science.

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We do it really well and we do a lot of types of science

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that answers a lot of different questions, but involves a lot of different types

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of people on there.

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And I think the type of stuff they would do is really kind

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of leading the way in sort of 21st century environmental science.

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And I think that will be do really well. So

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thanks, Corey.

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Appreciate your time.