The CUNY Climate Assembly Project (CCAP) is a groundbreaking initiative that advances climate solutions, civics education, and models of collaborative governance. Supported by an Andrew W. Mellon seed grant, the initiative is led by the Center for the Humanities and the Institute for Research on the African Diaspora in the Americas and the Caribbean (IRADAC) at the CUNY Graduate Center.
At the heart of this initiative is a Climate Assembly. CCAP will gather a group of students, broadly representative of the CUNY community, to participate in a year-long democratic process. During the assembly, students will weigh all sides of a specific policy issue at CUNY and develop solutions for the broader CUNY Community. After the assembly, implementation efforts will be advanced by student fellows working with CUNY stakeholders. Learn more about CCAP, Climate Assemblies, and join our mailing list on our website.
The CCAP Organizing Fellows will play a key role in designing and implementing the assembly and the various public programs for the broader CUNY community. They will translate theory into practice, gaining hands-on experience in deliberative and participatory democracy as they help launch the first university-convened climate assembly in the U.S. Meet and learn more about our CCAP Fellows and their roles and backgrounds:
Cameron Espinoz — Communications Fellow
Cameron Espinoza (she/her) is a PhD candidate in Political Science at the CUNY Graduate Center. Her research focus is on voter suppression and restrictions of suffrage at the state level in the United States. She holds a Master’s degree in Politics and International Relations from Selwyn College, University of Cambridge, and a BA in English Literature and Political Science from the University of Southern California. Outside her academic work, Cameron enjoys reading literary fiction and anything to do with micromobility and urban planning.
How do you hope that CCAP will impact CUNY?
My hope for CCAP is that it will be a step toward establishing deliberative democratic structures in decision-making processes at CUNY at every level, and ultimately become a model for deliberative democracy and sustainability efforts at public universities across the country. I also hope that CCAP will model ways to make CUNY policy accessible to employees and students through learning sessions, showcase how ostensibly technocratic decisions are value-judgements about what matters to the university, and demonstrate a more robust model of participation and engagement based on principles of democratic equality.
What is the significance of practicing deliberative democracy at a public university?
CUNY is our employer, a university, in its own words, “dedicated to the public good”, and a place which is part of defining what is worth knowing. CCAP can model a way to redefine all these relations to be ones of collective self-determination, as well as reshape traditional power dynamics through civic action, rather than a top-down process. Deliberative democracy is a form of governance which can diminish disparate power relations between employees, students, and employers—because a democratic conception of equality is not just concerned with how goods ought to be distributed, but with social relationships. While it is important to begin practicing these efforts at a public university, I do not think deliberative democracy should be limited to the public sphere, but ought to include what is traditionally considered the ‘private sphere’ (e.g., private workplace, the domestic sphere). Simply because something is in the private sphere does not mean it should be a relation of domination. CCAP is one way for everyone at CUNY to practice and learn a fundamentally different form of engagement with policy decisions.
How does your scholarly and professional background prepare you for your role?
Teaching experience has prepared me most for this role. As a teacher I’m always asking myself questions about communication: How do I make my lesson plan engaging, while inviting critical analysis of the content? How do I create a positive classroom culture? How do I frame discussions of divisive issues that invite debate within a hyper-partisan context?
When shaping communications with CCAP I hope to show the importance of deliberative democracy and the climate crisis, as well as set discussion norms that invite conversation and make everyone feel welcome.
Sasha Isaac — Democratic Engagement Fellow
Sasha Isaac (they/she) is a doctoral student in Geography at the CUNY Graduate Center and studies the ethnoecology of guerrilla warfare. In particular, they are interested in how insurgent groups and communities in conflict zones use knowledge of the local environment for food, medicine, and tactical advantage. Their research examines the relationship between environmental knowledge and armed resistance, with broader interests in climate justice and grassroots activism. Sasha’s work investigates how control over land and botanical resources shapes both ecological politics and survival strategies in contested territories.
Why is it important to expand our democratic practice to advance climate solutions?
Because the same political and economic systems causing climate catastrophe are the ones monopolising decision-making power. We can’t solve a crisis of dispossession and extraction through processes that reproduce those relations. Expanding democratic practice is not just about better consensus-building; it’s also about challenging who controls resources, land, and futurity. Climate solutions require dismantling the authority of those whose power depends on maintaining the current order.
Why is foregrounding student voice and decision-making crucial in developing climate adaptation and resilience strategies?
Students are already living in a climate-compromised future. They understand precarity, resource scarcity, and institutional abandonment as material conditions, and not just abstract risks. Foregrounding student decision-making is crucial because adaptation and resilience strategies designed by those insulated from consequences will inevitably prioritise institutional preservation over community survival. Students know that resilience under capitalism means organised collective refusal.
How do you think CCAP will impact your scholarly work?
CCAP will help me understand how institutional deliberative democracy works to challenge power, rather than becoming a safety valve for dissent. I’m interested in questions like: How might a climate assembly genuinely redistribute decision-making within a hierarchical institution? What happens when student recommendations threaten administrative priorities? These tensions are theoretically informative and politically telling.
Annie Stoeth — Curriculum Development Fellow
Annie Stoeth (she/her) is an Earth and Environmental Sciences PhD student at the CUNY Graduate Center. Annie was born and raised in the Bronx and completed a BA at McGill University in Canada, where she studied history and English literature. After graduating, Annie spent 5 years in the Peace Corps, serving in Peru, Guatemala, and Panama. Annie also taught high school biology in the central Bronx. Annie started her graduate studies in urban soil ecology so that she could become an effective academic mentor for science students following behind her. Since beginning graduate school, she has also been consistently invested in initiatives to improve science education and engagement, not just for STEM students, but for all learners.
How does your scholarly and professional background prepare you for your role? (Curriculum Development, Communication, Democratic Engagement)?
During my professional career, I’ve worked with a diversity of learners who have come from varied backgrounds and who have held vastly different goals for their futures. I have discovered that I love this diversity among students, and I am drawn to pedagogies that value the pre-existing experiences and knowledge of adult learners. This fellowship provides me with an exciting opportunity to write curriculum aimed at different campuses and departments across CUNY, as well as curriculum broadly applicable to the overall community. My hope is that these activities have the potential to engage CUNY community members in climate policy, whether these folks are passionate environmentalists or new to the field.
How do you think CCAP will impact your scholarly work?
While my experimental PhD research is focused on soil ecology, during my time at CUNY, I’ve spearheaded several research studies that investigate the impact of diverse teaching practices on student learning and engagement with academic science. Unlike my other projects, CCAP is extracurricular and inclusive of non-student CUNY communities. For me, this represents an exciting new approach to science engagement. I love teaching university students, but the state of our environment in 2025 demands that we engage a larger community in the climate conversation. I hope that the results of CCAP might inform similar democratic environmental initiatives in the United States and abroad; surely it will inform my own work at CUNY and beyond. A fundamental question is: if democratic assemblies effectively engage diverse, representative audiences in policy making, how can they be expanded, funded, and adapted to non-academic contexts?
Why is foregrounding student voice and decision-making crucial in developing climate adaptation and resilience strategies?
Young people are likely to be among the most invested parties when it comes to climate change mitigation and adaptation strategies, given the importance of these solutions to their collective futures. Indeed, students have witnessed the effects of climate change during their lives and have adapted in real time to protect themselves from extreme heat, wildfire smoke, and storms. They know that climate change is expected to intensify, and that effective climate solutions will need to be innovative and adaptable. On the other hand, students are usually at the very beginning of their political careers, inexperienced, and often disillusioned by the democratic political process they’ve observed as adolescents and young adults. Many of these students have never considered the fact that they could one day run for office, design a municipal resilience plan, or speak at a town hall. Initiatives like CCAP provide a unique opportunity for students to gain confidence and experience in political discourse and convince these future leaders that their voices, ideas, and votes matter.
