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FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Impostors of Conservation
Written by Jessie Panazzolo Speaking to individuals of the Lonely Conservationist community I am amazed at their knowledge, field skills and general attitude towards conservation. After speaking with them for a while I realise how fortunate I am to be learning so much and having a conversation I know a lot of others would benefit from. It is at this point where I urge them to tell their story in a blog for the rest of the community to listen in on, because if I can learn so much from just a small conversation with them, I bet many others would too. It is at this precise moment that 95%…
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Nia (Education or Activism)
Story by Nia Jones I’m not quite sure where my passion for the environment started. I have early memories of dragging my parents to a local recycling centre with homemade bins (home recycling wasn’t a thing then) and winning a green ‘Blue Peter’ badge for my letter to the programme about recycling dehumidified water to water the plants. We learned about the ozone hole in primary school, and then climate change in secondary school, but these were pretty much consistently presented as facts we should learn – not things we could change. It wasn’t until university – where I’m now in my third year studying Environmental Geography – that the…
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FOOD FOR THOUGHT: Education and Conservation
Written by Jessie Panazzolo A common focus around the discussions I have been having since creating this community has been education. Some people don’t believe they have had enough formal training to identify as a conservationist, some people are trying to figure out which tertiary education path to take to maximise their potential in the field, and others are drowning in data during studies and are unable to stay afloat. To tell my truth, I am not super proud of my university experience and I don’t have my undergraduate or honours degree framed on my wall. For me, university was not about getting a fancy piece of paper, wearing a…
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FOOD FOR THOUGHT: How Lonely Conservationists changed my life
Written by Jessie Panazzolo Looking at the Instagram page I created a mere eighteen days ago, I never expected to see the 300 Lonely Conservationists who had joined me in my plight to make conservation a little less lonely. I also never expected to get a message on every single one of those eighteen days thanking me for creating the community and letting me know how this community has come at just the right time for a lot conservationists out there. Some people had just lost their contracts, some people were drowning in data and other people felt alone in their struggles to work for free, continually switching jobs that…
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FOOD FOR THOUGHT: A little goes a long way
Written by Jessie Panazzolo Imagine a world where you are me and you are sitting on my family couch with my mother and she starts talking to you about McDonald’s straws. Are you immersed? Good. Because this was the first of two very similar situations I was in where I was about to say the very same thing about two completely different topics. My mum went on. “Did you hear about McDonald’s stores in Europe switching their straws from plastic to paper? How ridiculous is that when there is so much more waste produced from McDonald’s products!” Next: Sitting in the car with my partner, we were discussing the date…
