Senior fellow Amanda Bergson Shilcock was quoted in a USA Today story about the sustainability industry’s struggle to reach communities of color, particularly indigenous communities. While there is an abundance of green jobs, many fields are very new and connecting workers with training opportunities has been difficult. What training exists often fails to resonate with Native people, focusing more on technical skills than on environmental knowledge and cultural practices. Bergson-Shilcock says there is a “a painful history of tracking,” in Career and Technical education, referring to the practice of funneling people of color into low-wage jobs. Many “communities in this country that feel like vocational education was … patronizing or condescending or even racist.”
