White House Climate Equity Champion to Speak at Saint Mary's College

From Saint Mary’s College:

Vien Truong, winner of the White House’s Champion of Change for Climate Equity award is the featured guest speaker at the Saint Mary’s College Leadership for Social Justice Conference “Earth: Belonging to All, Meant for All” on Sunday, November 20, 2016. Truong will deliver the keynote presentation at the conference, which takes its theme from Pope Francis' encyclical on the environment, and focuses on sustainability and environmental justice. The leadership summit also features workshops and networking opportunities to empower college students and young people to lead, serve and make a difference in their communities.

The director of Green for All, an Oakland-based national environmental justice organization that works to to build an inclusive green economy to combat poverty, Truong is a longstanding and highly effective social justice activist. She helped lead a coalition to pass California's landmark SB 535 law, a community reinvestment bill that created the largest fund in history for low income communities to green up and to spark economic revitalization for residents. In the last two years, the measure has directed over $900 million into the poorest and most polluted communities in the Golden State.

Truong grew up the youngest of 11 children to a refugee family that fled from war-torn Vietnam. Her parents labored as farmworkers in pesticide ridden fields in Oregon picking strawberries. Later they worked at sweatshops, where she grew up in the heavily polluted region of Oakland, California, known as the toxic triangle. It is through these life experiences that Truong grew to understand the importance of addressing the inequalities and marginalization endured by disadvantaged communities of color.

When: Sunday, November 20, 2016

• 3:00 p.m. Vien Truong Keynote Presentation
• 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Conference Schedule

Where: Soda Center, Saint Mary’s College, 1928 St. Mary’s Road, Moraga, Calif. 94575

Cost:

Conference (includes keynote)

• $15 — SMC students, alumni, faculty, staff, community partners
• $20 — General community members

Vien Truong Keynote Presentation

• Free — SMC community members
• $10 — General community members

Background: Vien Truong’s presentation is sponsored by Saint Mary’s Catholic Institute for Lasallian Social Action (CILSA), as part of the Institute’s annual fall Leadership for Social Justice Conference. Founded in 1999, CILSA promotes civic engagement through faculty community-based research and a culture of student leadership, service, and social justice education, which reflects the College’s mission to foster personal and social responsibility for the common good. For more information, visit here or contact Ryan Lamberton at (925) 631-4015 or at rml4@stmarys-ca.edu.

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Image via Saint Mary’s College