Join us for a luncheon and discussion with Akira Drake Rodriguez, Al-Jalil Gault, and Rajiv Sicora on education, racial inequality, and climate change.
About the speakers:
Akira Drake Rodriguez is Assistant Professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Weitzman School of Design and School of Social Policy and Practice. Her research examines the ways that disenfranchised groups re-appropriate their marginalized spaces in the city to gain access to and sustain urban political power. She is the author of Diverging Space for Deviants: The Politics of Atlanta’s Public Housing, which explores how the politics of public housing planning and race in Atlanta created a politics of resistance within its public housing developments. Dr. Rodriguez was recently awarded a Spencer Foundation grant to study how educational advocates mobilize around school facility planning processes.
Al-Jalil Gault is an Urban Planning and Analytics professional who seeks to advance social, environmental, and economic resilience in regional development. As a Business Analyst at Gensler, Al-Jalil addresses client needs associated with Real Estate & Portfolio Optimization, Organizational Strategy, Sustainability, as well as Diversity, Equity, and inclusion. As a Member at Climate and Community Project, he collaborates with a collective of politicians, scholars, professionals, and activist groups to translate Climate Justice movement groups' demands to the policy development process. Al-Jalil earned a Master of City Planning from University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Architecture from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (RPI).
Rajiv Sicora, Senior Policy Advisor, Representative Jamaal Bowman (NY-16), has spent the last decade working to advance transformative climate action, as primary researcher on Naomi Klein's This Changes Everything and most recently at The Leap. Rajiv is thrilled to be fighting with Rep. Bowman and his new colleagues for racial, economic, and climate justice.
