Texas A&M University
EN-10: Community Partnerships

The Partner, a magnet school and Green Institute of the Houston Independent School District (HISD), currently offers high school students from across Houston the opportunity to study one of three educational pathways, including Environmental Communications, Renewable Energy, and Energy Efficiency systems. The Green Institute Career and Technical Education programming, connects students to real world applications and promotes Linked Learning as “an educational approach that combines rigorous academics with hands-on learning and the opportunity to apply classroom knowledge to real-world experiences.” With ubiquitous connectivity and career-oriented partnerships, students experience a classroom without walls. Mentors, coaches, and guest speakers are accessible through digital communication, face-to-face meetings, and virtual field expeditions to career-centered sites. The Green Institute also includes the Woodsy Owl Conservation Corps Green Ambassadors which have gained recognition as youth keynote speakers at the 2015 Environmental Justice Conference surrounding their work with food justice, food deserts, and creating urban food forest and corridors throughout the city of Houston. In addition, Green Ambassadors also work with elementary, middle and other high schools to connect and create a sustaining feeder program in which students continue ‘greenification’ projects and efforts throughout their education. In 2015, the Green Ambassadors were awarded the highest honor of The United States Department of Agriculture with the Abraham Lincoln Award for Diversity, Outreach, and Inclusion. Fundamentally, the Partner seeks to build a program that attracts and serves a diversity of students from across the Houston region and creates a conservation constituency that reflects the community and its natural resource values. Furr High School is located on the East End of Houston. Houston Ship Channel communities such as the Harrisburg/Manchester super neighborhood are at particularly high risk of impacts from the nexus of exposure to hazardous substances and natural disasters. In fact, Manchester residents bear some of the highest cumulative cancer risk among all of Harris County (Linder et al., 2008). Within 1 mile of the Manchester neighborhood, there are 21 facilities that report to the EPA’s Toxic Release Inventory, 11 large quantity generators of hazardous waste, 4 facilities that treat, store, or dispose of hazardous wastes, 9 major dischargers of air pollution, and 8 major storm water discharging facilities (WEACT – find original cite). The population of the Harrisburg/Manchester Super Neighborhood is 98% minority, with a median income that is one-third less that the City of Houston. Only 6% of residents have obtained a bachelor’s degree (City of Houston Planning and Development Department, 2014). Floodplains along Sims Bayou have increased by 15% since 1980, due to increases in development and pervious cover like concrete and asphalt, while expected sea-level rise could expose another 35,000 residents along the ship channel to flooding (CITE Leslie, Paco; RCCCP Fact Sheets).

Texas A&M University's College of Architecture has developed a Memorandum of Understanding with Charity Productions. The MOU specifies that projects scopes will be identified as projects emerge. Currently, the Institute for Sustainable Communities is working with Charity Productions in a number of ways. First an urban planning course conducted a visioning and strategizing workshop with community leaders to address issues of health, hazard exposures, lack of green space, and lack of access to fresh food. Another engineering course is assessing flooding concerns in the neighborhood, while a landscape architecture will develop design solutions to decrease flooding and increase water quality. The duration is expected to last through the summer, though we believe ongoing relationships with communities is critical for community resiliency and sustainability. Charity Productions began in 1984 and became a full nonprofit organization in 1988, their services are primarily delivered on an outreach format. Charity Productions is staffed by volunteers and uses contracted services when funded by contract or grant. Charity has service footprints with several major initiatives’ with the City of Houston Health Department and Municipal Courts, Harris County Emergency Management, Harris County Juvenile Probation, Red Cross (southeast and northeast branches), Beaumont and Port Arthur PDs and the Texas Youth Commission dating back to 1987. One of the neighborhood focus areas of Charity Productions is Sunnyside. Sunnyside, the oldest African-American community in southern Houston, is located south of Downtown Houston between Loop 610 and Beltway 8. Approximately 93% of the neighborhood’s population is African-American and nearly 40% live in poverty (City of Houston Planning and Development Department, 2014). Lacking public support and city-wide buy in, the neighborhood is characterized by its lack of civic services, grocery stores, and safe walkable streets. Environmental concerns are at the forefront of communal concerns, according to the City of Houston’s Department of Health and Human Services, within one mile of Sunnyside, there are 8 Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) reporting facilities, 3 Large Quantity Generators (LQG) of hazardous waste, 2 major dischargers of air pollutants, and 1 facility which treats, stores, or disposes of hazardous waste.

Texas A&M University partnered with Tyler County in June of 2016 through August of 2017. The project is to development countywide strategic plan to address issues the many rural issues they face. Students within 4 courses have and will conduct visioning and goal setting workshops, develop recommendations around sustainability and resiliency, and an action plan to achieve it over the next 10 years. Texas A&M is working closely with the county government and city governments within the county to achieve a holistic strategy. Tyler County is located in rural east Texas. Much of east Texas has similar characteristics to the Mississippi delta, including high poverty, low income, limited access to healthcare, poor health outcomes, large elderly population, and disconnected youth. Texas A&M is working with Tyler County to develop a strategic plan. Using courses on campus, students are exposed to complex problems and the opportunity to explore innovative ideas. Community members are engaged in a participatory process including visioning, goal setting, alternative scenario exploration, and strategies for implementation.

We are also working with the City of El Campo on a Downtown Revitalization Plan. As many rural communities (pop. 10,000), El Campo has seen decline and blight within it's downtown. With roughly 47% of the population as Hispanic ethnicity, this town would like to see their community thrive once again. Texas A&M is working with students on campus to develop a design and policy strategy to transform the downtown into a bustling marketplace. We are also partnering with Impact Lufkin, a non-profit community-based organization in Lufkin, TX to serve the North Lufkin neighborhood, a historic African-American neighborhood. Through courses on campus, Texas A&M is assisting Impact Lufkin in designing a new community center, park, day care, social services complex, and trail system for the community.