<\/p>\n
Phyllis Cuttino \u201988 has ideas at her fingertips <\/strong>to offer anyone who feels the urgency of action on<\/strong> climate change but might not know where to begin: Why not start by lobbying your local school board to phase in electric buses?\u00a0<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n Environmental action can be as sweeping as an international organization, such as The Climate Reality Project, and as personal as a phone call within your own area code.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI never want anyone to think they can\u2019t have a voice in policy \u2013 smart decisions on climate action can be made in a lot of places,\u201d says Cuttino, who became president and CEO of The Climate Reality Project in June 2022.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The organization was founded by former Vice President Al Gore to educate and empower climate activists around the world. He \u201cknew a long time ago that we needed a groundswell of support to make progress on climate change, and he went out and built it,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n At Furman, Cuttino double majored in political science and history. She was fine being a progressive alongside conservatives.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cIt taught me lessons that have endured today about respecting a diversity of viewpoints and disagreeing without being disagreeable,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n After graduation, she joined Michael Dukakis\u2019 presidential campaign and then held staff positions with two U.S. senators.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n When Republicans gained the majority in the House of Representatives in the mid-\u201990s, there was a renewed urgency to better articulate critical progressive causes. And the environment was one of those causes. <\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n While working on a team that handled Ted Turner\u2019s $1 billion gift to the United Nations, Cuttino found her niche.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cI really liked switching from working for candidates to running a campaign for causes,\u201d she says.\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Climate change quickly became her primary passion. But even on a global issue with ever-worsening impacts, it\u2019s challenging to draw attention to the long-term when short-term problems are pressing in all around. Cuttino thinks the most effective climate messages demonstrate the environment\u2019s relationship to policy areas such as energy, health, national security and social justice.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cFortunately, there are solutions that are better, cheaper, more inclusive,\u201d she says.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n She has seen awareness and activism grow in the last few decades. Young people especially tend to be deeply interested in lifestyle and societal changes.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re going to help drive and lead to the change we need to save this beautiful planet<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>that we have,\u201d Cuttino says.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n And she\u2019s thrilled to see universities, including Furman, make institutional and academic commitments to sustainability science. Corporations, too, understand that environmental action is in their own best interest.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cTheir clients, their customers, care about it,\u201d she says. Climate Reality has chapters throughout the United States and branches worldwide. The organization\u2019s key mission is education that equips participants to go back and spread the message in their own circles. During Cuttino\u2019s first months on the job, her team was preparing for a virtual training session in Brazil for more than 6,000 people.<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n \u201cEverywhere you look, you see the impact of climate change,\u201d she says. \u201cThe question is now, are we going to be able to meet the moment?\u201d\u00a0<\/span>\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Phyllis Cuttino \u201988 says we can all play a role in addressing climate change.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":272,"featured_media":25823,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1966,1963,1964],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-24187","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-class-notes","category-furman-magazine","category-spring-2023"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24187","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/272"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24187"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24187\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24187"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24187"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.furman.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24187"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}