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Sunset Park, Brooklyn
The high school workshop aimed to educate young adults in the community on interpreting risk:
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What should you do when an evacuation warning is sent out?
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What is at risk when evacuation warnings are ignored?
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How can communities prepare for extreme weather events?
To paint a picture, the workshop leaders summarized what happened during Hurricane Sandy.
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What parts of the city were impacted the most?
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Do the students have any memories of themselves, family members, or friends being impacted by the storm?
Looking past Sandy, what can we expect from the 2020s regarding natural disasters? After discussing the relationship between climate change and worsening storms, how are communities, cities, and higher level governments preparing?
NYC has numerous projects in the works that will improve waterfront green space resiliency, and sea wall projects such as the Big U and Staten Island.
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Physical infrastructure projects improve coastal resiliency, but are only half the battle.
Source: nycgovparks.org
The other half lies in social resiliency and community preparedness. After learning about community evacuation plans, the interoperability of municipalities during states of emergency, and interpreting evacuation notices, the students drew up their own notices. These not only helped the students compartmentalize what they learned but also served as learning assessment tools for the workshop instructors and supporting teachers.
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Examples of the students work can be seen below.
The next step will involve incorporating virtual reality into these workshops, and working specifically with older members of the community, to learn more about their experience and understand if virtual reality can serve as a more effective tool.
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