Tishman Environment and Design Center

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Tishman Environment and Design Center The Tishman Center fosters the integration of bold design, policy, & environmental justice.

The Tishman Environment and Design Center fosters the integration of bold design, policy, and social justice approaches to environmental issues in order to advance just and sustainable outcomes in collaboration with communities. The Tishman Center is a university-wide center that is committed to bringing an interdisciplinary and environmental justice approach to contemporary environmental challenges. We work on the following core areas:

ADVANCING CLIMATE AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

The Tishman Center is designed to serve as a hub for climate and environmental justice research and practice, with a focus on deep engagement with underserved urban communities. Through our collaborative efforts with a variety of organizations, we intend to influence research, practice and policy. The Tishman Center seeks to offer technical support to community-based organizations, advocates, and policymakers on the front lines of these movements, with an emphasis on supporting the co-production of inclusive, bottom-up approaches that amplify the knowledge and expertise of these communities. SUPPORTING PROGRESSIVE INNOVATION FOR SUSTAINABILITY

The New School has a rich record and deep knowledge in the design and social science fields, and we are therefore uniquely positioned to critically address the most complex environmental issues of our time. At the Tishman Center, we create opportunities that bring together the diverse talents of students and faculty from across our schools of design, public engagement, jazz, music, drama, and social research to develop creative, interdisciplinary solutions and new possibilities for change. CREATING JUSTICE AND SUSTAINABILITY AS CORE LITERACIES FOR THE 21ST CENTURY

By incorporating climate action and sustainability grounded in social justice into our campus culture, The New School is mobilizing 14,000 students, faculty, and staff to have a positive impact on our community and the larger society. The Tishman Center’s role is to educate and prepare students through experiential learning to be leaders in this change toward a more just and sustainable society. Our intention is that students graduating from The New School will be able to demonstrate deep knowledge of environmental issues, a heightened awareness of their social justice implications, and a measure of responsibility for taking action.

📣 RSVP NOW Webinar Part 2 of the Series-Just Community-Academic Partnerships In An Age of AI Data Centers 🗓️ October 1...
10/07/2026

📣 RSVP NOW Webinar Part 2 of the Series-

Just Community-Academic Partnerships In An Age of AI Data Centers

🗓️ October 16, 2026
⏰ 2:00pm - 3:30pm ET
🔗 RSVP: bit.ly/CJwebinars

As participants in the knowledge economy, what are the responsibilities of universities and research centers amid the growth of AI data centers?

How should scholar-activists position themselves to support community responses to data center buildout and broader societal concerns around AI?

Join us for this brief presentation followed by a Q&A session.

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Hosted by the Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School, in partnership with the University of Michigan School for Environment and Sustainability, and the Center for Community Engagement, Environmental Justice, and Health - CEEJH

APPLICATION DEADLINE EXTENDED! 🚨📅 Apply by October 12, 2026, 11:59 PM ET🔗bit.ly/aronson-application This is your remind...
10/06/2026

APPLICATION DEADLINE EXTENDED! 🚨

📅 Apply by October 12, 2026, 11:59 PM ET
🔗bit.ly/aronson-application

This is your reminder to finish your Aronson Scholarship application.

If your work engages environmental or climate justice, climate change, sustainability, equity, design, or policy, we want to hear what you're thinking about-and what you hope to make possible.

Representing the Tishman Environment and Design Center alongside frontline community and academic partners, Dr. Ana Isab...
10/06/2026

Representing the Tishman Environment and Design Center alongside frontline community and academic partners, Dr. Ana Isabel Baptista called on leaders to recognize and leverage the movement opportunities present within this moment of crisis.



📣 The Urban Systems Symposium 📣

🗓️September 22, 2026
📍NYU School of Law

Session Panel: NYU's International Symposium on Urban Systems

Place-based innovation often stalls after the pilot phase - not for lack of good ideas, but because the civic infrastructure connecting community knowledge, institutional capital, and technical expertise doesn't exist. This panel explored place-based innovation as an ecosystem-design challenge: what connective infrastructure lets communities identify, resource, and scale local solutions without disconnecting them from the communities that created them. Panelists drew on cross-sector work in cities like New York, Detroit, Los Angeles, and more to discuss what durable, replicable community resilience actually requires.

📌Towards a future beyond fossil fuels: Lessons from a refinery town in transition
Michelle Chan
Asian Pacific Environmental Network (APEN)

📌Scaling Place-Based Climate Resilience: Lessons from Frontline Leaders
Ana Baptista
Tishman Environment and Design Center
The New School, Parsons School of Design

📌Place-Based Innovation: What Role Should University Labs Play
Brian A. Smith
Columbia University

Moderated by:
Simon Sylvester-Chaudhuri
CIV:LAB

📣New Urban Matters Publication by Center for New York City Affairs 📌Reclaiming New Jersey’s ‘Peaceful Valley’ — And Als...
10/02/2026

📣New Urban Matters Publication by Center for New York City Affairs

📌Reclaiming New Jersey’s ‘Peaceful Valley’ — And Also Stopping Future Water Pollution

Written by: Dr. Ana Baptista, Director, Tishman Environment and Design Center

Photo by: Andrew Aliferis

Dr. Ana Isabel Baptista is an associate professor in environmental and climate justice, director of the Tishman Environment and Design Center at The New School, and co-chair of the Passaic River Community Advisory Group.

🔗Read and share the full publication: bit.ly/UrbanMatters-PeacefulValley

New Gothamist article, Cleanup of New Jersey’s Passaic River inches forward with $125M settlement, features Dr. Ana Bapt...
10/02/2026

New Gothamist article, Cleanup of New Jersey’s Passaic River inches forward with $125M settlement, features Dr. Ana Baptista, Director of the Tishman Environment and Design Center

For generations, Ironbound, New Jersey residents and environmental justice advocates have fought for the cleanup of the Passaic River and accountability for the communities most impacted by its contamination.

Dr. Ana Baptista, an Ironbound native, longtime Passaic River advocate, and co-chair of the Passaic River Community Advisory Group, describes the cleanup as “an intergenerational fight” and welcomes the new settlement as a step toward progress.

“We were getting very concerned that the whole thing was going to just stall out,” Baptista said. “It’s definitely a bit of forward progress in what has been basically languishing.”

🔗 Read the full article: Cleanup of NJ's Passaic River inches forward with $125M settlement

Written by Michael Sol Warren

bit.ly/Gothamist-PassaicRiver

Working on your Aronson Scholarship application? Don't forget your faculty mentor. 🤝Applicants are asked to identify a N...
10/02/2026

Working on your Aronson Scholarship application? Don't forget your faculty mentor. 🤝

Applicants are asked to identify a New School faculty mentor who will support them during the scholarship period.

You'll also need to submit:

📄 Resume or CV
✉️ Letter of recommendation from your prospective faculty mentor
🎨 Optional PDF of related visual material

Your resume/CV and mentor recommendation should be emailed to [email protected] with the subject line “Aronson Scholarship 2026.”

🔗 Application: bit.ly/aronson-application
📅 Deadline: October 5, 2026

We’re excited to share the full recording of *Climate Desk Live: AI, Energy, and Our Fight for Democracy and a Healthy, ...
10/01/2026

We’re excited to share the full recording of *Climate Desk Live: AI, Energy, and Our Fight for Democracy and a Healthy, Affordable Future,* Climate Week 2026 keynote event presented by the Tishman Environment and Design Center in collaboration with Climate Desk partners Mother Jones, Capital B, & the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

The response from The New School community and the public was extraordinary—the Tishman Auditorium reached capacity even before we announced that Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani would join us. So we opened the conversation to an even wider audience through livestream and now, you can watch the full event on demand.

🎥 Watch the full event recording:
http://bit.ly/ClimateDeskLive-Recording

If you were able to make it into the room, we’re grateful you were there. If you weren’t, we hope this event recording makes you feel just as much a part of the energy, ideas, and collective space we created together.

The morning opened with music, poetry, and movement from culture keepers Etienne Charles, Eljon Wardally, Funmi Sofola, and Russell Hall, followed by a fireside conversation between Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani and Mother Jones correspondent Garrison Hayes on affordability, extreme weather, and building a city where everyone can thrive.

The conversation continued with a powerhouse lineup of community leaders, mayors, scientists, researchers, journalists, and organizers examining the connections between AI, energy, democracy, nuclear legacies, and environmental justice and the disproportionate impacts of these developments on Indigenous communities, communities of color, rural communities, and frontline communities.


09/29/2026

“You are actually part of something bigger than yourself.” — Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani

Check out this clip from the fireside chat with New York City Mayor Zohran Kwame Mamdani, in conversation with Mother Jones’ Garrison Hayes, during the Climate Week 2026 keynote event, Climate Desk Live: AI, Energy, and Our Fight for Democracy and a Healthy, Affordable Future, presented by the Tishman Environment and Design Center, in collaboration with Climate Desk Live partners, Mother Jones, Capital B, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Thank you to everyone who showed up, tuned in, and brought your energy to our 2026 Keynote Event at The New School, C...
09/29/2026

Thank you to everyone who showed up, tuned in, and brought your energy to our 2026 Keynote Event at The New School, Climate Desk Live: AI, Energy, and Our Fight for Democracy and a Healthy, Affordable Future.

What a morning! The Tishman Center is deeply grateful to the extraordinary panelists, moderators, mayors, artists, and storytellers who joined us from near and far to connect the dots between impacted communities, hyperscaled technology, democracy, affordability, and climate justice.

Every morning should be kicked off with music, dance, and joy. 🎶

Give it up for Etienne Charles, Funmi Sofola, Russell Hall, and Eljon Wardally for bringing such a VIBRANT Cultural Spotlight to our Climate Week keynote — and for setting the stage for a fireside chat with New York City’s Mayor, the Honorable Zohran Kwame Mamdani, moderated by Garrison Hayes of Mother Jones.

That energy carried into in-depth conversations about the forces shaping our communities, and our collective power and fight for democracy:

📌AI’s Hidden Toll
LaTricea Adams, Young, Gifted & Green
Manish Bapna, Natural Resources Defense Council
The Honorable Kate Gallego, Mayor, Phoenix, AZ

📌Nuclear Legacy: Mapping Local Impacts
Lilly Adams, Co-Creator, US Nuclear Impacts Map
Moñeka De Oro, Micronesia Climate Change Alliance
Leona Morgan, Diné No Nukes

📌Power in Our Hands: Solutions for an Affordable, Just Future
Dr. Ana Isabel Baptista, Tishman Environment & Design Center, The New School
Dr. Gretchen Goldman, Union of Concerned Scientists
Bill McKibben, Third Act & 350.org
The Honorable Michelle Wu, Mayor, Boston, MA

📌Moderated By
Garrison Hayes, Mother Jones
Sharon Weinberger, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
Adam Mahoney, Capital B

This special event was presented by the Tishman Environment and Design Center, in collaboration with Climate Desk Live partners Mother Jones, Capital B News, and the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

Special thanks to our event sponsor, Mom’s Clean Air Force.

A warm shout-out to our Climate Mayors — Mayor Wu, Mayor Gallego, and Mayor Mamdani and to the Climate Mayors organization.

And gratitude to all the New School staff and student volunteers who helped move such a large crowd quickly and safely into the auditorium. We couldn’t have done it without you.

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Subscribe to our newsletter to learn more. http://bit.ly/tishmancenterconnect

ONE WEEK LEFT! 🚨This is your reminder to finish your Aronson Scholarship application.If your work engages environmental ...
09/28/2026

ONE WEEK LEFT! 🚨

This is your reminder to finish your Aronson Scholarship application.

If your work engages environmental or climate justice, climate change, sustainability, equity, design, or policy, we want to hear what you're thinking about-and what you hope to make possible.

📅 Apply by October 5, 2026
🔗bit.ly/aronson-application

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