Ana Diaz—2016 Fellow
Year: Class of 2018
Major: Political Science
Organization: Fresh Energy
For my Chuck Green project I partnered with Fresh Energy, a non-profit advocacy organization in downtown St. Paul that works to accelerate the transition to a clean energy economy. Independent from its advocacy work, Fresh Energy publishes Midwest Energy News, an online news site dedicated to keeping stakeholders, policymakers, and citizens informed of the important changes taking place as the Midwest shifts from fossil fuels to a clean energy system. My project consisted of improving and executing Midwest Energy News’ 40 Under 40, a program to highlight leadership in the clean energy economy across all sectors.
The project required a scattered skill set that ended up being a great fit for me given my background as a student at a liberal arts college. Utilizing my general writing skills from Macalester, I wrote communications materials like emails and tweets. Eventually I wrote for the Midwest Energy News page itself and edited content. I used soft skills to connect with and interview various leaders in energy across the midwest in order to help me understand how to develop the 40 Under 40 program. Fresh Energy’s name allowed me to speak with pioneers in clean energy including a CEO of the largest wind and solar developer in the Midwest and an executive director of one of the largest nonprofits working to organize youth into the climate movement. I also used general design and coding skills acquired from previous blogging projects to redesign the page and rethink the rollout of of the winners. In the end, the project showed me left me feeling empowered even as someone without any specific technical knowledge.