Name: Emma Fajardo

Location: Tucson, Arizona

Contribution: Volunteer for the Sierra Club's Borderlands campaign

Describe your introduction to environmentalism. One of my first jobs was working at Saguaro National Park, here in Tucson. I started in the summer between freshman and sophomore year of college. Over the next three years, I went from knowing absolutely nothing about conservation and restoration to leading crews of volunteers and other staff.

Are you from Tucson? I was born here, but I was raised in Durango, Mexico. I came back to the U.S. when I was 10. Thankfully, because I was born in the U.S., we were able to travel back and forth with ease, so I never felt ripped apart from my culture. But it was still a hard transition to a new place and a new language, with huge barriers to overcome.

You must have gotten to know Saguaro National Park well. What's special about it? It's not a park that you fall in love with at first sight, and I think that's what I love about it the most. From the get-go, it just seems harsh, like nothing lives there. That's the perception that a lot of people have. But once you spend time in it, you realize it has so much to offer. That's how I felt about myself when I was working there—like I am so much more than just an immigrant. I have so much to offer if you get to know me. I saw myself in the park, I guess.

What do you do now? I'm the bilingual conservation coordinator at Sky Island Alliance, which does restoration and monitoring work in the Madrean Sky Islands—a chain of mountains surrounded by lowlands in Arizona, New Mexico, and northern Mexico. Right now, I am working on an initiative called Coronado Outdoors. It's a partnership between the Coronado National Forest and Sky Island Alliance to promote more volunteerism around public lands. It's basically a platform for different organizations to advertise their volunteer opportunities. We want to make volunteering a lot more accessible and attractive for diverse audiences.

What's your connection to the Sierra Club? I show up to events organized by the Borderlands team and help out when needed. I wouldn't call myself an activist. I'm interested in finding ways to create cross-border collaboration despite what's going on politically. Sky Island Alliance works to maintain and create natural corridors between the sky islands, and that entails a lot of Mexico-U.S. cooperation. That's really my passion.

This article appeared in the September/October 2018 edition with the headline "Conservation Across Borders."