How this U of A grad found her passion for environmental justice

Growing up in Houston, Aria Bernal, who graduated from the University of Arizona on Friday, saw what environmental injustice looks like.

Lower-income communities, especially those with high concentrations of Latino residents, often didn’t have sidewalks, greenspaces and proper irrigation. She’s noticed it in Arizona, too, where chemicals from factories and contaminants from old mines seem disproportionately positioned near poorer communities.

But Bernal was also exposed to the power of activism through her late maternal grandparents.

“They were huge social justice advocates. They were part of the Latino rights movement in Houston,” said Bernal, who recalls how her grandparents built a ditch in a neighborhood that was prone to flooding. “Their legacy lives on through me. All of the efforts they made in their life are a huge motivation for me and I want to make them proud.”

After four years at the UA, Bernal is leaving Tucson with a bachelor’s in environmental science and a deep understanding of how she can use her degree to advocate for marginalized communities like her grandparents did. She has plans to pursue a master’s in environmental science after graduation, though she’s not sure where yet.

While she doesn’t know precisely the job she wants after that — she’s hoping graduate school will present some ideas — her overarching aim is to “help marginalized communities, make them environmentally sustainable living spaces and reduce the impact of global warming.”

But that wasn’t so clear to her during her first year of college. She credits her professors and campus mentors with bringing her interests into focus.

When Bernal was recruited to join the swim team at the UA, she already knew she wanted to major in environmental science. “I saw what was happening with climate change and how it was impacting us. Preserving the beauty of nature is something I felt was innate,” she said. “I felt passionately enough to study that.”

But she wasn’t entirely sure how her coursework would translate into a career. And between her demanding swimming schedule — she held the fastest 100-yard backstroke time on the team for three straight years — and school, there wasn’t a lot of downtime to think about it.

Finding her “fire”

Further, Bernal said she struggled to find a sense of belonging as a Latina on campus, competing in a white-dominated sport.

“I’ve dealt with my fair share of prejudice and microaggressions,” she said, recalling the “obvious segregation” within her high school classes — she was one of the few people of color taking advanced courses. “I thought when I came to college it would be different, but I was incorrect. … It’s very prevalent and common and it’s something I want to change in any way I can.”

Aria Bernal, 2021 — Aria Bernal swims during a meet against USC at the Hillenbrand Aquatics Center in 2021.
Mike Christy / Arizona Athletics

Then, she joined a group on campus called Men and Women of Purpose, which is a program designed to help underrepresented student-athletes establish their individual values, networks and career insights.

“I finally had a space where I felt like I belonged. I could talk with people who were going through the same things I was going through,” Bernal said. “I’ve been able to develop good communication skills and more of an inner confidence. I feel more confident to speak up about things I have issues with.”

Aaron Davis, a senior leadership specialist at the UA, was the educator who connected Bernal with Men and Women of Purpose. They’ve stayed in touch, and he’s watched her come into her own.

“She’ll come into my office and tell me about her environmental science classes — how different policies have affected community resources and opportunities in relation to the environment,” Davis said. “It’s exciting to see someone so excited about these issues our world needs to address so badly. I don’t always see the kind of fire in students like I do in Aria.”

That fire is something Mónica Ramírez-Andreotta, an assistant professor of environmental science at the UA, saw in Bernal when she took her class on ecosystem health and justice a few years ago.

“She always sat in the front row and took a lot of notes,” said Ramírez-Andreotta, who noted Bernal’s above-average academic performance while balancing a rigorous swimming schedule.

She remembers one moment in particular when Bernal came up to her after class and told her not only how important the material was to her, but also that it was being taught by another Latina.

That interaction left a lasting impression.

“They sky’s the limit with Aria. She has the trifecta of intelligence, passion and discipline — and really wants to do the right thing,” Ramírez-Andreotta said. “When you see that kind of light and energy in a student, my job is to create these platforms and find opportunities for them.”

Ramírez-Andreotta encouraged Bernal to get more involved with field work and focus her interests. Several months later, Bernal joined one of Ramírez-Andreotta’s labs and worked on a project investigating the quality of native plants growing in stormwater drainage basins.

Ramírez-Andreotta is confident Bernal will take what she’s learned at the UA, build on it wherever she chooses to attend graduate school and apply those skills toward affecting positive change in the realm of environmental science.

The field, Ramírez-Andreotta added, needs more people like Bernal.

“To create structural change, it’s important to have cultural knowledge brokers — individuals who come from the communities in which we’re aiming to serve, who are able to engage those communities and who are also fluent in the science,” Ramírez-Andreotta said. “I see Aria being able to create that structural change as both a cultural knowledge broker and scientist.”