Yale Program on Climate Change Communication

Westmont College is a private Christian liberal arts institution located in Montecito, California. In 2023 and 2024, Westmont College (Westmont) hosted the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop, gathering experts from across the country to train Christian students and faculty to become advocates for a faithful response to climate change. The goal of these workshops was to empower participants to return to their home campuses and churches ready to lead and inspire climate action.

Sonia Klein from YPCCC’s Partnerships Program had the opportunity to sit down recently with Janell Balmaceda, Sustainability Coordinator and Garden Manager at Westmont, to learn more about the college’s climate communication and community engagement initiatives, and ongoing partnership with YPCCC.

Sonia: Can you tell me a bit about yourself and your role at Westmont College?

Janell: I wear a few different hats here at Westmont. I’m the Sustainability Coordinator and Garden Manager for the campus, where I brainstorm new sustainability initiatives and connect with students and faculty to make Westmont more environmentally friendly. In 2023, we started an oak woodland restoration project on campus, which I co-manage with Dr. Laura Drake Schultheis, an assistant professor of biology here at Westmont. On top of that, I also serve as the Workshop Coordinator for the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop.

Sonia: What led you to where you are now? How did you get involved in climate work?  

Janell: What led me here is a love for creation and all of the biodiversity here, specifically California’s native plants. I had an internship with the National Park Service when I was an undergraduate at Biola University, where I worked in ecological restoration. A lot of our work focused on invasive species management, and that’s where I learned about how climate change is driving the spread of non-native species. The species composition is unbalanced, and these invasives contribute to worsened fire cycles here in California.

Yet, what deepened my involvement in this space was my work with the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop. Dr. Amanda Sparkman, a biology professor at Westmont, received a grant from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation. For two summers, we brought together experts from across the country to train evangelical college students and faculty to be advocates for a faithful response to climate change. The workshop offered a robust theology, showing how scripture supports the idea of being good stewards of God’s creation, as well as the science behind climate change. Communication was a big part of it too. We had speakers like Ben Lowe from A Rocha, who works on climate change through an evangelical lens, and experts from the Evangelical Environmental Network, who focus on engaging Christians in climate change. We also had Dr. Katharine Hayhoe, who spoke about her book Saving Us, and served as the opening speaker. It was an interdisciplinary effort with Christians from various fields coming together to address climate change for the glory of God, with a particular focus on effective climate change communication.

Sonia: What are Westmont College’s broad goals for climate action from the audiences that you engage with? 

Janell: One of our key commitments at Westmont College is sustainability projects every semester that are geared towards climate change action. For example, one initiative was the “Eat Wise, Meat-Wise” sustainability campaign. This project encouraged students, faculty, and staff to commit to consuming less meat. These campaigns had strong educational components, where we shared with the campus community how meat consumption impacts the environment — both globally and locally, particularly in our prairies, which are nearly gone due to being cleared for agriculture and livestock. A major part of this campaign was making it easier for students to choose meatless options. We did this by partnering with our dining commons to diversify plant-based protein offerings, and encouraging use of special green plates to signal a meat-free meal.  

One of the most significant projects here at Westmont was the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop. Our main goal for this initiative was to equip participants — students and faculty from Christian colleges and universities across the country — with the tools to return to their campuses and churches as advocates for a faithful response to climate change. As part of the workshop, we offered mini grants for student-faculty groups to launch their own climate advocacy projects. These projects are still in progress, and the participants are currently wrapping them up as their semesters come to a close.

Sonia: Who is Westmont’s target audience, and how do these supporters get involved in your efforts? 

Janell: The primary audience we engage with is evangelical Christians, particularly within our campus community, including students, staff, and faculty. We’ve also worked with students from other Christian schools like Malone University, Biola University, and Southeastern University. These students primarily get involved by participating in the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop, where they are given the opportunity to propose and lead their own climate action projects or advocacy initiatives for their campus or church. This hands-on involvement empowers students to create real change within their own communities, grounded in their Christian faith and values. By engaging directly with the climate action process, they are able to integrate their commitment to creation care into their everyday lives.

Sonia: How has your organization utilized YPCCC resources or insights in your strategic communication, organizing, or advocacy work? 

Janell: We’ve worked closely with Joshua Low from YPCCC, Tori Geobel from Young Evangelicals for Climate Action, and Ben Lowe from A Rocha to create content that’s tailored for our target audience. One of the most impactful strategies has been focusing on storytelling — teaching students how to develop, write, and share their personal climate stories. For instance, at Trinity Western University in British Columbia, students worked with Joshua to create their own climate narratives, which were later featured in both their campus and local newspapers. These stories not only highlighted how students learned about climate change, but also illustrated the real-world impact it’s having on their community.

YPCCC’s resources, like the SASSY tool and Global Warming’s Six Americas research, have been critical in engaging our community. Joshua shared the survey and research with Workshop attendees to provide them with tools for educating their family and friends back home. This process helped students realize they could overcome misconceptions about climate support and shed light on how many people and organizations are already working towards similar climate action goals.

Additionally, we’ve applied these insights from YPCCC’s toolkit in various climate action projects. Right now, students at Trinity Western University are using their grant from the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop to install solar panels in a high-traffic area on campus to educate students and faculty about clean energy. At George Fox University, students partnered with a local church to start a community garden focused on sustainable agriculture. They leveraged YPCCC’s communication strategies to digitally share their climate stories, which made it easier for both their campus and church communities to get involved in the gardening initiative. Other universities have drawn inspiration from YPCCC’s engagement techniques by launching surveys to gauge interest in plant-based diets and stimulate a climate change dialogue. These projects go beyond theory; they provide opportunities for students to take action to foster sustainable behaviors, and YPCCC’s resources have been invaluable in building momentum for our supporters’ advocacy efforts.

Sonia: What does Westmont College do well that other climate communicators could learn from? 

Janell: A big part of our success has been community, community, community! Students, staff, and faculty here at Westmont meet throughout the school year. We also have regular meetings with the institutions working on climate advocacy projects who participated in the Faith.Climate.Action. Workshop. These meetings are crucial for sharing progress, receiving feedback, and discussing challenges in our sustainability initiatives. We start our meetings by working on our project proposals, which Joshua Low helped us with during the Faith.Climate.Action.Workshop. Then we proceed to share updates and offer feedback on how our projects are developing.

We also reflect on the work we’ve accomplished, discuss successes, and address any obstacles. One of the challenges we’ve had to navigate is the climate denial that has historically been prevalent among evangelical communities. We work to communicate climate action in a way that is not controversial, instead framing activism as a win-win. For example, we tackle issues like food waste, which benefits both the environment and aligns with biblical teachings on stewardship. In Genesis 2:15, it says that God placed man in the garden to care for and serve it, which is a strong foundation for our faith-based approach to climate action.

Sonia: What has been Westmont College’s single most exciting or surprising discovery you made in communicating and organizing around climate?  

Janell:  One of the most surprising discoveries has been realizing that within the evangelical network, there’s already a deep desire and acknowledgment of the call to be good stewards of God’s creation. We conducted a pre- and post-survey for the Workshop, and very often, students expressed that they already believed climate action aligns with their faith’s requirements. This was a great starting point because it showed that the foundation was already there — what we needed to do was bridge that gap and help students move from awareness to action.

One key lesson we learned during the Workshop was how to encourage behavior change. Using techniques like choice architecture, we can make it easier for students to choose sustainable options. Social influence also plays a significant role, such as recruiting professors who are well-respected in their communities to engage in climate discussions. However, what really surprised me was that the student body, along with faculty and staff, already felt that call to care for creation. The challenge has been mobilizing that existing desire into concrete actions.

Sonia: How does Westmont remain hopeful and inspired to build public will in the climate movement?

Janell: There’s certainly a lot to get discouraged about in the climate movement, but because we are a Christian institution, we always tie our work back to our faith and God’s sovereignty. Even though we’re laboring to care for God’s creation, we trust that it’s ultimately God who sustains and works through the world, even when we can’t always see it. When we face discouragement, we place our trust in the promises we find in Scripture, like the assurance that God is working all things for the good of those who love Him. Ultimately, we believe that we are pilgrims passing through this world, but while we’re here, we strive to be good stewards of the resources God has entrusted to us. Our hope is deeply rooted in God’s work, and it’s from that foundation that we continue our efforts in the climate movement.

Thank you to Janell Balmaceda and Westmont College for their time, ongoing partnership with YPCCC, and important work in the climate space.