Studying and Addressing Climate Change

When she was choosing a college, Rachel Beall ’25 knew she wanted to study environmental science, but she had a teacher in high school who reinforced that “math is everything in science.”

Beall chose Washington College for its unique environmental offerings, especially the Chesapeake Semester, and from the start she took advantage of opportunities from the Center for Environment and Society (CES). During her sophomore year, a guest speaker that CES had brought to campus mentioned the incomplete data being used in climate modeling in the polar regions, and Beall felt this might be a problem she would like to work on in her career.
 
Remembering her high school teacher’s words and realizing that much of climate science is driven by predictive modeling—effectively many interrelated and complex equations using environmental data to understand large systems and their potential future states—Beall added a math major to set herself up for graduate school.
 
“I like thinking about environmental science through the lens of predictive modeling and how we can better understand how climate change might impact specific places like a forest or how we can understand the impact of certain actions on the entire globe,” Beall said.
 
Even as Beall has been adding academic studies that have taken her closer to her career goals, her other activities on campus have expanded her view of the ways she can contribute to the well-being of people and the planet.
 
“I feel so connected and grounded when I’m outside,” Beall said. “That passion, for me, is what guides a lot of things.”
 
Beall got involved with the campus garden her first year at Washington and now serves as the head apiculturist (beekeeper). She has an internship funded by CES in which she is studying herbalism, and in the fall 2024 semester, she taught a special two-hour workshop in herbal remedies to about 20 Washington students and others, helping them to harvest and dry herbs, make tinctures, and make herb-infused oils for various wellness goals. She also works for campus recreation as a yoga instructor and finds herself getting others involved with the campus garden the way others did when she first arrived at the College.
 
“We want everyone to feel like the campus garden is their space. My freshman year, I was quiet and kind of reserved, and I really needed that community,” Beall said. “In all these climate change studies, a lot of the solutions start with community-based practices, building community and trust with one another. This is how this happens: build this community of people who do care and who want to be together and who find joy in this.”

 — Mark Jolly-Van Bodegraven