Faculty Spotlight: Erica Bree Rosenblum

Spotlights are The Leaflet’s way of recognizing UC Berkeley alumni, professors, and students who are environmental changemakers.

Doing environmental work can be exhausting — our values are often at odds with societal norms, and it feels like a constant uphill battle to get to where we want. In a world where convenience and profit are put above all else, how can we remember to be kind to the environment, but also to each other?

Dr. Erica Bree Rosenblum, an associate professor in ESPM who prefers to go by “Bree,” attempts to tackle this dichotomy in all aspects of her life.

Bree studies biodiversity, specifically how species adapt to a rapidly changing environment — or, how they’re unable to adapt and subsequently face extinction. At the undergraduate level, Bree has taught ESPM 152, Global Change Biology, and ESPM 139, “The Environment and the Self: an Eco Practicum.” The former aligns with Bree’s research rather well, but she and some of her students felt that there was something missing from the class.

“It felt like there were students who had gotten a lot of really great content-oriented education in Berkeley, but not necessarily have a place to really explore... what all that means to them,” Bree said on some of those conversations she had with some of her students. 

That was how ESPM 139 was born — it was a space where students could dive deeper and allow themselves to connect with another side of the content presented in classes. In environmental work, we tend to focus on external acts, whether it’s “protesting or recycling or saving the turtles,” but according to Bree, we also need to “address our inner views about what it means to be a person at this point in history… the way we see ourselves is itself environmental activism.” As individual agents of change, caring for ourselves is also an essential part of caring for the environment.

Bree does her best to be a living example of this mindset. She is a professor, a researcher, Berkeley Connect Director, a mother — but instead of drawing lines between these “lives,” she sees things differently: one’s personal and professional experiences influence each other, and these make up one whole person. It was “like I [had] all these different hats that [I was] supposed to wear at these different places in my life and it was exhausting, and it felt really fractured,” she said. For example, her personal and spiritual practice has affected how she does science. While it is common to kill animals for the purpose of research, she decided to turn to non-invasive methods of data collection. This allowed her to stay true to herself and inspire new research directions at the same time.

(Source: CNR Breeakthroughs, Fall 2018 edition)

And while non-invasive methods are right for the Rosenblum Lab, there is no one “right” way to do science, or to be an environmentalist. “I don’t know what’s right for others… I used to think I did,” said Bree.

Her self-proclaimed “arrogance” and “self-righteousness” when it came to how she viewed the way others worked eventually shifted as she came to realize that it’s important to acknowledge when something is coming from a place of integrity as opposed to judgement. She might be able to share how she does her work, but she won’t antagonize others for approaching the same issue differently — ultimately, she believes in the importance of doing what’s right and true to her.

With her philosophy that she doesn’t want to be restrained by those “hats” and rather, stay true to herself, Bree has allowed herself professionally to do things she wants to do instead of things she’s supposed to do. When it comes to writing grants, she’ll try and wait to see to see if it feels “right,” rather than forcing out a proposal simply out of the expectation that researchers need to apply for all these grants. And she’s found that she feels rewarded for it — she is still getting funding, and is even able to work on Berkeley Connect, an academic mentoring program that aims to strengthen a student’s sense of belonging and community at Cal. She hasn’t had to give up her passion for community building for science, two values that, on the surface, seemingly don’t coincide.

At the end of the day, despite the many shapes and sizes that environmental work comes in, we only have control over ourselves. Bree advises to not “leave yourself out of the equation” when considering your role in environmentalism. Assume good intent, try not to get dogmatic, be kind to yourself and others, and live life in a way that’s right for you — only you know that for yourself!