Week One of Flying Solo!
Dear Reader,
Less than a month ago, Editor-in-Chief Alex Ip announced my promotion to Managing Editor of The Xylom, as well as captain of the ship while he goes on his sabbatical until early October.
What an exciting position to be in — and equally nerve-wracking. It is not my first time flying solo; I founded and was the inaugural editor of Annenberg Media Earth, the only climate vertical at USC, and often, it was a one-woman operation where I played the role of writer, editor, fact-checker, copyeditor and all the other roles that go into creating a piece of journalism.
But running an entire newsroom, especially one that has been so carefully nurtured by Alex, feels like a big responsibility, not just towards him, but towards all of you wonderful readers.
And so, today, I want to share with you how my first week as sole captain of the ship has been.
I’ve spent this week meeting up with potential new writers, creating contracts, assisting current writers, and editing and fact-checking stories that will come out in the next couple of weeks. (Keep an eye out for a wonderful essay from our Editor-at-Large KC Cheng about a trip to Mt. Kenya!)
We are also in the process of expanding our newsroom by hiring an incredible public health reporter who will be covering the issue from an Asian American lens. More on that soon!
The Xylom is also participating in the 2024 Democracy Day as a media partner, which means we get to put out a story about democracy on September 15. I am working on a piece about voting during natural disasters in the state of Georgia, so if you plan to check your email at all next Sunday, do take a quick look.
We are extremely passionate about all the work we do at The Xylom. But as (what may turn into) one of the most consequential climate elections comes closer, it is clear to us that our voices as scientists-turned-journalists are even more important than before.
To continue doing this work, we definitely need your readership and support. Thanks to our participation in NewsMatch, any contributions you make to The Xylom on Sep. 15 will get matched up to $500, so please consider contributing.
As always, we love hearing from you all, so please reach out if there are any stories you’d like us to cover, or even to just say hi!
Yours sincerely,
Rhysea Agrawal
Managing Editor
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THINGS YOU SHOULD READ
FAMILY NEWS!
Thank you to our new donors Christina and Guest! Help us grow science with words by donating to the only Asian American science newsroom here.
Our alumna Sneha Khedkar wrote this cool piece on how experiments on Egyptian bats’ neural patterns can be affected by the experimenters for The Transmitter; make sure to check it out!
Our contributor Pragathi Ravi will be joining the Science, Health and Environmental Reporting Program fellowship at NYU this Fall. Congratulations!
A SOUTHERN FLAIR
LAKE CHARLES, Louisiana — Court blocks use of civil rights rule for environmental protections in Louisiana (Tristan Baurick, Verite News)
“Louisiana has given industrial polluters open license to poison Black and brown communities for generations, only to now have one court give it a permanent free pass to abandon its responsibilities.”
- Patrice Simms with Earthjustice, an environmental group that has used Title VI to argue for better protections in St. John the Baptist Parish.
ORANGE BEACH, Alabama — The Booming Business Of Alabama’s Artificial Reefs (Irina Zhorov, Noēma Magazine)
“It’s kind of like picking wild raspberries. You plant more instead of just waiting on Mother Nature to plant.”
- Brian Annan, charter boat captain and Armand Annan’s nephew.
ASHEVILLE, North Carolina — The Inflation Reduction Act is 2 years old. What has it done for Western North Carolina? (Katie Meyers, Blue Ridge Radio)
“I think that everybody out there wants to meet the moment right now and be able to access the funding.”
— Bridget Herring, Asheville Sustainability Director.TEXAS — Justice, Brought To You By Big Oil (Katya Schwenk, The Lever)
Now, come September, fossil fuel interests in Texas will have access to the legal system that they helped build. Once they open their doors, the courts are poised to start deciding major environmental cases in the state — particularly appellate cases that will quickly be transferred to the new Fifteenth Court of Appeals.
WHAT ELSE WE'RE READING
LAHORE, Pakistan – A Trip To One of the Hottest Cities on the Planet (Ross Andersen, The Atlantic)
The Lahori poet Kishwar Naheed once wrote that “the sun spends itself” in Pakistan. In recent years, its expenditures have increased. In May, temperatures rose into the 120s. Schools were closed so that kids would not get heatstroke during their commute or on the playground.
The transit beat is becoming the climate beat (Neel Dhanesha, Nieman Lab)
“Transportation is just an essential part of daily life for so many people, in particular lower-income folks and people who don’t have the luxury of working from home. I definitely see the intersection between transit and climate, and it’s something that I’ve been trying to incorporate into my coverage more.”
- Erin Stone, climate emergency reporter at LAist
LOS ANGELES, California — Can L.A. Really Pull Off a “Car-Free” Olympics? (Alissa Walker, Dwell)
In 2017, when Paris and L.A. were awarded their games simultaneously, Hidalgo and former L.A. mayor Eric Garcetti signed an agreement to align their climate goals leading up to the events. But seven years later, it’s becoming increasingly unclear if L.A. can deliver part of its 2028 Olympics promise: to produce what planners have dubbed the "car-free games."
VP Candidate Tim Walz Was a Big Dreamcast Fan, and We Think We've Found His Favorite Game (Rebekah Valentine, IGN)
We first learned that Gov. Walz was, at one point, a Dreamcast enjoyer due to an article in The New York Times. In the report, a former student of Walz’s recalls that he used to share “unusually relatable” stories with his classes, “like the time his wife had seized his Dreamcast, the Sega video game console, because he had been playing to excess.”
THE XYLOM’S RECENT STORIES
Who’s Taking A Million Gallons of Water from Memphis A Day? Elon Musk.
Elon Musk‘s plans for an energy- and water-intensive supercomputer have rattled Boxtown, Memphis. The historically Black neighborhood has dealt with toxic facility clusters upstream and recently warded off the Byhalia pipeline. Check out Alex Ip’s visual for the piece, first reported by Ashli Blow for MLK50!
This Barbie Is... A Dolled-Up Wax Cadaver?
When Ellie Rose Mattoon researched across Europe, she could never shake off the specter of the Anatomical Venus: a life-sized wax teaching model from the 1700s that soon took on a life of her own. Is there still something to learn from her and her sisters?
Aquafarmers are Fighting A Losing Battle to Keep Algae from Ruining Their Shellfish
Harmful algal blooms lead to biotoxins that can’t be removed by boiling or freezing. Aquafarmers, researchers, and regulators are doing their best to prevent them from entering our shellfish diet, but climate change and poor infrastructure are making their jobs more difficult than before.
In Rural Western Uganda, A Tree-Planting Initiative Shows Signs of Life
In rural Western Uganda, an ambitious collaboration between Ecosia, Jane Goodall Institute Uganda, and residents to grow 200,000 trees in the Budongo-Bugoma Corridor is reaping the rewards for people and wildlife. A solutions photo feature from Kang-Chun Cheng:
Perspective: Am I Invasive?
Check out an exclusive excerpt of Ayurella Horn-Muller's book, Devoured: The Extraordinary Story of Kudzu, the Vine That Ate the South, where she detangles the complicated stories of the South’s fickle relationship with kudzu, and hers with the South.