Pooja is an award-winning global climate justice leader who founded and publicly launched Youth Climate Collaborative (YCC) in March 2021. YCC is a global youth-led community creating a more just, inclusive, and intergenerational climate movement that activates and sustains youth. She also co-founded the Entertainment + Culture Foundation in June 2023, an organization that advocates for the creative industry to decarbonize and for greater resources for climate creatives, especially emerging artists. She serves as an Advisor for Rivet, which is creating the world’s largest micro-grant fund for youth-led action, an Advisor for Penn State University's Global Youth Storytelling and Research Lab, Alumni Committee Chair of the Aspen Institute Future Leaders Initiative, and an Alumni Committee Member of the Walking Softer Young Leaders Program. She is also a public speaker, judge for various youth climate grants, and co-designer of a number of climate funds and grant programs. She is an active member of YOUNGO (the children and youth constituency of the UNFCCC), and in November 2022, although not ultimately selected, she was double-nominated and shortlisted to serve as the North America youth climate advisor to the UN Secretary General. She was also shortlisted in summer 2024 to serve as a youth advisor to the UN Human Rights Council.Through YCC, she leads these key initiatives:1. Climate Courage - a climate mental health program helping youth strengthen their emotional resilience2. Jaali - essentially Yelp! for the environment, a network of networks. It is a mapping and matchmaking tool to connect our climate movement with resources and each other to accelerate climate action3. Reclaim Your Narrative Fellowship - a comprehensive storytelling program to train 30 young leaders as effective communicators on various climate topics. The goal is for them to produce content that can elevate their community's stories and influence decision-making on key issues such as climate finance and the energy transition.4. Intergenerationals - a research consortium on intergenerational governance, collaboration, and dialogue to encourage more intergenerational action, and establish standards for meaningful youth collaborationOther: opportunity curation, trainings on NY Climate Week and COP, enabling access to badges/tickets, lodging, scholarships for courses, etc.
Listed skills include Public Speaking, Microsoft Office, Leadership, Research, and 16 others.
