Land as Pleasure Workshop Series: Jesi Harris
The series will kick off with Jesi Harris, in a conversation that brings together the science of WHY going outside is so transformational, with generative questions to apply this science to your life.
Jesi Harris is a Master of Urban Planning student at USC’s Sol Price School of Public Policy. She hails from North Carolina where she graduated from UNC - Chapel Hill with a BA in Psychology and a minor in English. After graduating from UNC in 2010, Jesi worked as a Direct Support Professional at nonprofit Residential Services Inc. assisting adults who had intellectual and developmental disabilities where she worked to help her residents live with independence and dignity. She began to see that in order to truly deinstitutionalize its people, cities must be intentionally shaped into accessible places for everyone.
She moved to Los Angeles in 2013 and began working at the Youth Center on Highland, the LA LGBT Center’s shelter and drop-in space for homeless youth in Hollywood. In her position as Health Education Specialist, implementing a grant from the AIDS Coordinator’s Office to intervene in the relationship between substance abuse and HIV infection among at-risk youth of color, she integrated outdoor play through a weekly group called Recess, giving transitional aged youth a chance to learn and grow through play. She left the LGBT Center to be the Organizing Director of the LA County Bicycle Coalition and, in 2019, served as the Growth Manager at People for Mobility Justice. She has since joined the research team at USC’s Equity Research Institute as a Graduate Researcher. After her upcoming graduation in May 2021, she hopes to build a career in affordable, sustainable development.
(image description: Black babe smiling in floral button-down and black t-shirt against a wall of green vines)
The series will kick off with Jesi Harris, in a conversation that brings together the science of WHY going outside is so transformational, with generative questions to apply this science to your life.
Jesi Harris is a Master of Urban Planning student at USC’s Sol Price School of Public Policy. She hails from North Carolina where she graduated from UNC - Chapel Hill with a BA in Psychology and a minor in English. After graduating from UNC in 2010, Jesi worked as a Direct Support Professional at nonprofit Residential Services Inc. assisting adults who had intellectual and developmental disabilities where she worked to help her residents live with independence and dignity. She began to see that in order to truly deinstitutionalize its people, cities must be intentionally shaped into accessible places for everyone.
She moved to Los Angeles in 2013 and began working at the Youth Center on Highland, the LA LGBT Center’s shelter and drop-in space for homeless youth in Hollywood. In her position as Health Education Specialist, implementing a grant from the AIDS Coordinator’s Office to intervene in the relationship between substance abuse and HIV infection among at-risk youth of color, she integrated outdoor play through a weekly group called Recess, giving transitional aged youth a chance to learn and grow through play. She left the LGBT Center to be the Organizing Director of the LA County Bicycle Coalition and, in 2019, served as the Growth Manager at People for Mobility Justice. She has since joined the research team at USC’s Equity Research Institute as a Graduate Researcher. After her upcoming graduation in May 2021, she hopes to build a career in affordable, sustainable development.
(image description: Black babe smiling in floral button-down and black t-shirt against a wall of green vines)
The series will kick off with Jesi Harris, in a conversation that brings together the science of WHY going outside is so transformational, with generative questions to apply this science to your life.
Jesi Harris is a Master of Urban Planning student at USC’s Sol Price School of Public Policy. She hails from North Carolina where she graduated from UNC - Chapel Hill with a BA in Psychology and a minor in English. After graduating from UNC in 2010, Jesi worked as a Direct Support Professional at nonprofit Residential Services Inc. assisting adults who had intellectual and developmental disabilities where she worked to help her residents live with independence and dignity. She began to see that in order to truly deinstitutionalize its people, cities must be intentionally shaped into accessible places for everyone.
She moved to Los Angeles in 2013 and began working at the Youth Center on Highland, the LA LGBT Center’s shelter and drop-in space for homeless youth in Hollywood. In her position as Health Education Specialist, implementing a grant from the AIDS Coordinator’s Office to intervene in the relationship between substance abuse and HIV infection among at-risk youth of color, she integrated outdoor play through a weekly group called Recess, giving transitional aged youth a chance to learn and grow through play. She left the LGBT Center to be the Organizing Director of the LA County Bicycle Coalition and, in 2019, served as the Growth Manager at People for Mobility Justice. She has since joined the research team at USC’s Equity Research Institute as a Graduate Researcher. After her upcoming graduation in May 2021, she hopes to build a career in affordable, sustainable development.
(image description: Black babe smiling in floral button-down and black t-shirt against a wall of green vines)