Series - Youth Environmental Leadership

Here’s how BIPOC youth-led nature groups are adding colour to the great, white outdoors

Author Neha Chollangi
Though the Canadian outdoors can often be seen as a “white space,” these BIPOC youth leaders are creating space for other racialized youth to feel comfortable in nature

Why It Matters

Many racialized youth face barriers to accessing nature, but bridging this gap can improve their physical and mental health, and also help bring more Black, Indigenous and people of colour (BIPOC) into Canada’s very white environmental sector.

This story is in partnership with the Lawson Foundation. See our editorial ethics and standards here. 

Patricia Wilson’s first in-person outdoor event for Black, Indigenous, and people of colour (BIPOC) was an intro to cross-country skiing and snowshoeing. It took place on a warm, sunny winter day — unseasonably warm for winter at 13 degrees — just north of Peterborough, Ontario. Wilson was worried that many people would cancel because of the weather, assuming that the trails would be in less-than-ideal conditions for cross country skiing and snowshoeing. 

But 40 participants showed up that day. All diverse faces, many international students, and none of them had done cross-country skiing or snowshoeing before. There were some people who even drove up to Peterborough all th

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