{"id":75425,"date":"2024-12-04T08:01:00","date_gmt":"2024-12-04T13:01:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/?p=75425"},"modified":"2025-11-03T07:54:07","modified_gmt":"2025-11-03T12:54:07","slug":"valerisa-gaddy-rain-gardens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thestoryexchange.org\/valerisa-gaddy-rain-gardens\/","title":{"rendered":"Her ‘Indigenous Knowledge’ Almost Cost Her a PhD. Now, She’s Using It to Help Desert Communities"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"Valerisa
Valerisa Gaddy now serves as the community conservation director at the Watershed Management Group, helping communities thrive in the Sonoran Desert. (Credit: Courtesy of Valerisa Gaddy)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Editor’s note: Meet all five winners of our 2024 Women In Science Incentive Prize here<\/a>. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Valerisa Gaddy grew up on the border of Arizona and New Mexico \u2013\u00a0in Navajo Nation. \u201cI was constantly [shuttling] back and forth between res and non-res communities, because my parents wanted me to attend schools that weren\u2019t on the reservation,\u201d the research scientist remembers.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The huge disparities between these two communities didn\u2019t hit her until she was at college, though. \u201cI saw how easy it was for people to call and ask their parents for help \u2013 my parents just couldn’t do that. I never had that net where, if I fell, they\u2019d be able to catch me, because they were struggling themselves.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As an Indigenous student, Gaddy came up against a number of other challenges. \u201cIndigenous knowledge<\/a> is still not recognized as science, and my dissertation kept getting sent back because there was \u2018too much Indigenous knowledge\u2019 in it. I was told if I want to be taken seriously as a scientist, I have to reduce the amount of Indigenous knowledge in there.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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Related<\/h4>\n <\/div>\n \n
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\n \n Announcing Our Women In Science Incentive Prize Winners\n <\/a>\n <\/h3>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n\n

Against the odds \u2013 and in spite of the discrimination she received \u2013 Gaddy defended her dissertation, receiving a PhD and master of science in environmental science from the University of Arizona, as well as a bachelors in microbiology from New Mexico State University. She now works as the community conservation director at the nonprofit Watershed Management Group, helping communities across Southern Arizona thrive in the Sonoran Desert. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

One of Gaddy\u2019s projects is Cool Tucson, which aims to reduce the city\u2019s temperature by 5 degrees. The average temperature has increased by 11 degrees over the past century, with half of that increase attributable to the urban heat island effect: Streets and buildings absorb more heat than green spaces, making cities hotter than rural areas. Urban heat islands disproportionately impact<\/a> low-income people and people of color, and the project plants tree canopies in these neighbourhoods, helping lower the temperatures.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cA lot of these heat indexes are quite high on Native American land because of how the government built the houses \u2013 on these huge slabs of concrete that are impossible to have gardens on.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gaddy has also launched a plan to work with the Pascua Yaqui Nation, which is currently experiencing both extreme flooding and <\/em>heat stress, to develop rain gardens. \u201cThe reservation is hot and dry, and when they do have rain they get flooded so badly that even their one emergency road is underwater, and they can\u2019t go in or out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A rain garden is a cost-effective, long-term solution that provides shade and cools the ground \u2013 as well as alleviates flooding. Gaddy\u2019s project hosts workshops for tribal members and distributes kits made up of native grasses, shade trees, shrubs and mulch so that the community can build their own garden. \u201cWe teach people how to \u2018plant the rain,\u2019\u201d she explains, \u201cby first digging a basin and then incorporating the tree and plants within it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By digging a basin no more than 12 inches deep, a pocket is created where water can collect. The tree and plants added to the basin help absorb the water, and the mulch helps prevent unwanted weeds and keeps the basin hydrated by slowing evaporation. A workshop held this past spring built 15 basins throughout the Pascua Yaqui Nation, which varied from 3 feet to 25 feet in size. The workshop\u2019s success has led to requests for Gaddy to host workshops for other tribes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Holding onto her Indigenous knowledge has been a driving force for Gaddy. \u201cThere\u2019s a need for it to be recognized and acknowledged as scientifically valid, and that keeps me going as a professional \u2013\u00a0making sure that I intertwine that knowledge with my work.\u201d ◼️<\/p>\n\n\n

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Related<\/h4>\n <\/div>\n \n
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\n \n \"Heather\n <\/a>\n <\/div>\n
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\n \n Investigating Extreme Heat in Salt Lake City\n <\/a>\n <\/h3>\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Valerisa Gaddy heads up Cool Tucson, and is helping the Pascua Yaqui Nation develop rain gardens.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":155,"featured_media":75406,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"autoblue_enabled":false,"autoblue_custom_message":"","autoblue_shares":[],"autoblue_post_url":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[187],"tags":[21139,22314,19518,22320,19479],"class_list":["post-75425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features","tag-environmental-conservation","tag-indigenous-knowledge","tag-indigenous-women","tag-urban-heat-mitigation","tag-women-in-science"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nHer 'Indigenous Knowledge' Almost Cost Her a PhD. 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