The TAMU Water Project: Critical Environmental Justice as Pedagogy

The TAMU Water Project is a trans-disciplinary collaborative that works to address the water needs of rural communities along the Texas/Mexico border called colonias. Modeled initially after the work of Potters for Peace, the TAMU Water Project recognizes access to potable water as a human right and is dedicated to the production, distribution, and research of affordable, appropriate technology to purify water. This thesis proposes critical environmental justice as the theoretical framework and lens through which to examine the TAMU Water Project as a praxis of public pedagogy. Extant data in the form of articles, publications, presentations, photo essays, and video, were analyzed using an inductive process of content analysis and thick description to prove that the TAMU Water Project fulfills the criteria of critical environmental justice and can be used as an example of critical environmental justice as pedagogy.