A Day in the Life: Alexis Dickerson, our Sr. Director of Community Conservation
/Here’s how Alexis helps Potomac Conservancy build partnerships for a healthier Potomac River
alexis dickerson (L) with potomac conservancy’s summer 2022 intern grant miller (r)
***This story is part of a series that offers a behind-the-scenes look at Potomac Conservancy’s amazing team of local clean water leaders. Meet your Potomac River defenders!***
Alexis Dickerson is Potomac Conservancy’s Senior Director of Community Conservation. In her role, she helps local communities address the environmental challenges in their neighborhoods and provides them with the tools and support to see themselves as change agents.
Read on to learn how exactly she does that!
A lifelong water lover turned clean water warrior
alexis (in green vest) snorkeling with a group of fellow river enthusiasts
Alexis is no stranger to the DC metro area and has been connected to the local waterways her entire life.
Having grown up in the suburbs of Baltimore, she played in streams, attended outdoor camps, and went swimming, crabbing, and fishing throughout the summers during her childhood. Her family moved to Kansas City, and Alexis later decided to go to college in Los Angeles, but she found herself back in the area in 2009, and has been an Alexandria, VA resident ever since.
Before coming to work with Potomac Conservancy, Alexis worked at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the US Census Bureau, and the National Society of Black Engineers. She then made a career change and dove into environmental work with The Ethical Omnivore Movement, Virginia Master Naturalists, and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation.
Despite her childhood growing up with a multitude of outdoor experiences, her pivot to environmental work was actually a pragmatic one. Food was her entry point! Struggling with food-related health issues, Alexis began to explore how to resolve the problem and uncovered a rich symbiosis between her food, the environment it grew in, and her own health.
“I learned that inside of us is a diverse array of microorganisms that is very similar to the soil, and I developed a deep understanding that I couldn't be healthy without an environment that was healthy,” says Alexis. “So I decided that I had to get involved in protecting the environment for myself and others.”
A typical day
chatting about our tomorrow’s trees program with community members at the prince george’s county 2022 green summit
Community conservation is people-centered work, so a typical day for Alexis usually means working with people from all walks of life.
In the fall and spring, Alexis can be found doing site visits, leading public talks about clean water advocacy, and meeting with community leaders to learn about the specific environmental concerns in their neighborhoods.
A perfect example of an initiative that meets local needs is Tomorrow’s Trees, our volunteer-powered acorn collection program. Tomorrow’s Trees invites communities to collect indigenous tree seeds for local reforestation projects to strengthen the Potomac River’s natural defenses against polluted runoff.
“At a time when both climate and social changes can feel uncertain, it feels hopeful to know that you can take control over a small piece of a larger environmental issue and make a meaningful impact.”
Building relationships with state nurseries and nonprofit partners is the lifeblood of Alexis’s work and is crucial to make meaningful change.
Partnership and community input help Alexis decide how best to use our network of volunteers and Volunteer Leaders to meet critical clean water goals. She works with a wide range of partners in both the public and private sectors.
Relationships with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, the Virginia Department of Forestry, the Maryland Forest Service, StreamLink Education, and other organizations help us keep a finger on the pulse of local needs around clean water issues and be truly rooted in community needs.
“Environmental challenges can seem large, so we try to bring them down to human scale. Every person can make a difference.”
When she’s not meeting with community members, Alexis reviews data on the river’s health and identifies strategies for what, how, and where Potomac Conservancy’s community conservation efforts might be of best use.
Our Community Conservation program currently activates residents in the DMV in land-based activities that restore water quality. Through cleanups, volunteers remove harmful plastic and litter from shorelines that would be washed downstream. And through acorn collections, volunteers supply foresters with the seed stock they need to plant trees, nature's best defense against polluted runoff.
For Alexis, community building doesn’t stop at the end of the work day! In her free time, she enjoys spending time outdoors with others, a habit she began during the pandemic when she turned to nature for safe recreation.
Since then, Alexis has joined several other amazing environmental nonprofits to explore our beautiful Potomac River region. With the Potomac Riverkeeper Network, she went stream-snorkeling on the Shenandoah River, and with Outdoor Afro, she paddled at Mallows Bay, attended a snakehead fishing derby, and even learned how to fly fish!
What project is she working on now?
alexis and tomorrow’s trees volunteers getting ready to collect acorns at the arlington national cemetery
Alexis is currently working on expanding our Tomorrow’s Trees initiative so that more community partners and individual residents can be involved this coming fall and make a bigger impact.
The program raises awareness of the shortage of high-quality indigenous tree seed stock at a time when Chesapeake Bay leaders have committed to planting tens of millions of trees. This puts pressure on state nurseries, which are often run with a small staff and on self-supporting budgets.
At the same time, tree seeds such as acorns and black walnuts are freely available in communities all over the Potomac River region, so Alexis began encouraging the public to find and identify the species needed by nurseries. Her team set up multiple drop-off points for seed donations in Maryland and Virginia.
Collecting seeds to create future forests is particularly important as streamside trees receive a failing grade in Potomac Conservancy’s biennial report card, and yet clean water is not possible without plenty of trees to defend the river’s health.
“We simply cannot restore the Potomac without the protection that trees create for clean water,” Alexis notes.
Establishing roots in local communities
alexis talking trees with community members at dora kelley nature park in alexandria, va
Alexis’s favorite part of her job is right in her title: community!
“I work with the kindest, most generous people,” says Alexis. “These are the people who come out in their spare time to make a difference in their communities!”
Alexis loves talking to the people she meets about how we are all connected to the river. With the Potomac River being the main source of drinking water for DC and surrounding counties, its water is present in our daily lives whenever we cook, drink, or bathe.
“60% of the human body is water, so it’s pretty interesting to contemplate that a large part of you is the river.”
Alexis is also passionate about working with people who reflect the demographics of the Potomac River region and building pathways for communities who, historically, haven’t had the opportunity to connect to the Potomac River.
In line with this goal, Alexis partners with organizations such as Defensores de la Cuenca, Outdoor Afro, Green Muslims, and Gay4Good. She is always looking to expand this list of partners, so please reach out to Alexis at dickerson@potomac.org if you want to collaborate.
“I feel very fortunate to be in a role where we help to bring people together for positive social change,” said Alexis adding, “I really enjoy connecting people to resources that can support the needs and vision of their community.”
