Editor’s Note for February 2026 Networker
In addition to our in-house contributions this month, we’re happy to feature an essay by a dear friend to SEHN, Kamyar Enshayan, PhD. Originally trained as an engineer, Kamyar recently retired after spending the past 16 years directing the University of Northern Iowa’s Center for Energy & Environmental Education (CEEE). Like many of my colleagues, I’m privileged to also count Kamyar as a personal friend. After a professional invitation to me in early 2020—to speak to and network with others in Cedar Falls—ended up being my first Covid-related cancellation (enter Zoom), we became ongoing supporters of each other’s work and fast friends. I was also fortunate to befriend from afar Audrey Tran Lam, Environmental Health Program Director at CEEE, who does remarkable work that is close to my heart.
We thought of inviting Kamyar to contribute to the Networker this month because his approach and his work (which very much continues in so-called retirement) responds to the central question on our minds. What are the impactful actions we can carry out in our spheres as we struggle with the federal government’s daily affronts to democracy and all the ways those affronts impact the interconnected crises of human rights, climate chaos, and public health? Kamyar’s work exemplifies the possibilities, as noted in this article about the leadership transition at CEEE:
At UNI, Enshayan pursued environmental education and change at the local and state level with what his colleagues described as a ‘relentless’ and ‘infectious’ optimism.
Whether it’s combatting nitrates in Iowa water or developing immigrant-focused community gardens, Kamyar continues to act strategically and with compassion. Incidentally, he knows a thing or two about immigration, having come to the United States from Iran as a young adult. Listen here (starting at 32:00) to an Iowa Public Radio interview for his recent reflections on his own migration and what he is currently observing in his adopted country.
Along with Kamyar’s piece—urging the practice of democracy to make an impact on Iowa’s crisis of nitrate contamination—SEHN’s Peter Montague and Sandra Steingraber each explore dimensions of water-related crises and challenges globally.
Peter lays out the extent to which water cycles have been altered by climate change and our economic system, and interrelationships of those forces with the current “slide toward fascism.” Solutions, he says, must match the scale and scope of the problem.
Sandra takes us on a water-safety related journey with a look at Typhoid fever, a waterborne disease. In it we meet two nineteenth-century New York City women: a cross-dressing physician who cared about and for immigrants, and an immigrant scapegoat who suffered unduly for being identified as the first asymptomatic carrier of the disease.
Whether you’re thinking about what more you can do about the erosion of our rights, the revoking of bedrock environmental regulations, the worsening climate crisis, the state of water quality and supply, or the protection of immigrant neighbors, I hope you’ll find something informative or inspiring in these pages.
There have been some beautiful, spot-on writings lately about finding one’s place and keeping steady in the darkness. Minneapolis-based writer Will McGrath recently wrote a wonderful essay documenting his part in an organically-formed network of parents driving a new kind of high school car pool, transporting kids whose parents are afraid to leave the house: “that holy responsibility, the ferrying of innocents among the wolves.” He went on to say (and you can take the “cold” literally and/or metaphorically),
It’s been so cold for so long… But today the sun is out and the sky is a brilliant blue. The days are getting longer. A thaw is coming.
With my and all of SEHN’s very best regards,
Carmi Orenstein, MPH