Alexia (she/they) is an interdisciplinary scholar and artist. Their work as a grassroots organizer, policy advocate, and consultant aim to build a new world centered around liberation, joy, healing, and justice. They graduated summa cum laude from New York University in 2020 and are currently a graduate student at Harvard.
KEY EXPERIENCES
As the environmental policy and campaign manager and comms director, I led and worked on various campaigns and passed policies combatting environmental racism on the city, state, and national levels. Some of the key campaigns include access to clean water in East Austin, holding Tesla accountable, aggregate mining regulations, writing a strategic development plan for the Colorado River Corridor, change in demolition proccess, mutual aid response to covid-19, and the no way prop A campaign (to not increase police funding).
I co-founded the Colorado River Conservancy alongside longtime East Austin environmental advocates in order to develop a community-led conservation vision for the stretch of river from the East Longhorn Dam to the Travis County Line, an area that has been historically ignored and is rapidly being developed by newer aggregate mines, tech companies like Tesla and housing development. Our goal is to protect, preserve, and restore this beautiful stretch of river.
I co-founded Start: Empowerment, an education non-profit, to provide social-environmental justice and political education in schools and community spaces with the goal of bridging the gap between education and action to create meaningful change. My environmental curriculum has reached over 120,000 students across the United States and Start: Empowerment's programming has reached thousands of youth in NYC & Austin, TX.
Consulting
As a consultant, I aim to help grassroots groups and climate organizations create strategic plans to achieve their goals. Additionally, I help white-led climate organizations implement Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion programs and identify the ways they can support environmental justice groups.
Research
As a scholar, my research interest focuses on political economy, inequality, (Post)colonial studies, liberation pedagogy, Queer, Asian & Indigenous ecologies, and environmental justice. Whether it researching neoliberalism and the rise of the far-right, environmental justice education disparities in NYC, the commodification of land and zoning in Texas, or water quality testing in the Colorado River, I aim to use research as a tool to further understand and dismantle systems of oppression. I'm currently working at the Haber Lab at the Harvard Graduate School of Public Health.
Please visit my Linkedin for more details on my work & volunteer experience.
Awards & Honors
2023 Harvard AOCC Award for Educatioal Justice
Tom's of Maine Incubator Recipient
2022 WWF Conservation Award Winner
2022 Echoing Green Fellowship Finalist
2022 Jericho Fellowship, Activism Prize
2022 UN Youth Assembly USA Ambassador
2022-2023 Diamonstein-Spielvogel Fellowship
Graduated Summa Cum Laude from NYU
Deans List, Latin Honors, University Honors Scholar
Undergraduate Academic Excellence for the Class of 2020 for Gallatin
Phi Beta Kappa 3rd year of college
Tori Burch Innovation Scholar
Selected to showcase paintings in the Gallatin Arts Festival
Dean’s Conference Fund to attend Environmental Law and Policy Review Conference in Washington D.C.
NYU Conference funding to attend 2018 PrepCom for the 2020 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference in Geneva
Finalist in the NYU E-lab 10k Changemaker Challenge
Publications
Leclercq "How Asian-Pacific Islanders Shaped Environmental Activism," Atmos, Dec 19th, 2022.
Chen & Leclercq "The Problem with Climate Change Influencers," Teen Vogue. June 29th, 2022.
Leclercq, Herrera, and Almanza “Demolition: The Legacy of displacement and gentrification in East Austin Continues.” PODER, Feb 2022.
Almanza, Herrera, and Leclercq, “Reaching Vulnerable Population in East Austin” Austin Public Health, 31 October 2020.
Almanza, et al. “Comparative Analyses of Low-Income Housing Along the East Riverside Corridor Master Plan 2019.” Humanities Institute at the University of Texas at Austin Community, 2019.
Bell and Leclercq, "Take This With You Zine." May 2019.
Leclercq, Alexia "The World is Already on Fire" EMBODIED Magazine, 2019.
Leclercq, Alexia "In My Mother's Eyes" BRIO: NYU’s Undergraduate Literature journal, 2020.
Leclercq, Alexia “American Paranoia: The Fight Against ‘Evil.’” EMBODIED Magazine, 29 April. 2019.
Fun Facts
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I'm obsessed with capybaras, chickens, valais blacknose sheeps
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I published a cookbook in high school
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I have a cat Instagram with 81k followers
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I speak 4 languages fluently, learning my 5th
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I learned English in middle school after immigrating to the U.S
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I've actually moved 9 times and lived in 4 countries
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I'm an avid tree climber
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I'm learning to ride horses