The Green Review

Universities play a crucial role in achieving a sustainable future, especially through their research. Considering this, we are excited to highlight individuals and groups at UNB that have dedicated their time to pursuing sustainability-related research.

Our newest Sustainability Research Champion is Michèle Banks.

Research project title: Breaking Barriers Beyond the Trail: Women, Outdoor Recreation, and Empowerment

Overview of your research project

My research explores how women-only outdoor recreation programs can create opportunities for empowerment, leadership development, and personal transformation among women facing adversity. The study focuses on women participating in outdoor recreation in socioeconomically marginalized communities and examines how experiences in nature and outdoor environments can influence confidence, agency, leadership, belonging, and connections with others and with place.

Using a feminist ethnographic approach, my research brings women's own experiences and voices to the centre of the study. Through interviews, participant observation, and reflexive research, I explore both the barriers that can prevent women from accessing outdoor recreation and the ways women-only programs can create more supportive, inclusive, and empowering spaces.

The research is particularly interested in what happens beyond the trail. How do experiences gained through outdoor recreation extend into women's everyday lives, relationships, communities, and leadership?

How does your work intersect with sustainability?

My research approaches sustainability as both an environmental and social issue. Sustainable communities depend not only on healthy environments, but also on equitable opportunities for people to participate, develop their capabilities, build relationships, and contribute to their communities.

Outdoor recreation provides an important connection between these dimensions. By increasing women's access to nature and meaningful outdoor experiences, women-only programs can support wellbeing, environmental connection, confidence, leadership, and community participation. At the same time, my research examines the social and structural barriers that can exclude women from outdoor spaces, including socioeconomic circumstances, geography, confidence, access, and previous experiences of exclusion.

Ultimately, I see sustainability as being about creating healthier relationships between people, communities, and the natural environment while ensuring that opportunities to experience and care for those environments are accessible and equitable. My research therefore contributes to the social and environmental dimensions of sustainability by examining how equitable access to outdoor recreation and meaningful experiences in nature can support empowerment, leadership development, and stronger connections among women and their communities.

What impact do you hope this research will have?

I hope this research will demonstrate that outdoor recreation can be much more than physical activity or leisure, it can be a pathway to empowerment, leadership, connection, and social change. Ultimately, I hope the research can contribute to more inclusive outdoor communities, greater gender equity in outdoor recreation and leadership, and stronger connections between people, communities, and the natural environment.

Where can people find information about your work?

Information about my research and future publications will be available through my academic research profile as the project progresses. I am also continuing to share aspects of the research through academic presentations, conferences, and professional networks. Individuals can reach me at my academic email: michele.banks@unb.ca.

Know someone who should be a Sustainability Research Champion? Tell us about them by filling out our nomination form!