Caroline Chou

Caroline Chou was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and received her Bachelor’s in Microbiology at the University of California, Berkeley. After working alongside Asian youth challenging the stigma of mental health and alongside Oakland residents building community power through art and storytelling, Caroline is now crafting her Master of Arts at Gallatin School of Individualized Studies. She is inspired by the replenishing and symbiotic relationships microbes have with the world around them. She recognizes that collaborative relationships are integral for community resilience not only in ecological environments but also in our vulnerable and marginalized communities. She is interested in exploring ways to regenerate fractured relationships with the land, community, and systems of power through storytelling. Working with Dr. Hénaff’s Gowanus Canal Microbiome team, she will share the stories of microbes in the canal investigating the molecular memory in tandem with the collective human memory in hopes of bridging the gap between scientific research with the local community.

Caroline’s Projects