Editor's note: University of Michigan junior Ellora Gupta is writing a regular summer series called "Passionate People." Her goal is to inspire others and her column will cover uplifting stories about Ann Arbor locals who are striving to achieve their goals and passions.

Right off the bat, Kat Superfisky admitted that her passions in life are fairly abstract. 

Her interests lie in the connectivity between things, particularly humans and nature.

“I’m really passionate about life and enjoying life and making sure that life is maintained in a state that is functional for all components,” she explained. “So that’s why I look to bringing humans together with the land.”

Superfisky said her outlook in part comes from having graduated from the University of Michigan with a degree in environmental science. However, even as a child, she had always been interested in nature and the environment.

“When I was in second grade, we switched show-and-tell to ‘Science with Superfisky’ because I would bring in some turtle or rock I found and would teach the other students about it,” she said.

Superfisky said her parents also exposed her and her three siblings to outdoor activities, often taking them on nature hikes. When she was 7 years old, her parents enrolled her and her siblings in a local farm camp.

“I learned how to slaughter a chicken, shear sheep and make your own wool, shovel manure and take care of farm animals, weird things like that,” she said. “That, I’m sure, had a large impact on me as well.”

However, it was not simply exposure to nature that fueled Superfisky’s passion. She realized that, despite having done the same activities growing up, her siblings did not feel the same way about the environment. This led her to believe that her passions had a more inherent source.

“I grew up with siblings who aren’t as passionate about environment as I am even though they did very similar things as I did,” she said. “I think it’s something with my chemistry, what was inside me.”

She had also grown up playing in the woods and pond behind her house, examining the life forms that lived there. She cited one of the biggest turning points in her life to be when the tree there were cut down to make way for new neighborhoods.

“I remember thinking this was the end of my home,” she said.

Superfisky began her college career at Michigan State University with plans to transfer to the Art Institute of Chicago. At first, she had not considered environmental science as a focus for her degree, but during her sophomore year, she realized that it truly was her passion.

“That was when I really started realizing that I have this gift of art and I have this passion towards the environment,” she said.

After her sophomore year, she decided to transfer to the U-M’s School of Natural Resources and the Environment so she could pursue this degree. After graduating in 2007 with a bachelor’s degree, Superfisky decided to return to the U-M to pursue two masters degrees: landscape architecture and terrestrial ecosystems.

“I think it’s particularly interesting that after many years, I have essentially come back to art,” she said. “I’m meshing art with the environment within landscape architecture because that is looking at how to make art out of the land.”

Superfisky felt that these degrees would help her achieve her goal of making connections between people and the environment.

“I really needed to give a voice to things that don’t have a voice, like the hawks and cows and soil and to the trees, because they aren’t able to stand up in city council things and communicate,” she explained. “I have essentially committed to my life to trying to be that translator and get homo sapiens to also understand how we’re so dependent on these things.”

She has taken on a number of projects in order to spread environmental awareness. In 2007, she started a natural resource volunteer program at the Huron-Clinton Metroparks. “(The program) got people out in the environment in these natural areas working to make them function more, whether it was invasive species removal or plant seed collection,” she said.

Superfisky has worked on organic farms worldwide and has backpacked extensively across the United States. 

“Taking classes, having certain jobs, talking to certain people, going on trips,” she said. “It really started to sculpt my idea about the fact that all this is really connected and we need to foster that connection and allow it to continue existing.”

Her goal for the future is to make the world a more beautiful place.

“I want to meet people and make connections. I want to fashion landscapes and design them that are aesthetically pleasing. I want to create environments where birds and bees and whatever kind of people can survive in it,” she said. “I think that there is a lot of beauty in the world and it’s not all visual beauty. I want to capitalize on that and enhance it and make the world a more beautiful place.”

Ellora Gupta is a junior at the University of Michigan with a strong interest in passionate people. If you want to share your passions or the passions of others, please contact her at egupta@umich.edu.