Junior Ruby Leonard took up sewing during the COVID-19 lockdown to manage her stress and boost creativity. As a human services and social justice major, she also wanted to keep making a difference and decided to pair her hobby with activism for the Black Lives Matter movement.
Ruby recalled, “I couldn’t donate money, leave the house, or even vote. To contribute, I started selling handmade patches to raise funds for the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, supporting a cause I deeply believe in.”
The more she threaded her needle, the more Ruby thought critically about where clothes come from and who makes them. She stopped purchasing new clothing to avoid supporting an industry that she believes harms both people and the planet.
“As Americans, we often don’t think about where our consumer goods come from,” she said. “We may notice a ‘Made in Bangladesh’ tag, but rarely consider the conditions under which those items are produced or their broader impact on the world.”
Ruby, who is minoring in Spanish, began serving at the Latin American Youth Center (LAYC) in Columbia Heights, a local nonprofit that offers free art and leadership classes to D.C. high school students. There she had an opportunity to teach sewing and discuss ways in which youth could contribute to sustainable fashion. Last spring, she was awarded a GW Upstart Eco-Equity Grant and taught the first SewUp! Sustainable Clothing Practices class at LAYC.
“I was immediately drawn to the way fashion sits at the intersection of environmental and social justice,” she said. “I began to ask myself what I could do through this project to address how my community engages with the fashion industry. I decided to teach a class that explores the environmental and human impacts of fashion while also providing upcycling skills and resources to help students become more sustainable and self-sufficient.”
As her LAYC class was winding down, Ruby reached out to her advisor Dr. Michelle Kelso with ideas on how to deepen the impact of the project through research. Ruby was awarded the prestigious undergraduate Luther Rice Research Award (2025-26) for her project “Upcycling and Empowerment: Sustainable Artistic Workshops to Address Youth Consumption of Fast Fashion.” Her mixed-methods research focuses on the impact of a 10-week course she developed on sewing and sustainability for LAYC students, evaluating how the knowledge about fast fashion combined with action may shape sustainability practices. It also looks at how youth reflect on their ability to create and make social change, using artists and statements and Photo Voice techniques. In March 2026, LAYC student creations—functional works of wearable art—were exhibited for an afternoon at the GW Textile Museum and have since moved to the Elliott School where they will be available for viewing this spring.
“This project has been my proudest accomplishment at GW,” Ruby said. “Undergraduate research allows students to apply the theories and techniques we learn in the classroom to real communities, and through it I have gained valuable experience in nonprofit community work, teaching, program evaluation, grant writing, reporting and showcasing student work.”
The Upcycling and Empowerment project was awarded two additional GW Upstart microgrants and has been recognized by the Julian Clement Chase Prize for Community Impact and the Transform Mid Atlantic Transformational Student Leadership Award.