Join the Climate Equity Community Task Force!

Written by


Are you interested in helping your community adapt to climate change impacts? Would you like to shape what your local government is doing to help us to reduce pollution, prepare for climate impacts, and to partner with Black, Indigenous, People of Color, immigrant, and refugee communities in this work? Are you passionate about environmental and climate justice?

We are seeking 8-10 individuals representing organizations/collectives/networks and 2-3 youth applicants to join the Climate Equity Community Task Force.

This is a group of climate justice and community leaders acting on the commitments King County has made in the King County’s Strategic Climate Action Plan (SCAP). The SCAP is a 5-year blueprint for County climate action, and it outlines King County’s priorities and commitments for climate action to residents and partners. King County is currently updating the SCAP for 2025-2030, and it will be published in summer 2025.

Submit your application here! 

Dungeness crab monitoring internship or volunteer position (apply by March 21st)

Written by

Want to gain field experience while helping to answer important questions for Dungeness crab management?

The Pacific Northwest Crab Research Group (PCRG) is a diverse group of researchers including state and tribal co-managers, federal agencies, academics, and non-profit organizations. Formed in 2018, the PCRG seeks to address multiple critical data gaps to promote and support the sustainable management and harvest of Dungeness crab (https://www.pnwcrab.com).

A top research priority of the group is to monitor abundance of larval crab (zoeae and megalopae) in Puget Sound waters using light traps. A light trap is a water bottle with funnels on the side, a buoyant lid, and a light in the center that turns on at sunset and off at sunrise. Larval crab exhibit positive phototaxis, meaning they are attracted to light. We can take advantage of this behavior with these traps, which are especially effective at capturing megalopae, the final larval stage of these crab. By counting and measuring megalopae captured in the trap, we can evaluate recruitment of Dungeness crab.  Additionally, we monitor local beaches to evaluate potential bottlenecks as these larval forms transition to the juvenile stage.

Objectives

  • Regularly monitor a light trap at a station in Shilshole Bay marina
  • Count larval crabs and other organisms
  • Measure the size of the megalope
  • Observe patterns in light trap catch relative to ocean and atmospheric conditions
  • Participate in bimonthly beach surveys of juvenile crab at Golden Gardens (TBD)

Methods

The trap is checked every other day throughout spring and summer (April 15th – September 1st). Student(s) will need to identify a schedule to share the responsibility, which is typically a 1-2 hour time commitment during each sampling event. We’re looking for 4-5 students who could work together to sample throughout the week. Students must commit to sampling on average 3 times a week throughout the season.

During each sampling event, the trap is removed from the water and emptied into a basin. Organisms are sorted, identified, and counted before release. A subset of Dungeness crab megalopae are retained for measurement and additional tissue collection. Here’s a link to a short tutorial video (9-minutes): https://www.pnwcrab.com/larval-crab-study?wix-vod-video-id=b42f5cba46f74374be4640260a73fcac&wix-vod-comp-id=comp-kgjuvgko. And if you want more details, here’s a link to the methods paper: https://www.pnwcrab.com/_files/ugd/b705fa_80dd95db53fe42fd839883ab7f0cc621.pdf

Additional beach monitoring may occur 1-2 times a month. During each sampling event, ten quadrats are randomly selected. Using a trowel, the contents of each quadrat are excavated and sieved to remove all organisms. Crabs are sorted, identified, and counted before release. Dungeness crab are measured.

Benefits of Participation:

–       Experience in field methods and best practices

–       Experience in biological data collection and data management

–       Experience in species identification

–       Development of professional networks that span tribal, state, federal, and non-profit organizations operating in Puget Sound

–       Independent study or capstone projects available

Required Qualifications:

–       Positive attitude

–       Willingness to learn new skills

–       Willingness to work in sometimes adverse weather

–       Detail-oriented and self-starter

–       Reliable with good time-management

–       Able to work independently and within teams

–       Can commit to sampling 3 times a week (on average) throughout the season (April-September)

Desired Qualifications

–       Some coursework in Marine Biology, ecology, and/or oceanography

–       Coursework in data collection

–       Previous lab or field experience

To Apply

Complete this form: https://forms.gle/kW569fR7R2yy6bED9 AND send Resume, Cover letter, and unofficial transcript by March 21st to P. Sean McDonald, Associate Teaching Professor, UW Program on the Environment at <psean@uw.edu>. In your cover letter please indicate your preference for volunteering versus earning academic credit (independent study or capstone).

Congratulations to our 5 PoE Husky 100 Winners!

Written by

A HUGE congratulations to the 🎉5🎉 PoE students who were selected to be part of the 2025 Husky 100 cohort! Alec Baron, Elena Vega de Soto, Kort Maeda, Megan Hassi, and Nina Pursai — we are so excited to celebrate you and your accomplishments. You should be proud of this amazing distinction.

Each year, the Husky 100 recognizes 100 undergraduate, graduate and professional students from the UW Bothell, Seattle and Tacoma campuses in all areas of study who are making the most of their time at the University of Washington. It is an amazing achievement to have 5 of our students receive this award — a whole 5% of Husky 100 winners are environmental studies majors, how neat!

Stay tuned for more Husky 100 news as profiles for this year’s winners are released! Click here to view a complete list of 2025 winners, and for more information on the Husky 100, visit this webpage.

Palestine & Sustainability: UW Tacoma Event

Written by

Explore the connection between environmental and social sustainability in Palestine. Learn about the impact of settler colonialism on land and water, human rights violations, and the psychological effects of war. Join us for a discussion on education, culture, and resilience. Open to students and non-students. FREE EVENT, plus hear PoE’s own Professor Lubna Alzaroo speak!

The event will take place on Friday, March 7th from 4:30 – 7:00 PM. RSVP here.

Attend the Washington State Recycling Association Conference

Written by

treatment systems in the United States.

Topic Overview:

The WSRA-WORC Conference will have nearly 20 unique breakouts representing nearly 40 different sessions. Some of the key subject areas being covered include:

  • Waste Reduction is a Team Effort
  • Glass Panel
  • Farm Waste
  • Organic Management Laws
  • Textiles
  • Food Waste
  • Offal
  • Electric Fleets
  • Bin contamination
  • Grant Opportunities
  • Fighting waste contamination

Students can apply to receive free registration!

UW Environmental Career Fair

Written by

We’re thrilled to announce the annual Environmental Career Fair is now open for registration!

Register here

Event Details:

  • Date: Thursday, February 13th
  • Time: 12:00 PM – 3:00 PM
  • Location: The HUB North Ballroom

How You Can Prepare:

  • Update your resume and be prepared to talk about your interests and career goals.
  • Dress to impress – this is your chance to make a positive first impression. While there is no formal dress code, dress in something that makes you feel confident and ready to talk with employers.
  • Research the attending companies on Handshake to make the most out of your interactions.
  • Prepare questions about employers’ organizations and their available opportunities.

For more information on what to expect at the Fair, check out this resource from the Career & Internship Center. Don’t miss out on this chance to kickstart your future career! Mark your calendar for February 13th, 12-3pm in the HUB North Ballroom.

Disability Accommodation

To request disability accommodation, visit the UW Disability Services Office website or email them at dso@uw.edu. The University of Washington makes every effort to honor disability accommodation requests. Requests can be responded to most effectively if received as far in advance of the event as possible, preferably at least 10 days.

Questions?

Email us at envjobs@uw.edu

Connecting Communities to (Crab) Conservation

Written by

Annie Schlanger measures Dungeness crab megalopae captured in light trap at PCRG’s Shilshole Bay site (photo by Ally Galiotto).

For Annie Schlanger, a senior in Environmental Studies, her capstone project has been an eye-opening dive into the world of citizen science and Dungeness crab conservation. As part of the Pacific Northwest Crab Research Group (PCRG), Annie and other student volunteers have been collecting valuable data to help improve our understanding of the early life stages of Dungeness crabs—an iconic species in the Salish Sea, vital to both the ecosystem and local fisheries.

Through PCRG’s larval Dungeness crab monitoring program, Annie and a team of community scientists have been using light traps to capture megalopae—larval crabs at their final stage before they settle into their juvenile form. But it’s not just about counting crabs. It’s about something deeper: building connections between the public and the ecosystems they rely on. And that’s exactly what Annie’s work explores.

Her capstone project focuses on how citizen science—where community members step up as researchers—can also turn participants into environmental educators. While working with PCRG, Annie realized how powerful it is to not only engage volunteers in data collection but to help them translate their newfound knowledge into educational opportunities for others. In fact, her research found that volunteers don’t just learn about the species they’re studying—they share their knowledge with friends, family, and fellow community members, spreading the word about the importance of Dungeness crabs and the science behind the project.

An outreach rack card produced by Annie to promote the Dungeness crab monitoring network

“I found that 80% of volunteers felt confident about teaching others about the project”, said Annie, referring to results of a survey she conducted of program volunteers.

Annie’s contribution to PCRG doesn’t stop there. She created a “rack card” for volunteers—an easy-to-use tool to help them communicate with the public about the project. This card, which will be distributed at over 60 light trap monitoring sites throughout the region, contains key information about the project and a QR code to help others get involved. It’s a simple yet effective way to ensure that volunteers can easily share what they’re learning and inspire others to take part in the effort.

But perhaps the most exciting part? Preliminary results from the Dungeness crab monitoring program were published in Fisheries Magazine on January 22, 2025. And just a few days later, Annie presented her work at the 2025 Winter Meeting of PCRG. It’s an exciting time, not only for Annie but for the entire PCRG team, as they continue to build a long-term dataset that will help inform sustainable fisheries management and ecosystem conservation efforts in the region.

Annie’s capstone journey was shaped by the guidance of her site supervisor, Alexandra Galiotto, a Program on the Environment alumna who is now the PCRG program assistant and a co-author on the paper in Fisheries Magazine. She also received advice from Program on the Environment (POE) faculty advisor, Tim Billo. Their experience and mentorship have played a key role in helping Annie connect her research to the broader community conservation efforts. P. Sean McDonald, Annie’s capstone instructor and another POE faculty, is also a co-author of the PCRG paper. As a member of the PCRG coordinating committee, P. Sean has been a consistent advocate for the power of community science and has helped bring this project to life.

Dungeness crab megalopae captured in light trap at PCRG’s Shilshole Bay site (photo by Ally Galiotto).

Through her work with PCRG, Annie has learned that science is as much about community as it is about data. The impact of her capstone project reaches beyond just the numbers. By helping to connect the public with local science projects and encouraging everyone to become a part of the solution, Annie is helping to inspire a new generation of environmental stewards.

“The experience of being a part of participatory science is enough to give community members the knowledge they need to teach others,” shared Annie. “Now we just need networks to give their volunteers the tools and opportunities necessary to practice and hone their skills.”

This project is a perfect example of how collaboration, community engagement, and hands-on science come together to create real change. And who knows? The next time you find yourself at a marina or beach in the Salish Sea, you might just run into one of Annie’s fellow volunteers, eager to share the wonders of Dungeness crab research with you.

If you are a UW student interested in participating in monitoring for the 2025 season, then apply here. Priority application deadline is March 1st. Contact psean@uw.edu with questions. More information about recent research can be found here.

Annie shares her research at the 2025 PCRG Annual Meeting in Kingston, WA.

Global Visionaries: Yen-Chu Weng

Written by

The Office of Global Affairs is excited to celebrate Yen-Chu Weng for our November 2024 edition of the Global Visionaries series. The Global Visionaries series highlights the UW’s global impact by featuring innovative, globally-engaged faculty, staff, students and alumni.

 

Tell us about your background and experience.

I was born and raised in Taiwan. From an early age, I knew I wanted to explore more of the world. I chose geography as my field of study when I went to National Taiwan University. I really enjoyed all of the field components of the curriculum, especially going out to explore different topics across various regions in Taiwan. While I was in university, I took advantage of an opportunity to go on a new global exchange program to Germany. The language program allowed me to study German intensively for three months in Munich. In my senior year, I decided to study abroad again but this time in Australia on an exchange program to the University of Melbourne. My first few weeks in Australia were very difficult as I figured out how to navigate a different system of higher education and I gained more confidence to speak out during class discussions.

After I graduated from university, I spent one month in Taiwan after returning from Australia before I packed up all of my things and moved to Madison, Wisconsin. I came to the United States in 2003 to continue studying geography in graduate school. While I was in graduate school, I served as a teaching assistant for multiple courses in my department. It was a very formative experience for me. I learned more about what higher education looks like in the United States. I found a way to deliver instructions to students in my class while sharing my own perspectives. It involved a lot of self preparation and learning from my peers and mentors to learn how to adopt a more interactive teaching style.

My first job after graduate school was in the Program on the Environment in the College of the Environment at the University of Washington back in 2013. For the first couple of years, I mainly focused on developing curriculum and learning the curriculum in my program. In 2017 or 2018, after establishing some of my teaching credentials in my program, I decided to incorporate more of an global learning component into our curriculum. I saw there was a demand from students in the Program on the Environment to learn more about environmental issues in countries outside of the Western context. I decided to challenge myself and started seeking opportunities to bring in an international perspective to our curriculum. I got started by making connections with colleagues in Taiwan to lay the groundwork for a new study abroad program.

Turning the Tide: Chris Mantegna on changing the face of marine science

Written by

On a windy June afternoon, Chris Mantegna, ’21, encourages a half-dozen undergraduates to flip over barnacle-studded rocks and sift through seaweed. Equipped with clipboards to record their findings, they’re creating a snapshot of the organisms in the island’s intertidal zone — from orange sea cucumbers to the camouflaged armored mollusks called chitons.

Mantegna, a third-year graduate student in aquatic and fishery sciences, has spent the past three summers in Washington’s San Juan Islands, mentoring undergrads here on Yellow Island — a pristine 11-acre nature preserve owned by the Nature Conservancy. She created this eight-week program for students to get their hands dirty in the field and learn cutting-edge lab techniques at the UW Friday Harbor Laboratories — where she had a transformational research experience herself as a Husky undergrad.

This mentorship program reflects Mantegna’s passion both for advancing the science and for making it more inclusive and accessible to others. Her face lights up when she spots a small chiton (her favorite) clinging to the bottom of a rock, and she invites others to feel the mollusk’s tough plated back. Even Mantegna’s doctoral work — examining the genetic response of shellfish to contaminants in Puget Sound waterways — has a focus on community outreach and environmental literacy.

Mantegna says we have a better chance at fighting climate change when everyone — scientists and community members — feels connected to their environment and each other. “I can tell you that the ocean is dying or that we have too much acidification,” says Mantegna, a U.S. Navy veteran who is the first in her family to graduate from college. “But it doesn’t matter if you’ve never had the chance to feel the joy that comes from this place.”

Alumni in the Non-Profit Sector Virtual Event

Written by

PANEL: ALUMNI IN THE NON-PROFIT SECTOR
Thursday, November 21, 2024

5:30-6:30 PM Pacific Time

Attend via Zoom: https://washington.zoom.us/j/9584529669

Co-hosted by Jackson School Career Services and the Jackson School Student Association (JSSA)

Want to find out about diverse and fulfilling career paths in the non-profit sector? Come and learn from Jackson School of International Studies alumni Carolyn Bain of Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute, Sambath Eat of the Cambodian American Community Council of Washington, and Betz Mayer of the Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER) about their interesting jobs and careers in the non-profit sector. OPEN TO ALL UW STUDENTS AND ALUMNI.

Panelists:

CAROLYN BAIN, Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute

Carolyn Bain was born and raised in Seattle, received her BA in International Studies from the University of Washington Jackson School, Master of Public Health from Columbia University, served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in the Dominican Republic, and trained Peace Corps Volunteers in the Child Survival Program. Carolyn was a consultant for the Ford Foundation’s Sexual and Reproductive Rights program in Santiago, Chile. She worked at Fred Hutchinson on breast cancer and HIV studies and worked at PATH coordinating a breast cancer detection research program in Peru. Carolyn was also executive director of Guatemala Village Health for 10 years and currently works at Kaiser Permanente as a Research Program Manager.

SAMBATH EAT, Cambodian American Community Council of Washington (CACCWA)

Sambath Eat holds a BFA in Ceramics from the University of Montana, a BA in Asian Studies from the University of Oregon, and an MA in International Studies from the University of Washington Jackson School. He serves as the Executive Director of the Cambodian American Community Council of Washington (CACCWA) where he manages four projects funded by state and city grants and leads a team of 12 staff members. Sambath is committed to upholding the CACCWA’s mission and values, which aim to strengthen and elevate the Cambodian American community in Washington state. He is passionate about empowering the BIPOC community and dedicated to building a more diverse and inclusive community.

BETZ MAYER, Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER)

Betz Mayer serves as the Assistant Director of the Regional Infrastructure Accelerator (RIA) program at the Pacific NorthWest Economic Region (PNWER), leading initiatives to improve understanding of freight transportation systems and accelerating projects that decarbonize Pacific Northwest supply chains. Betz has developed deep expertise in medium- and heavy-duty zero emission vehicles and the infrastructure needed to meet zero emission refueling needs. She also works on port infrastructure projects, legislator education, and the promotion of expanded passenger and freight rail service to the Pacific Northwest.