News

2019-2020 Graduation Celebration

Watch the 2019-2020 Program on the Environment Graduation Celebration! June 11th, 2020 Event Program: 11:00 Welcome Gary Handwerk, PhD Bruce J. Leven Endowed Chair for Environmental Studies Director, UW Program on the Environment 11:05 Remarks from the Dean Lisa Graumlich, PhD Mary Laird Wood Professor Dean, UW College of the Environment 11:10 Alumni Speaker Anna Johnson ’18 Legislative Assistant Washington State House of Representatives 11:20 Capstone Awards Presentation P. 

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Spring 2020 Capstone Symposium: May 27

The Program on the Environment will host the Spring 2020 Capstone Symposium on Wednesday, May 27, online.  All are welcome to attend and support students as they present on the culmination of their hard work over three quarters. 

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Environmental Communication Panels

The Program on the Environment will host Environmental Communication Panels during Winter quarter, in Wallace Hall.  Panels consist of practitioners with expertise in different areas of environmental communication. All are welcome to attend. 

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Autumn 2019 Capstone Symposium: November 20

The Program on the Environment will host the Autumn 2019 Capstone Symposium on Wednesday, November 20, in the Fishery Science Building.  All are welcome to attend and support students as they present on the culmination of their hard work over three quarters. 

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Bill McKibben Discusses Falter: May 2 7:30pm Kane 120

McKibben’s earlier work offered prescient warnings about climate change. But in his newest book he suggests the danger is broader than that. Join us for a thought-provoking discussion about the future. ABOUT THE BOOK: Thirty years ago Bill McKibben offered one of the earliest warnings about climate change. Now he broadens the warning: the entire human game, he suggests, has begun to play itself out. Bill McKibben’s groundbreaking book The End of Nature -- issued in dozens of languages and long regarded as a classic -- was the first book to alert us to global warming. But the danger is broader than that: even as climate change shrinks the space where our civilization can exist, new technologies like artificial intelligence and robotics threaten to bleach away the variety of human experience. Falter tells the story of these converging trends and of the ideological fervor that keeps us from bringing them under control. And then, drawing on McKibben’s experience in building 350.org, the first truly global citizens movement to combat climate change, it offers some possible ways out of the trap. We’re at a bleak moment in human history -- and we’ll either confront that bleakness or watch the civilization our forebears built slip away. Falter is a powerful and sobering call to arms, to save not only our planet but also our humanity. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Bill McKibben is a founder of the environmental organization 350.org and was among the first to have warned of the dangers of global warming. He is the author of the bestsellers The End of Nature, Eaarth, and Deep Economy. He is the Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and the winner of the Gandhi Prize, the Thomas Merton Prize, and the Right Livelihood Prize. He lives in Vermont. This event is presented in partnership with the University of Washington Program on the Environment, and is supported by The Seattle Public Library Foundation, author series sponsor Gary Kunis, and media sponsor The Seattle Times, and presented in partnership with Elliott Bay Book Company. Books will be available for purchase at the event.  

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PoE Lecturer Tim Billo Makes News in Work with Sword Fern Die-Off

Tim Billo, instructor of our Natural History of the Puget Sound Region course, practices what he preaches. He uses his research into the natural history of our local sword ferns as a way of introducing undergraduates to research, demonstrating to them that they can make important contributions to natural history, as well as to helping to solve pressing ecological issues. Indeed, as the article suggests, this research would not be possible without the collaborative efforts of many concerned citizens, including our students who have played crucial roles over the past four years.

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