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The University of Washington Garbology Project (UWGP) is an ongoing student effort dedicated to the use of archaeological methods for the study and improvement of UW systems of waste management.  They are working with UW Recycling and a host of other campus groups to help reduce the UW’s $1.3 million annual landfill bill, and their spring 2013 efforts will focus on the waste produced in Denny Hall.  In doing so, They’ll be directly testing the effectiveness of UW Recycling’s newest waste initiatives, and our results will be used to help inform future UW Recycling policy and to advance sustainable advocacy efforts on campus.

To carry out this work, they need students to come and help us examine the trash produced by Denny Hall.  They’ll provide all necessary training and safety equipment, and student participants will get the chance to:

1) participate in ongoing archaeological research right here on campus,

2) help UW strategically reduce the amount of landfill waste we produce annually (currently over 10 million annual pounds), and

3) earn 1 hour of course credit (listed under Archy 299, so this credit can count towards an Anthropology major).

What does participation entail?

Participants will be expected to attend one trash sorting session per week.  Sorting sessions will be held at Raitt Hall from 4 PM to 6:30 PM on Monday and Wednesday evenings from April 8th through June 5th (although we won’t meet on May 6th or May 8th).  For scheduling purposes UWGP asks participants to consistently attend either Monday or Wednesday sessions rather than a mix of the two days. Once you have indicated your preference, write to Jack Johnson at anamgorm@uw.edu to express your interest, and (more importantly) to make sure he has your email address so that you can receive project-related correspondence.

For more information about UWGP check out our website and feel free to contact Jack via email.

[course]: Citizen Ecology

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Tired of large classes? Looking for a unique class only offered this spring? The following course can count for the natural science, policy and decision-making, or fieldwork requirements of the Environmental Studies major or minor. Open to all sophomores, juniors, and seniors. Science communication and community outreach are incredibly relevant to PoE and environmental studies in general!

ENVIR 495D, Citizen Ecology
MW 10:30-11:20, W 1:00-2:50
Open to all majors, SLN 13758
  • Should ecologists recruit the public to help collect important data to better understand global change—data that is otherwise difficult to get? 
  • Or is data collected by the public fundamentally flawed?
  • How can scientists and non-scientists communicate effectively about ecological ideas? 
  • Does citizen science change participants’ understanding of ecology and science, or their civic decision-making? Should it?
Citizen science (CS)—or “crowdsourced science”– is an important emerging phenomenon in ecological research. CS is characterized by collaboration between academic scientists and interested participants from the public, who volunteer to collect and share data.  This course explores the potential uses and shortcomings of CS research in ecology through labs and readings.  We also address science communication and social implications of CS.

[course]: ESRM 430: Hyperspatial Remote Sensing in Natural Resource Management

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The course title is a mouthful, but check this out if you’re still looking for a course to fulfill the ’other quantitative methods’ requirement.

Announcement for ESRM 430 – Hyperspatial Remote Sensing in Natural Resource Management

Want to be on the cutting edge of science? Learn ecology at the speed of light? Hyperspatial remote sensing combines the latest technologies with traditional dirt under your finger nails ecology. Please forward to any interested parties.

5 Credits (no requirements, opened to non-ESRM majors)

Summary: You will be exposed to the principles of remote sensing using a combination of traditional and latest techniques (example: automated image segmentation/feature extraction). Working with a conventional set of aerial and high resolution satellite imagery in the first half of the course and with LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) data in the second half of the course, you will have the opportunity to apply these principles and obtain hands-on experience. Environmental applications including watershed analysis, change analysis, forest resources, wildlife, point and non-point pollution, environmental monitoring, land-use planning, urban-suburban-forestry interfaces, and outdoor recreation will be discussed and illustrated throughout the course.

Lectures:  T & Th  12:30 – 1:20

Lab:  Session A T 2:30 –  3:50 Session B T 4:00 – 5:20

http://courses.washington.edu/esrm430/.

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Looking for a great course for Spring?  Interested in Environmental Modeling?  Don’t have advanced mathematics?  Check this course out!  

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This course is offered one time only through Huckabay Fellow (and ENVIR 280 TA from last spring!) Susan Waters. It will count for either the ‘natural science’, ‘policy and decision-making’, or ‘fieldwork’ perspectives requirements.

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Spring 2013 ENVIR 479 PoE Honors Seminar- 2 credits
(Un)Making a Green Argument: Climate Policy and Environmental Advocacy

Last June, Rolling Stone published an essay by climate activist Bill McKibben titled “Global Warming’s Terrifying New Math.”  As a piece of popular advocacy, the essay is extraordinary in its clarity of argument and power of persuasion.  It has received over 123,000 likes on Facebook and launched a nationwide movement encouraging “divestment” of fossil-fuel corporate stock by public pension systems and university endowments.

 In this seminar we will critically examine this popular essay as an extended case study of modern environmental advocacy.  Over the course of 11 weeks, we will work through the essay’s factual claims, its reasoning, its rhetorical frames, and its policy conclusions.  We will critique how the essay was assembled and disassemble it into constituent pieces.  At the end of the class, students will reassemble the same pieces to reach their own policy conclusions.  Along the way, we will take tours of major proposed fossil-fuel developments and the current debates surrounding them—namely development of the Albertan tar sands, oil drilling in the Beaufort and Chuckchi Seas, and construction of proposed west coast coal terminals.

The purpose of this seminar is to encourage students to think about policy arguments from multiple perspectives and to consider how a given argument works.  What relative roles do logic, science, and rhetoric play in a given argument?  What facts do advocates highlight, how related are those facts to the advocates’ conclusions, and what policy alternatives are left behind?  This is not a seminar endorsing any particular environmental policy.  It is a quarter-long study in claims, counterclaims, strategies, and tactics used in current climate policy debates.  Diverse viewpoints will be welcomed and encouraged.

Class Day/time: Tuesdays 3:30-5:20
Taught by Todd A. Wildermuth, Scholar in Residence, UW School of Law
Open to Honors Undergraduates.

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The Oceanography summer study abroad program in Pohnpei, Micronesia will take place June 22-July 20, 2013. The class will focus on coastal ecosystems in a changing climate, and will provide students with field experience studying coral reefs, mangrove forests, estuaries, and atolls, and the ways that human activities affect those ecosystems.

The application deadline is February 15th, 2013. Foundation in the natural sciences is useful, but students from a wide range of backgrounds and majors are encouraged to apply.  More information and the online application is available at http://studyabroad.washington.edu/index.cfm?FuseAction=Programs.ViewProgram&Program_ID=11114

To learn more about this opportunity, attend one of the following information sessions:  Thursday, January 17th at 5pm or Wednesday, February 6th at 5pm, both in Ocean Sciences Building 425.  If you are unable to attend either of the information sessions, please contact Nemiah Ladd (snladd@uw.edu) with questions about the course.

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This Summer ‘A’ term 2013, the Department of Anthropology is holding a field study school taught in Colorado and New Mexico. The 5 course involves experiential learning on the topics of agroecology, restoration ecology, and permaculture methods and materials at historic acequia farms, which are sustainable, equitable, and resilient farming systems. This summer, students will work on projects at the following acequia farms:

  • Almunyah de la Junta de Los Ríos in Embudo, New Mexico. Edible landscape feature of heirloom wine grape trellises.
  • Rancho Dos Acequias in San Acacio, Colorado. Contour swale to control water flows and trap sedimentation associated with flood irrigation.
  • Rancho de los Martínez in San Francisco, Colorado. A raised-bed polyculture milpa and a seed savers’ hutch.
  • Rancho Vialpando in San Francisco, Colorado. A dispensa, storage building of locally harvested wood (aspen and fir) built entirely without nails.

For more information, attend the information session on January 25 at 1:30 pm in Denny Hall 401, and/or contact dpena@uw.edu.