3E-COE

Refilling instead of landfilling

2011-10-04T09:10:00.006-04:00

There are two pieces of good news for us today at Penn State. It's amazing, the work that the original crew of Alex, Jared, Steve, and I started almost 3 years ago has spread farther and deeper.

First, Penn State's green.psu.edu from the Office of Sustainability fills us in on the bottle refilling stations across PSU. Those early and strong efforts (victory fill at right) to work with the Office of Physical Plant paid off. Today, there are 20 bottle stations at University Park and a few more across the Commonwealth campuses. 18 more will arrive at University Park in the next two years.

Second, tonight at 7 pm, the Bucknell Green Film Series will be showing Tapped, Stephanie Soechtig's debut feature film about the surprising and far-reaching impacts of the bottled water industry. The film probes topics like the petroleum used to make plastics and transport bottled products long distances, excessive groundwater withdrawals by bottling plants, and the general lack of regulatory oversight over the bottled water industry. Who profits and who loses out when society prioritizes convenience over sustainability?

Following the film, the a post-screening discussion and Q & A session about bottled water and its impacts here in Pennsylvania. The discussion will be moderated by Cathy Curran Myers, Director of the BUEC and former Deputy Secretary for Water Management at the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. I (Peter Buckland) will also be a panelist discussing our work advocating on reducing bottled water here at Penn State.

Free and open education on climate change

2011-08-31T12:15:00.004-04:00

One of my colleagues and mentors, Don Brown of Penn State and primary author of the blog Climate Ethics, has written, "climate change must be understood as a civilization challenging ethical issue" It is the greatest technical and ethical problem human beings have ever faced.

Global? Check. Complicated? Check. Hinged on human activity? Check. Hinged on natural processes humans don't control? Check. It's possible that human-induced climate change could in the next century create an atmosphere more CO2-intense and warmer than any since the Jurassic period 150 million years ago. Sadly, there will be no dinosaurs*.

Challenges issues of justice, rights, and responsibilities? Check. Faces us with our own limits? Check. If this is the case, and climate change is a civilization challenging ethical (and technical issue) then education must respond. At colleges and universities across the world faculty have set up all kinds of courses to introduce students to the science, ethics, politics, and policies that deal with climate change. There are even signatory agreements between colleges and universities like the American College and University President's Climate Commitment, University Leaders for a Sustainable Future, Second Nature, the Copernicus Charter and others mandate that signatory institutions create greenhouse gas reduction and mitigation programs with curriculum for environmental literacy. Climate change education occupies a central part of that curriculum these days.

But all universities and colleges have limited enrollment. They have maximum student capacity made possible by people's ability to gain admission and their ability and willingness to pay. How can someone something like course in climate change without going to college?

The Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions now offers online courses that take the lay person through the science of climate change. They have an Introduction, a lesson on CO2 and the greenhouse effect, Mother Nature's influence on climate, observable changes in climate, and finally climate modeling. What's great to see as teachers is that there are learning outcomes for each of them that build upon the previous lesson and enabling further understanding, connected to other resources through the home website, and also linked to education for sustainability in British Columbia and abroad (pdf here).

It might be the case that understanding the what and the how of climate change are very important. But at some level answering the question "Why have humans used technologies that caused climate change to begin with?" might be more important. If we can answer that question, we might be able to figure out how we can change society to mitigate our impacts on the climate and thus ourselves. But that might be a really radical form of education and possibly the kind of education that ethically grounds a better civilization.

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* There has been woolly mammoth DNA found and some people would like to engineer and birth a mammoth. Jurassic Park may be less fictional than we thought.

Reimagining education for resilient and sustainable people and communities

2011-08-29T14:02:00.004-04:00

We have to change educational systems. Failing schools. Dropouts. Low rates of literacy. Scientific illiteracy. Achievement gaps a mile wide between ethnicities and socio-economic brackets. America has problems in its educational systems. But we have perhaps a much bigger problem of education looming behind everything.

Ecocide. The industrial people of the world have used so much fossil fuel so fast that we have fundamentally altered the planet's atmosphere, hydrosphere, lithosphere, and biosphere. In the Arctic we're melting glaciers, displacing Inuit people, melting tundra and ruining boreal forest soil, and messing with polar bear, walrus, seal, caribou, reindeer, wolf, and migratory bird habitats. The Amazon and southeast Asian tropical rain forests are being falling, transforming it from a water and carbon sink into a carbon releasing territory, changing rainfall patterns all around it, turning a biodiversity hot spot into an extinction hot spot, and eradicating indigenous populations. What's to be done?

If you're a teacher you must believe you have some agency in the world and that touching people's lives and awakening them to new knowledge or deep connections can happen in school. How about awakening them to their connection to and reliance on the Earth and its systems? Albert Einstein is credited with saying, “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.” That must include school too.

How are people trying to build a bridge to a better future? Creative Change Education Solutions is taking some steps in this direction.

A new vision is taking hold —a future where communities thrive, the environment is healthy, traditions matter, and green economies provide real prosperity for all. We believe everyone has a stake in this future and that education must inspire learning and leadership towards it.
Creative Change Educational Solutions is a nonprofit organization advancing educational leadership and transformation through a lens of sustainability. Based in southeast Michigan, we serve K12 schools, nonprofits, universities, and teacher education programs at the national level.

They are taking on the critical problems of the world and offering what I've been calling "gorgeous solutions." It's not just doom and gloom and the notion that we're all just about to get dunked with the sinking Titanic. We have choices ahead and great things to learn, interesting and compelling people to meet, relationships to develop, technologies to advance, and communities to thrive in. So how?

Take for example their materials from Sustainable by Design:

Our world is filled with “stuff”, but where does it all come from, and where does it go when it’s done? How—and why—do we design, create, use and dispose of the things we use each day? This program explores ways to make design, building, and manufacturing greener and more equitable. Programs explore how scientific, economic and cultural factors influence decisions, and the implications for workers, consumers and business leaders.

What's really interesting about this resource is that they have scaled it so that you can work on it from elementary through higher education. I, for example, work in a teacher education program and have been seriously contemplating a course that would develop sustainability awareness for teachers, administrators, policy makers or analysts, architects, and engineers by using the built environment - from whole cities to single buildings - to understand and learn about our interactions with the more-than-human environment. From a newly developed understanding, how could we teach children, make better policies, and individually and collectively lead more sustainable lives? And here is a resource to get me started with something more substantial than what I'd had on my own.

If you're a third grade or tenth grade teacher now you have the same opportunity. If you're really lucky you can integrate curricula like these into school gardening, environmental footprint, and/or contemporary government work. This is a whole new way to arrange schooling that could work in many of the schools highlighted in Smart by Nature published by the Center for Ecological Literacy.

"The implications" they could be referring to above are considerable. Confronted with the patterns of waste we generate, our consciences might be piqued. So piqued, we could act better for ourselves and our world. This is getting at a whole other kind of thinking that gets away from the linear mechanical industrial school and gets at the webs of living and life we actually are in. [This isn't the only such resource. Peruse the this blog's right sidebar for many many more.]

Now that might be some really worthwhile schooling. It might be not only sustainability education but actually be sustainable education. Imagine that.

Oil'd

2011-07-17T10:17:00.002-04:00

How's this for a piece of education on patterns and sustainability? How can you use this in your class? Ideas?

Oil'd from Chris Harmon on Vimeo.

Arne Duncan's speech on "Education for Sustainable Development"

2011-06-14T14:47:00.003-04:00

Last September the U.S. Department of Education held a summit on Education for Sustainable Development, something I think we in 3E-COE have been interested in since we got going. Current Secretary of Education spoke to the conference. He notes some of the incredible challenges and opportunities before us as working teachers:

In my experience as secretary I've seen the impact of climate change first hand. Last year, I travelled to Alaska with a delegation of Cabinet members. We visited the remote village of Hooper Bay. Scientists have documented that more and more carbon dioxide in Alaska's oceans is affecting fishing for crab and salmon. But we heard directly from the village elders that they had noticed for years the changing water temperature—and that the changes were affecting their livelihood of fishing for salmon. We need to address these issues head on—and education must be part of the solution.

This week's sustainability summit represents the first time that the Department is taking a taking a leadership role in the work of educating the next generation of green citizens and preparing them to contribute to the workforce through green jobs. President Obama has made clean, renewable energy a priority because, as he says, it's the best way to "truly transform our economy, to protect our security, and save our planet."

Educators have a central role in this. A well educated citizen knows that we must not act in this generation in ways that endanger the next. They teach students about how the climate is changing. They explain the science behind climate change and how we can change our daily practices to help save the planet. They have a role in preparing students for jobs in the green economy.

Historically, the Department of Education hasn't been doing enough in the sustainability movement. Today, I promise you that we will be a committed partner in the national effort to build a more environmentally literate and responsible society.

You can read the entire piece at this link. What do you think of Duncan's ideas? Are incentives and money the way to go? Is it about jobs? What would you like the federal government to address on this issue?

Nestle at it again...

2011-06-09T16:53:00.000-04:00

Here we go again, not surprisingly- Nestle continues the push to privatize water. And also, not surprisingly, we continue to fight back! Here is a link to sign a Corporate Accountability International petition to Nestle's CEO, Kim Jeffery: http://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/2215/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=6433.

(Note: it's been a while since I've posted and I can't remember how to insert a hyperlink! Please excuse my blog illiteracy.)

Get out and learn about the campus environment and help too

2011-04-19T10:00:00.001-04:00

Earth Week - Get Outside!
Help beautify Penn State’s newest green space!

Volunteer at the Arboretum, Wednesday, April 20, 9:00 to 11:00 a.m.

Help maintain Penn State's beautiful Arboretum! The project involves removing invasive plants (i.e. cutting and hauling brush) from the Arboretum's natural areas. We recommend volunteers wear good shoes/boots, long pants, and a long-sleeved shirt and bring a water bottle. We provide work gloves and safety glasses, unless they would like to use your own. No tool needed. The work day begins at 9:00 a.m. Sign up to volunteer here.

Get Outside! Enjoy the spring weather on a guided walk with a with a Shaver’s Creek naturalist.

Campus Plant Walk, Tuesday, April 19, 12:00-12:45 p.m.

Take a mid-day break with Eric Burkhart, Plant Science Program Coordinator at Shaver's Creek Environmental Center, to learn more about plant life on campus. This 45-minute walk will include plant identification, as well as discussion of the traditional and contemporary uses of plants. Sign up today! (Registration required) Register here.

· Campus Bird Walk, Tuesday, April 21, 12:00-1:00 p.m.
Take a leisurely campus stroll to see and hear the numerous bird species that migrate through central Pennsylvania. Shaver's Creek naturalist Doug Wentzel will help participants identify the songs, calls and field marks of species from hawks and eagles to thrushes and woodpeckers. If you have them, bring a good pair of hiking boots, binoculars, any guide books you have, and an inquisitive mind! This walk is open to birders of all experience levels. All you need is curiosity. Some binoculars are available to borrow. (Registration required) Register here. 12p.m.- 1 p.m.; Meet at the Arboretum.

Real student-centered learning.

2011-04-07T11:56:00.004-04:00

As teachers and future teachers we often think of ourselves as "professionals" who are owed some position of authority in a school system. We line ourselves up in rows in college classes to be imputed with information, skill sets, and best practices to convey content to the next generation. And at the alleged end of this school process, we end up working in a system that we love and hate.

We love working with children or young adults and inviting them to explore new things. We hate some of the ways that the bureaucracy makes us do. We love connecting with students who are, after all, people with imaginations and stories and desires and purposes of their own. We hate that we have to compartmentalize them and examine them with some dehumanizing psychometric tools. Well, some of us do.

And we wonder, "Who is this education for?" There's a lot of talk about student-centered teaching and schooling. But it looks like an awful lot of that is so much talk and not so much action. The curriculum doesn't budge. The goals are still the same. Teachers want to center their practice on students but are tied into a command and control system that regulates them and their students so much that they are a molding device for an industrial factory school for someone else: the federal or state government, businesses, corporations, or some other entity. Too often anything and anyone but the child themselves.

So what happens when students really do it themselves with the guidance of adults? Do you ever wonder how people can be students without the stricture of school?

Here seems to be one answer.

North Star Slice No. 1 from North Star on Vimeo.

What do you think?

Five Schools Implementing Community Garden Projects

2011-03-07T07:21:00.004-05:00

This is a guest post by Katheryn Rivas, a freelance writer and blogger.

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As the threat of climate change continues to sink in to our collective psyches, this generation has had to slowly un-learn everything we became accustomed to in an effort to reduce our carbon footprint. The climate-conscious have done away with gas-guzzling SUVs in favor of hybrid or electric vehicles, switched out their light bulbs, learned to recycle, and learned to shop locally.

With a little help, the next generation of young people won't have as much un-learning to do. Parents, teachers, administrators and the greater community who want to instill principles of sustainability into the next generation can start with the children under their care. One way of doing so is by implementing community gardens in neighborhood schools. Here we'll discuss five schools that are implementing community garden projects to teach children about nature, the environment and what it means to grow one's own food.

1.) Mount Kisco Elementary School.

This public K-5 school in Mount Kisco, NY, is planting its first community garden this spring with the generous financial backing of a community partner, the Bedford Garden Club. Not only will members of the garden club act as master gardeners to the children who will learn from the project, but the community as a whole will be able to grow food there too. Children will learn how to garden, compost and irrigate using rain barrels. The garden, which will grow tomatoes, lima beans, snap peas, radishes, sunflowers and herbs, may be used in the future to launch an after-school cooking program. Read more about this community garden in Chappaqua-Mount Kisco Patch.

2.) Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School.

This urban public school in Berkeley, Calif., benefits from a program several years in the making called the Edible Schoolyard, a one-acre organic garden where they learn how to grow, harvest and prepare produce. The community partner here is a nonprofit called the Chez Panisse Foundation. The garden includes berries, herbs, fruits, veggies and flowers. There's even an adjacent kitchen classroom where students learn to cook using the produce they harvest. Most recently the project has taught children about sustainability through a Rainwater Catchment System. Read more about this education garden at the Edible Schoolyard Website.

3.) Waupaca Community/School Garden.

This community garden is situated on property owned by the School District of Waupaca in east central Wisconsin and is truly a collaboration among local businesses, nonprofits, a local school district and individuals. Not only is the garden used as an outdoor classroom and educational tool for area schools, but the community uses it to supplement the Waupaca Food Pantry with fresh produce. The community garden grows herbs, fruits and veggies like basil, squash, zucchini, cantaloupe and sweet corn. Read more about this community garden on the school district's website.

4.) The Wheeler School.

This independent day school in Providence, RI, has an organic garden where students learn to grow food and that also contributes food to the RI Community Food Bank. The garden not only provides a chance for children to get their hands dirty learning to plant and harvest food, but it also produced more than 200 pounds of organically-grown produce for the food bank in 2010. Learn more about the Wheeler School's garden through its blog.

5.) Carmel Middle School.

This school in Carmel, Calif., teaches kids about sustainability alongside the basics of gardening using a program called MEarth and an organic garden situated on the nearby Hilton Bialek Habitat. Kids learn about native plants, habitat restoration, climate change, cooking and nutrition, and waste and recycling through this program. The program also invites the wider community in through open volunteer days. Learn more about how the garden helps in the education process at Center for Ecoliteracy and the Carmel Habitat.

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Katheryn Rivas, who writes on the topics of online universities which discusses about education, students life, college life, career and eco living. She welcomes your comments at her email Id: katherynrivas87@gmail.com.

Let's Take Back the Tap

2011-02-22T09:25:00.003-05:00

Now that we've got the infrastructure going better for reusable bottles at Penn State, let's see about getting rid of Aquafina again.

We have a petition up calling on President Spanier and the Board of Trustees to stop selling Aquafina at Penn State. It reads:

Dear President Spanier and the Board of Trustees,

We the undersigned believe that Penn State should cease buying and selling single-use plastic water bottles immediately. The detrimental costs associated with single-use bottles are numerous.

Single-use plastic water bottles contribute to solid waste pollution when they aren’t recycled. In all parts of their lifecycle they contribute to climate change. They needlessly exploit a public resource for a price-gouging venture that charges about 700 times the price of tap water at Penn State. Finally, the EPA’s standards on municipal drinking water are more stringent than the FDA’s regulating bottled water.

With Penn State’s growing commitment to sustainability, it doesn’t make sense to carry on business as usual. Around campus, our Office of Physical Plant has installed bottle-filling stations that grow more popular every week. More students, staff, and faculty are moving away from single-use plastic bottles and using reusable steel, aluminum, and plastic canteens and bottles.

We know that more people across our university want good water. We have it.

We know that smart people are responsibly drinking water from our Spring Creek watershed.

We call on you not to renew the Aquafina contract with Pepsi and move us bottle free!!!

We are Penn State.

So take a minute if you are a Penn Stater and sign this petition. Let them know that we want accountability and responsibility.

Online Petition

Inspire

2011-02-10T12:36:00.001-05:00

Take a tip from our secretary Jared Blumer and let's get some inspiration in this joint.

Looking for a way to be a "green" part of the economy?

2011-01-24T09:18:00.001-05:00

This invitation to a "Green Careers Symposium" just came in from Penn State's Center for Sustainability:

The Symposium will take place on February 15 from 7:30 am to noon. At the event, a small group of employers will have the opportunity to discuss their sustainability-related career opportunities with a small group of invited students. After a facilitated personal networking session, there will be a panel discussion on green careers open to the entire Penn State community.

Large and small for-profit companies and non-profit organizations will be attending this event. Most, but not all, of the participating organizations/companies will also be participating in Spring Career Days.

Green Careers Leadership Symposium Itinerary:

7:30am - 8:30am: Arrival and breakfast, informal conversation

8:30am - 9:30am: Speed networking event, during which each employer will have the opportunity to chat briefly with each student in attendance (the format will be similar to speed dating). This portion of the event is by invitation only.

9:30am - 9:45am: Break; doors open to all interested individuals from the PSU community

9:45am - 10:45am: Panel Symposium on green careers—open to the public
Participants include Penn State alumni who are in green careers. Panelists will speak briefly about their own green career journey, or some larger issue in green careers. The floor will then be open for questions from the audience.

10:45am - 12:00pm: Open networking opportunity
Some employers will leave immediately for the Spring Career Fair, which begins at 11:00 AM. Others will have enough time to stay and converse with students until as late as noon.

If you are interested in participating in the Speed Networking portion should contact the Center for Sustainability by using this contact form.

Eat. Play. Love.

2011-01-13T09:33:00.005-05:00

The sustainable food movement's roots are branching.

In June 2010, The American Dietetic Association, American Nurses Association, American Planning Association, and American Public Health Association met to develop a set of shared food system principles.
For the first time, national leaders in the nursing, nutrition, planning, and public health professions worked collaboratively to create a shared platform for systems-wide food policy change.
Endorsed by coalition members, the principles were written to support socially, economically and ecologically sustainable food systems that promote health — the current and future health of individuals, communities and the natural environment.

You can read their combined statement here (pdf). What are your thoughts on educating for a sustainable food system? How can we support it?

Lately, I've been wondering if gardening is enough. Sure, it gets our hands dirty and keeps us working out there with ourselves and our power instead of being plugged into this machine in front of me and eating crummy industrialized potato chips. I'm not in a car. Kids are working and playing and learning at the same time and using their senses, assuming they're actually doing what's asked of them. The potential richness of experience of place is right there. But is it enough?

A friend of mine, a fairly experienced English teacher and avid wilderness explorer, went to Norway last year and visited schools. He talked to teachers there about environmental education (EE). They don't have much of what we would call EE and this perplexed him. It is a highly industrialized nation with an incredible standard of living, healthy and happy people, a fairly high rate of consumption, but has incredible environmental conservation. Maybe it's not even fair to call it conservation because it is part of Norway's identity to preserve wilderness.

People in Norway do much of what their leisure outside. They recreate in action with the wilderness. According to the United States' Official Norway site, "adoration of nature is a vital ingredient in the country's national identity." This is part of schooling, with annual ski jaunts at school. Out you go. Can you imagine? Status quo is cross country skiing, hiking, going to the lakes, or playing outside in nature. Playing in nature breeds love of nature instead of an outdoor-phobic people who don't see the relationship between them, natural resources, and the more-than-human environment.

So gardens are a start. A great start that connects us to a particular place and its cycles and system. It lets us work and play right there and experience growth; growth we hope is external and internal. But I think that we need more than that. We need, I think desperately almost, to bring children and adults into nature where they are and beyond where they are.

Who wants to go hiking? We can bring some food from one of our local farmers and breathe in the air given to us by the hemlocks deep in Allen Seeger or walk the deer paths in the local game lands (wear your orange). Sustain food systems and sustain yourselves. All the while we'll be playing and learning. And maybe, if you're lucky, you can start to love a place and want to be in it and with even more.

Who's game?

Teach children to be good stewards

2011-01-02T13:06:00.004-05:00

I (Peter Buckland) was recently invited to write an opinion piece for the Centre Daily Times on my vision of education. It is a broad appeal for democratic place-based education. I wrote:

There are three ways to retool school and society for a sustainable future: First, most schools are not democratic. Children generally do not have meaningful influence on school policies. But the sustainable future will require people to fully participate in civic life, to make the decisions that affect their lives. Given opportunities to help govern their schools with caring adults working with them, children will have an opportunity to learn the skills of self-governance by self-governing: informing themselves of issues and perspectives, persuading others to adopt new points of view, negotiating compromises and implementing solutions.

Second, most schools reflect the biases of the larger economic system, minimizing the crucial historic and current roles of indigenous people, nonwhite immigrants and women. We need to honor and focus on those roles and live into their cultural practices and beliefs. By grounding ourselves in part in movements for justice and how they changed society in the past, the sustainability movement can build on those successes.

Third, schools should better connect children with the places where they live. Here in central Pennsylvania, our children can learn the histories of Penns Valley, Bellefonte and surrounding towns. They can learn how the stream water in Galbraith Gap Run flows from Bear Meadows to meet Spring Creek. They can come to know the subtle changes in tree stands in Cooper’s Gap,learn to recognize by sight and sound the myriad birds that cohabitate with us and understand the cyclical seasons of the wild and domesticated plants and animals we live among.

Read the entire piece at this link.

Penn State's Strategic Plan & Sustainability

2010-12-20T11:19:00.001-05:00

Biophiles! This just in from Penn State's Office of Sustainability:

What would a sustainable Penn State look like to you? This is the key question to an ambitious sustainability strategic planning effort that was kicked off this fall with all the University’s top leadership—and the guidance of some of the world’s leading sustainable businesses. Town hall meetings and various other forums are being planned now to gather input. For more information, and to contribute, visit: http://www.green.psu.edu/SustPlan/default.asp

What do you think Penn State needs to do? What should the university's curriculum do to move us on a more sustainable path?

In Cancun, a movement for Mother Earth's Rights

2010-12-07T09:26:00.004-05:00

It's not just about human rights anymore. Free speech. The free exercise of religion. The right to due process. Assembly. These are all noble things that we, as citizens of the United States take for granted and hope for more of the world's people.

What about the right to free water? To sanitation? Maude Barlowe argues that these are essential to sustainable human society. And they rest, perhaps, on something much deeper. The right of the Earth's biosphere to sustain itself.

Yes! Magazine reports that a group of concerned people have gathered at the Cancun climate talks to press the case for a broader and more sustainable vision of the rights that global society ought to guarantee and the responsibilities it must fulfill.

Activists in Cancún and Mexico City are rallying behind the idea of environmental rights. Many support a document called the “People’s Agreement on Climate Change,” which includes a “Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth.” It’s an idealistic name for a proposal that would sound either visionary or improbable, or both—if not for the fact that the declaration represents the work of representatives from 56 countries and of tens of thousands of people who attended a climate conference in Cochabamba, Bolivia, last April. The document declares that everybody has rights to basics like clean water and clean air, but it also says something even more extraordinary: that the planet’s ecosystems themselves have rights.

You can read the text of the document here. This is a renewed vision of humans on Earth. When the Rio conference happened in 1992, people envisioned something better and more sustainable for the world, including renewed interest in education for sustainable development under Article 21. In the years since, it has been sorely neglected and only paid with lip service by most national and global institutions.

Barlowe and others see new possibilities on this global action. And yet, maybe it is going to be most effective through the creation of local and regional stability and sustainability. I think it's fair to say that our so-called "leaders" continue to lead us into more monetary and ecological indebtedness, more consumption, and more growth. And yet, at least in this country and many others around the world from Bolivia to India to Australia, it is communities working together that make the difference. And in some of those places, change occurs when people see themselves in their places and their places in them and then love those places and recognize their limits and its limits.

So it might just be the wise thing to do (maybe) to press for a declaration of rights for Mother Earth. Without her, we would and will be nothing. But with her, we flourish.

Learning Progressions, National Standards, and Environmental Science Literacy

2010-12-03T14:02:00.002-05:00

This just in:

Waterbury Lecture

Learning Progressions, National Standards, and Environmental Science Literacy

Professor Charles W. (Andy) Anderson

Department of Teacher Education, Michigan State University

December 9, 2010 11:00-1:00

Ballroom AB, Nittany Lion Inn

“Buffet Lunch Available Following Talk”

We are currently developing new national standards for science education. This gives us a rare chance to reconsider what is REALLY important in our science curriculum and teaching. This presentation focuses on research exploring two ideas. The first is "environmental science literacy:" We should prepare students who understand the environmental consequences of lifestyle, political, and economic decisions. The second is "learning progressions:" We should organize the curriculum around increasingly sophisticated ways of thinking about or understanding the most important scientific ideas and practices.

Charles W. (Andy) Anderson is Professor in the Department of Teacher Education, Michigan State University, where he has been since receiving his Ph.D. in science education from The University of Texas at Austin in 1979. He is past president of the National Association for Research in Science Teaching. He has been co-editor of the Journal of Research in Science Teaching and associate editor of Cognition and Instruction. He recently served as a member of NRC’s Committee on Science Learning, K-8 and of the NAEP Science Standing Committee, and NRC’s Climate Change Education Roundtable. His current research focuses on the development of learning progressions leading to environmental science literacy for K-12 and college students.

Contact Information: Jennifer Glasgow 814-865-180

Fiji fights Fiji

2010-11-30T12:21:00.005-05:00

That's right. Fiji water*, one of the most overpriced single-use plastic water bottle companies is in trouble with the Fijian government. MSNBC, AlterNet, and others are reporting that there is a dispute on taxes between the corporation and the military junta government.

AlterNet reports:

It seems there is trouble in paradise. The boutique bottled water brand Fiji Water has announced that it is shutting down its operations in Fiji after the nation's government proposed a tax hike -- from 1/3 of a cent to 15 cents a liter. This comes just a week after one of the company's top executives, David Roth, was deported.

Ouch. On the one hand, how great is it that there is less bottled water coming from one of the worst collusions in corporate-governmental history. But how terrible is it that the junta will sell it to some other corporation to come in and exploit the people and the ecosystem in which they live to sell overpriced water primarily to people who don't need it but are stuck believing in a manufactured need for "convenient" and "glamorous" "Artesian water?" Companies like Coke, Pepsi, Nestle, Violia, Suez, and Thames are probably going to scramble all over each other to get at this one.

I'm with Maude Barlowe and Wenonah Hauter of Food and Water Watch who say the closure should be permanent. At Food and Water Watch today they write the following:

“Like oil in the 20^th century, water has become increasingly managed by corporate cartels that move it around the globe, where it flows out of communities and towards money. The commodification of water will continue to contribute to human rights abuses around the world, whether it helps bolster undemocratic governments or drives water from a community where it is needed.

“Water must be managed as a common resource, not as a market commodity. Unfortunately, celebrities, sports figures and American consumers pay a premium for the Fiji Water brand, buying it at approximately 3,300 times the cost of U.S. tap water. According to the EPA, a gallon of tap water costs consumers anywhere from .002 to .003 cents. A liter of Fiji Water costs approximately $2.19.

“Ironically, Fiji Water, Coca-Cola and PepsiCo have been named finalists for the Secretary of State’s 2010 Award for Corporate Excellence. It would be extremely unwise for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to honor these corporations, which have been known to extract water from developing countries that are facing water scarcity or that otherwise cannot meet residents’ needs for clean water and sanitation.”

Hear here! Are you going to walk away from bottled water? Do it. And tell Take Back the Tap that you are on board by signing the pledge.

Hat tip to Vince and Jess for this one.

* You have to love the sound of the tropical rain forest coming through your computer to show you just how free and unblemished that water is. If only corporations really protected the wild that much. Maybe they'd leave the water there for the wildlife and the people. Just a thought.

World Sustainable Development Teach-In Day

2010-11-27T12:14:00.002-05:00

This coming Friday, December 3rd, marks World Sustainable Development Teach-In Day.

Sustainable development is an issue all countries in the world are currently looking at. The degree of emphasis and the level investing resources invested however varies from one country to another; but regardless of whether we are talking about industrialised or developing countries, the quest for environmentally sound, socially just, economically viable and ethically acceptable development needs to be regarded as a priority by all nations of the world.

For many years now, a large number of initiatives have been carried out throughout the world to attempt to stoke up awareness about sustainable development and promote initiatives to achieve it.

The 1987 Report "Our Common Future" produced by the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED), "Agenda 21" produced by the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and the "Johannesburg Declaration" produced following the World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002 are examples of the type of initiatives being worked on internationally. These have been complemented by the various "National Sustainable Development Strategies" produced prior to UNCED and after Johannesburg.

As a club committed to sustainability, this marks a great opportunity to learn from others around the world about the myriad faces and facets of this thing called "sustainable development."

What is being developed and what is being sustained? So far, much of sustainable development seems to have been a global corporate-governmental collusion that has served the advantage of the already wealthy and powerful. Looking at just water issues in India, Bolivia, and Africa, the idea and practice of sustainable development might seem an oxymoron. There is no doubt we have a conundrum on our hands if we hope to bring health and material prosperity to 6.8 billion people and counting. Maybe we should be going for what James Lovelock, father of the "Gaia theory" has called a "sustainable retraction" and/or get in on the Transitions Initiatives. Or maybe that's just doomsville.

As teachers, we have a significant role to play. What do hope to sustain? Who do we develop? What and whose purpose does all of this serve? In a world of uncertain futures, how and for whom do we conceive of our teaching? These are the biggest questions we have to answer. Ultimately, we are servants and we have to serve people well.

What should education for sustainable development look like right here at Penn State and in the Centre Region? Where should we go?

And the movement just keeps getting bigger

2010-11-24T11:32:00.002-05:00

Do you know how many people are fed up with bottled water? Millions. And lots of people are getting together in all kinds of configurations to do something about it.

Yes! Magazine has this feature:

Restaurants in California, Oregon, New York, Maine, and other states are serving only tap water. Students at Brown University were inspired to start Beyond the Bottle after Washington University in St. Louis ended sales of bottled water on its campus.

Seattle University and Gonzaga University in Washington state, and the University of Portland in Oregon, have also ended sales of bottled water. Multnomah County became the first county in Oregon to ban bottled water from county meetings and functions. Efforts to prevent a bottling company from extracting millions of liters of water from the local aquifer led the city of Bundanoon, Australia, to ban the sale and production of bottled water. Toronto, London, and other cities in Ontario, Canada as well as school boards in Ottawa and Waterloo have stopped the sale of bottled water in municipal facilities.

Bottled water is marketed as superior to tap, but public water supplies are actually cleaner, less expensive, and more environmentally responsible, according to organizations like Take Back the Tap, Food and Water Watch, and Stop Corporate Abuse. They are mounting campaigns to combat misconceptions caused by bottled-water marketing.

That's right. Take back that tap. In the near future, we'll be expanding our work on this with some film projects, a musical project, and other humorous theatrics. Stay tuned!

Expanding Sustainability: Rights, Global Economics, and Human Transformation

2010-11-02T16:58:00.000-04:00

Expanding Sustainability: Rights, Global Economics, and Human Transformation
A Public Talk with Chilean Environmental Economist, Diplomat and
Spiritual Teacher Alfredo Sfeir-Younis

Tuesday, Oct. 26
Noon —1:30 PM
124 Sparks

Brown Bag Lunch Talk (drinks and dessert provided)
Sponsored by Penn State’s Center for Sustainability & Global Studies Institute

"It is impossible to attain the aims of a sustainable civilization without agreeing on a bundle of rights, be it for this generation or future generations. Sustainable Development embodies a social contract which must unfold from a vision and a set of human values that prove essential to human transformation in our global reality.”
—Alfredo Sfeir-Younis

Learn more about our speaker at: http://www.policyinnovations.org/innovators/people/data/07539

Update: You can listen my interview with Alfredo Sfeir0-Younis here.

Look at this green school in New Orleans

2010-10-14T11:16:00.001-04:00

When you've lost everything, you can do anything.

10 bottle filling stations at Penn State University Park

2010-09-30T12:16:00.002-04:00

There are now 10 bottle-filling stations across campus! Though it's still technically in its pilot phase, it looks as though these things are going to stay. After getting a ton of emails this past spring requesting a machine or information on how to get them, I've been so happy to see new ones installed. That's fewer single-use plastic bottles in landfills.

In fact, this morning I used the Pattee Library bottle station. Its meter read over 24,000 plastic bottles saved! Yesterday I used the one in Chambers - over 10,000 bottles!

Green Careers in Energy

2010-09-28T22:08:00.005-04:00

We have had a splash in the nation's educational/schooling publishing wing with the release of Green Careers in Energy (linked through Powell's Books). I wrote an essay, titled "Education and Action to Achieve Sustainability" featured in Chapter 1: Essays on the Importance of Sustainability. Several people in the club, especially Zach B, Jared B, and Derek L contributed to the thinking and writing of the essay. Having read the other essays, we are the "bomb throwers" so to speak because we/I reject the global growth economy outright and demand place-based solutions.

I concluded the essay (with Zach's input!):

In the end, we must reduce our economy. We must not just learn about reduction. If we want a verdant planet, then we will need to educate ourselves by unlearning the consumption economy and retool culture to live while using less. Only then, will we live in a truly green economy, and will humans and all life flourish on Earth.

I think it's a hallmark of our progress and our society's progress that this can even make it into a book that informs "the economy." While not mainstream, we have people listening and reading and that is reason for hope.

The book, by the way, is a reasonably comprehensive guide to the opening field of renewable energy jobs and programs. Certainly, it provides a way for people to think and act on ways to retrain themselves in the emerging "green economy" and it helps students out there in undergraduate and graduate degrees or in their searches for the "greenest one." By the way, 3E-COE has a big fat blurb on page 242! Nicely done folks. Keep it up!

Bill McKibben coming to Penn State on October 4th

2010-09-23T10:04:00.001-04:00

Noted environmentalist and author Bill McKibben to speak on October 4, 2010

Bill McKibben will speak on the University Park Campus on Monday October 4, 2010 as part of the annual Colloquium on the Environment Speaker Series. His lecture, “The Most Important Number in the World,” is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. in the Auditorium of the HUB-Robeson Center. A book signing will immediately follow his lecture. The event is free and open to the public.

Bill McKibben is an American environmentalist and writer who frequently writes about global warming and alternative energy and advocates for more localized economies. In 2010, the Boston Globe called him “probably the nation’s leading environmentalist” and Time magazine described him as “the world’s best green journalist." In 2009 he led the organization of 350.org, which coordinated what Foreign Policy magazine called “the largest ever global coordinated rally of any kind,” with 5,200 simultaneous demonstrations in 181 countries. The magazine named him to its inaugural list of the 100 most important global thinkers, and MSN named him one of the dozen most influential men of 2009.

“Penn State continues on its path to achieve a 17.5 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2012 and is currently working on the next plan. We are looking forward to Bill McKibben’s presentation and hope to be inspired to do even more,” explained Steve Maruszewski, Assistant Vice President of Physical Plant and Manager of the Finance & Business Environmental Key Initiative.

McKibben is the author of numerous books. His first book, The End of Nature, was published in 1989 is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change. In March 2007, McKibben published Deep Economy: the Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future. It addresses what the author sees as shortcomings of the growth economy and envisions a transition to more local-scale enterprise. In April of 2010, he published Eaarth. In Eaarth, he insists, we need to acknowledge that we’ve waited too long, and that massive change is not only unavoidable but already under way. Our old familiar globe is suddenly melting, drying, acidifying, flooding, and burning in ways that no human has ever seen. We’ve created, in very short order, a new planet, still recognizable but fundamentally different. We may as well call it Eaarth.

He is a scholar in residence at Middlebury College and lives in Vermont with his wife and daughter.

The annual colloquium is sponsored by Penn State Institutes of Energy and the Environment and the Finance and Business Environmental Stewardship Strategy at Penn State. This year’s event is also sponsored by the Center for Sustainability and Penn State Outreach. The event has brought numerous high-profile guests to campus including Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Christine Todd Whitman, William McDonough, Amory Lovins, and David Suzuki.

Contact for more information:

Patricia Craig
plc103@psu.edu
814.863-0037

Paul Ruskin
pdr2@psu.edu
814.863.9620

Milea A. Perry
Program Coordinator
Penn State University
Campus Sustainability Office

1 Land and Water Building
University Park, PA 16802
Email: map40@psu.edu
Phone: 814-865-2714

websites:
www.opp.psu.edu
www.green.psu.edu

The completed greenhouse: A walkthrough

2010-09-14T12:31:00.001-04:00

Take a walk around the completed plastic bottle greenhouse.

Explaining the logic of the plastic bottle greenhouse

2010-09-14T10:59:00.004-04:00

These are some explanations of the greenhouse's purpose and our thinking behind it.

Part I

Part II

BPA in plastics - No certainty about its safety

2010-09-06T20:22:00.002-04:00

The New York Times has an interesting article on the science and the politics surrounding bisphenol-A, a chemical found in many plastics and linings in food packaging. It is a known endochrine disruptor and some studies have linked it to a several health problems not the least of which are cancer and disruption of male development in mammals. Being that one of our major thrusts has been to convince Penn State to eliminate the sale of plastic water bottles, it might serve to get a good read on this.

Here is a speck from the middle that I think nicely highlights how groups are arrayed in this fight:

Perhaps not surprisingly, the issue of whether BPA is safe has become highly partisan.

Environmental groups and many Democrats want BPA banned, blaming it for an array of ills that includes cancer, obesity, infertility and behavior problems. Environmentalists think the United States should adopt the “precautionary principle,” a better-safe-than-sorry approach favored in the European Union. The principle says, in essence, that if there are plausible health concerns about a chemical, even if they are not proved, people should not be exposed to it until studies show it is safe. The United States takes the opposite approach: chemicals are not banned unless there is proof of harm.

Many Republicans, anti-regulation activists and the food-packaging and chemical industries insist that BPA is harmless and all but indispensable to keeping canned food safe by sealing the cans and preventing corrosion, and to producing many other products at reasonable prices. They argue that the chemical has been demonized, and that adopting the precautionary principle would lead to needless and ruinously expensive bans on safe and useful products. Both sides are closely watching the issue unfold, because BPA is widely seen as a test case in an era of mounting worry about household chemicals, pollution and the possible links between illness and environmental exposures, especially in fetuses and young children.

“This isn’t the only endocrine-disrupting chemical on the block,” said Patricia Hunt, a biologist at Washington State University, in Pullman. “It’s just the one that’s captured the attention, because researchers like me have gotten into the field and gone, ‘Holy cats! We’re all exposed to this.’ There’s been a heavy industry response, and we’ve gathered our forces together a little more strongly to shine a light on it. This is the poster child for this group of chemicals. Academic scientists are saying we need to do something, and we need to do it fast.”

Read on here.

League of Women Voters to tackle bottled water

2010-08-31T09:40:00.003-04:00

The Centre County chapter of the Pennsylvania League of Women Voters is holding a panel discussion on the effects of plastics and other chemicals on human health. One of our most consistent allies, Lydia Vandenbergh from Penn State's Office of Sustainability, will lead things off.

Plastics, Pesticides, and Pharmaceuticals: Understanding the Potential Health Risks to Ourselves and Our Children
State College, Pa—Did you know that many plastics, pesticides, and pharmaceuticals contain harmful chemicals such as BPA that can disrupt our hormone systems? What are these harmful chemicals and how can we protect ourselves and our children from them?
A panel discussion, hosted by the League of Women Voters of Centre County, will answer these and other questions. The panel discussion—which will be held on September 15, 2010 at 7:00 p.m. at the State College Borough Council Chambers located at 243 South Allen Street, State College, PA 16801—will feature keynote speaker John Vandenbergh, a professor emeritus of biology at North Carolina State University, who is an expert on endocrine-disrupting compounds (EDCs) and their human health risks. Also, presenting research on remediation of EDCs will be Rachel Brennan, an assistant professor of civil engineering at Penn State, as well as the following local water officials: Max Gill, the executive director of the State College Borough Water Authority, Cory Miller, the executive director of the University Area Joint Authority, and James Baird, a utilities system engineer at Penn State. EDCs mimic or block the action of natural hormones in our bodies. Research suggests that they may cause a host of reproductive problems in animals and humans, such as cancer of the reproductive organs and the early onset of puberty. Babies and young children are particularly at risk.

Read the rest of the release here.

The greenhouse is finished

2010-08-26T10:58:00.004-04:00

Hey biophiles! Look! It's finished! Becky M went with her husband and attached the roof. It looks beautiful! I think we owe Becky and her family a lot of praise and thanks.

Responding to Nestle

2010-08-25T22:45:00.004-04:00

3E-COE president Peter Buckland responds to a Nestle employee who has argued for bottled water in the campus paper.

---
To the editor:

Yesterday, Nestle employee Tom Uhl argued that “bottled water is actually a better environmental choice than other packaged beverages.” Newsflash: water is better for you than soda full of chemical additives and high fructose corn syrup. Uhl’s argument is a distraction.

From beginning to end, the more than 50 billion bottles of water sold in the United States wreak environmental, social, and economic havoc.

First, it takes 1.85 gallons of water to manufacture one bottle of water – more than 14 times the amount of water finally delivered in a 16 oz. bottle itself. Why waste so much water?

Second, bottled water is fossil fuel intensive through its production, transport, cooling, and its disposal. Why waste so much oil to move water around?

Third, with a national plastic recycling rate of between 17% and 20%, I hardly think that we can call this a good environmental choice. Why waste so much plastic?

Finally, bottled water commodifies a biological need. It puts water into a “beverage” (it is still water isn’t it?) for “on-the-go” people (what are we hamsters in wheels?) at a price 700 to 10,000 times that of municipal water. Who profits? Not local communities and economies and the bioregions in which they live. It lines the pockets of already excessively rich people who have no right to that water. Why waste the money?

So do your part – grab a reusable bottle or cup and drink essentially free water from our Spring Creek Watershed.

"The wisdom to follow nature’s example..."

2010-08-25T21:40:00.006-04:00

These were my statements to the press today for the National Wildlife Federation's call for more sustainable action:

Thank you for coming today.

It is my great joy to say that the Centre region gifts us with abundant rainfall, mountain gap streams, deep wells, fertile soil for agriculture, gorgeous forests, and wildlife that brings rich experiences to all lives. As a modest gardener and naturalist (and I do mean modest), mountain biker, teacher, and father I love this place so much.

By disposition, I am an optimistic person. What isn’t to love about the Seven Mountains or the fields of the Penns Valley? Just go to Allen Seeger or Penn’s Creek and you will know what I mean.

But by forecasts and data, I am a pessimist. I doubt our collective ability to get out of this mess. As a nation, we are failing to act responsibly in the brotherhood and sisterhood of nations. As a wealthy community, much of whose wealth comes from the dizzying success of Penn State University, we are failing to act responsibly in the brotherhood and sisterhood of interconnected Pennsylvania communities. Why?

If you look at the data of the recent past and the experience of too many people in Pennsylvania and the American northeast you find troubling trends.
- Pennsylvania, according to an assessment released last year by Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection and the Governor’s office, generates 1% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions though we only house a smaller portion of that global population.
- We see fish kills in rivers because of rising temperatures that make life great for fish parasites and awful for fish. Fishermen can tell you this. This is climate change in action.
- If you listen to farmers, like my Uncle Tony from Whitney Point, New York you know that hay crops come in almost a month earlier than they did in the 60s. And it’s not because of advances in fertilizers. Steadily rising seasonal temperatures.
- If you listen to the Union of Concerned Scientists you’ll see that temperature spikes caused by climate change hurt everything from the hemlock tree susceptible to bark beetles to dairy cows who have trouble thermoregulating in extreme heat let alone produce milk under duress. Many of us eat beef and drink milk. This will be a challenge.
- If you examine the wake of our fuel consumption, you see tragedy. Whether it’s the TVA coal ash spill almost two years ago, the Gulf oil gash and geyser, or the natural gas tragedies across the Marcellus Shale in Pennsylvania and the delinquent companies that run them, we are confronted with the limits of our progress at the expense of people and the places where they live with the plants and animals that support them

All of these things align with the sad and quite certain statement contained in the National Wildlife Federation’s 2010 report.

Let us speak plainly. Poor and weak people and the non-human environment have paid, are paying, and will increasingly pay for our way of life. These may seem like radical statements but they are corroborated by too much data to be waved away.

If we want to live with something approximating the standards of living we enjoy, we need to act now to maximize our collective welfare in a way that stops doing what President Lyndon Johnson called an experiment with the atmosphere. This is no longer an experiment. Today, the United States plays a game of chicken with other “developing nations” that is running millions of humans off the road, runs over thousands of non-human species a year, and is in a collision course with the physical limits of our planet. The United States, for all its power and might, cannot overcome planetary physics. Nature limits us.

We rely on fossil fuels the way that dope fiends rely on heroin. We all do. In this room almost every piece of technology that we use relies on coal, natural gas, or petroleum. They will run out. Everyone knows this. You. Me. Ed. Dr. Mann. We all know. And yet we do not collectively act to change it knowing that we are driving ourselves right over an abyss. It’s like we are the alcoholics on the Titanic who’d rather fight for the last bottle of bourbon when we know that we can survive if we just drop it and get on the lifeboat…if we only knew where the lifeboat is.

I think we do know where it is. It is in a more sustainable way of life. To start, and only to start, it lives in the reduction of our dependence on the obviously disastrous path before us that will bring us to 600 ppm CO2. In part, that means a retooling of our national economy, our industry, and our education systems away from fossil fuels and focus them on the sources that have fueled organisms on this planet for billions of years – plants have harnessed the sun and birds and insects have taken flight on the wind and we all need water. With all of our ingenuity and intelligence, I hope that we can have the wisdom to follow nature’s example and sustain ourselves without eating ourselves, and the rest of nature, in the process.

Thank you. (Peter Buckland)

Let's follow one of our own through the process of teaching

2010-08-24T23:22:00.003-04:00

Derek Luke was a member of both 3E-COE and EcoAction at Penn State. He now teaches in Alaska. Derek organized the PowerShift conference in 2009 at Penn State and so many other events. And he is not one to shy from risk...And as someone who is a perfect commodity for the globalized educational economy why not take a kid from Pennsylvania and move him to Alaska?!?

So let's follow him on YouTube! Here is installment #1:

Here is installment #2:

Installment #3:

Installment #4:

...and #5 is at this link.

An adventure for sure.

The National Wildlife Federation's "Extreme Heat in Summer 2010"

2010-08-24T15:38:00.003-04:00

This in from the National Wildlife Federation:

The National Wildlife Federation has released “Extreme Heat in Summer 2010.” This summer is the hottest on record so far and a sign of more to come. The Eastern and Southern United States are especially suffering, with many states having one of their hottest summer months on record. A new analysis from National Wildlife Federation finds that summers like the current one could become the norm by 2050 unless steps are taken to curb global warming. Philadelphia and Pittsburgh are on a list of those cities most vulnerable to heat wave effects as the planet warms. Approximately half of the residents in both cities have relatively high levels of vulnerable populations and low rates of air conditioning.

The analysis comes a few weeks after the U.S. Senate shelved action on comprehensive climate and energy legislation.

The State College community is better equipped than most to deal with extreme heat because most residents have air conditioning. However, many communities are not so fortunate. Our failure to take action on global warming will affect those who can least afford to deal with extreme temperatures. It is the poor, elderly, and those with health problems who will bear the brunt of the expected extreme heat events.

When: August 25, 2010, 10:30am

Where: Schlow Memorial Library, Community Room

Who: Dr. Michael Mann, Director, Earth System Science Center, Penn State University
Prof. Sylvia Neely, Creation Care Coalition, Pennsylvania Interfaith Power and Light.
Arno Vosk, MD, Fellow of the American College of Emergency Physicians
Peter Buckland, President of Environment - Ecology - Education, Penn State University

Contacts: Ed Perry, National Wildlife Federation, Phone - 814-880-9593
paglobalwarmingoutreach@gmail.com

Reflections on Dirt! The Movie

2010-08-03T21:26:00.004-04:00

In recent years, filmmakers of varying stripes have collectively released a spate of ecologically-minded films, including Food Inc., Fresh, Gasland, Blue Gold, Flow, The 11th Hour, and An Inconvenient Truth, to name only a few. This seeming plethora of films dealing with our looming global ecological crisis and its corollary, sustainability, led a journalist with Time Out: London to ask a rather pointed question: "can eco-films save the planet?"

Putting that question aside, and being the glutton for punishment that I sometimes can be, I sat down this evening to watch Dirt! The Movie, a film that, as the title suggests, is about soil. Given the tenor of similar films that I have viewed in recent months, I was expecting to once again experience two hours of familiar arguments regarding the industrial systems and institutional relationships that are slowly destroying our planet, one farm field and local economy at a time. I was also preparing for the emotional recovery I would need following said anticipated experience.

Dirt! did present arguments regarding how "our butts is in the ringer," to quote a friend of David Orr's, but only for a concise and pointed fifteen minutes. The remaining hour and five minutes of footage addressed human relationships to the soil, how to keep humans and the soil healthy, and what is being done to promote peace and responsible stewardship of our communities, land, and food.

The first half hour of the film is part microbiology lesson and part spiritual awakening, which is a combination of perspectives that I have found increasingly pleasant and enlivening in recent years. The argument presented, in short, is this: we, as humans, come from the soil, and the minerals in the soils came from the stars. Our relationship to the soil, therefore, connects us with ourselves, creation, and the cosmos. Furthermore, there is a proper balance to be struck in this relationship that has ensured, and might still ensure, the flourishing of life on this planet.

The majority of the last half of the film is a panorama of organizations and people who are striking that balance to foster better relationships between humans and the soil. The organizations include The Land Institute, Hearty Roots Community Farm, Cannard Farm, Navdanya Farm, Sustainable South Bronx, Tree People, The Edibile Schoolyard, Kinney Compost, Four Seasons Farm, and even some Harvard biology laboratories. Throughout this exploration of professional and community groups, there is a focused discussion of the principles that enrich the soil upon which life on earth depends. While enriching the soil, however, relationships between humans and the soil are strengthened, as are relationships between individuals and their communities.

I will close this post with an observation presented in the early minutes of Dirt!: in Hebrew, the name Adam means "dirt or clay," and Eve means "life." We are, in the words of a fellow biophile, "earth standing."

Letter on Penn State's Coal Plant to the Board of Trustees

2010-07-20T08:57:00.003-04:00

Recently, I was alerted that the Board of Trustees removed discussion of the coal plant from their meeting. It prevented public comment. As a concerned person, I wrote them the following letter:

To the Board of Trustees,

It has recently come to my attention that the Board of Trustees were to discuss the energy future of Penn State University at its most recent meeting. Specifically, the coal plant's future was on the agenda. From the reports I have from attendees, it was absent. I do not include myself among the conspirators who think that Penn State and Massey Energy definitely colluded to obstruct and obfuscate the agenda, but it is most unfortunate that the UP coal plant's future was removed from the agenda the morning of the meeting. Given that interested and concerned groups lost their possible voice at that meeting, I would like to ensure that you understand my position.

In what follows, I speak as the founder and serving president of Environment-Ecology-Education in the College of Education, the co-host of a WKPS The Lion radio show called Sustainability Now, last year's Assistant to the Director of the Pennsylvania Environmental Resource Consortium, and the emcee for Penn State's first Student Sustainability Summit. I speak for none the organizations nor the show but as someone steeped in the sustainability movement who is concerned about his own impact on his own community and his sad involvement with the mandated ecocide and pollution that our university's cost of doing business does.

Silence and remove the coal plant as soon as possible. Coal, from its extraction, to its byproducts via extraction, to its combustion, to its scrubbing, and to its scrubber cleaning destroys life. It is a powerfull anti-biotic - a destroyer of life - that serves to enrich few people lavishly, support an unsustainable and ecologically crippling way of life for many more, and poisons poor people and their water systems. The cascading effects spread. One need only look at the economic, social, and ecological corrosion of the Tennessee Valley Authority disaster or the decades-long legacy of mountain top removal in Western Pennsylvania, West Virginia, or Kentucky. How fortunate and easy it has been that we at the lavishly equipped Pennsylvania State University have been able to define those people, their traditions and customs and ways of being, their watersheds, and the habitat that depends on those waterways as economic externalities. And I have said nothing of climate change, the study of which our university stands as a shining beacon.

Perhaps now, with all of the attention on the Gulf oil disaster, the methane gas disaster at the Upper Big Branch Mine, and the continued small disasters regarding drilling in the Marcellus Shale, Penn State will begin moving more ethically and responsibly regarding human welfare and the environment regarding its energy "needs." I understand that Penn State has been able to negotiate an environmental assessment of its coal purchasing. This is a noble first step and a good intention. Forgive me if I remain skeptical of its impact and am niggled by the statement, "The road to hell is laid with good intentions." Were we to be extracting coal from the Purdue Mountain to the west, Mount Nittany, the Tussey Ridge, and the Seven Mountains, I don't think we would have Penn State here and our good intentions would be too little to late.

I apologize for the polemic tone of this letter but have found that our turtle's pace could be quicker and that we could do more to reduce our energy use. The Campus Sustainability Office is doing marvelous things with behavior, curriculum is changing, and perhaps more than anything, facilities and operations under Steve Maruszewski and Al Matyasovsky have been doing amazing things. Now is the time to pony up and recognize that coal can't be clean and that we need to move away from it immediately. Too much of our collective health from the newt to the walrus to me need it.

Peter Buckland

HOME

2010-06-28T22:31:00.005-04:00

I want to share this movie, Home, with all of you. In all of our work for sustainability education and the flourishing of all life on Earth, it pays to watch something as humbling as this documentary (if you can even call it that). Home took my breath away on several levels and I think it might yours too. Best of all, it's a feature length film that the producers and directors decided needed to be free because its message was too important.

The brief showing on American agriculture placed in the context of human and natural history is particularly startling given the film's emphasis on balance. To paraphrase, the U.S. grows enough grain to feed 2 billion people but most of that grain goes to feeding livestock and increasingly into biofuels (that substitute for the fossil fuels the film has been discussing). This seriously calls into question the idea that the American farmer feeds the world.

Some people dislike words like "balance" or "harmony." What do you think? Does this film oversell those points? Or are we as out of balance as it portrays?

Plastic greenhouse redux on 6.21.2010...the longest day of the year

2010-06-21T20:38:00.007-04:00

In case you were wondering about what is happening with the plastic bottle greenhouse, here is an update. We have a roof frame with bottles on the outer edge...

...and they look really cool with the sun behind them...

...and now it also has some of the roof complete...

...and soon it will be up on the frame with the whole shebang in order.

See you soon.

Tragedy of the Commons explained by dinosaurs

2010-06-10T21:41:00.004-04:00

I love Dinosaur Comics and I love "The Tragedy of the Commons" by Garrett Hardin. Now they are both in one place! "Tragedy" is an exploration of what happens if people overuse common resources and stands as one of the most influential essays in the history of sustainability.

Plastic bottle greenhouse update - Two walls up! Door on next wall that's nearly ready for mounting!

2010-06-08T21:08:00.007-04:00

In the continuing saga of the Corl Street Elementary School plastic bottle greenhouse...we have some more progress. Over Memorial Day weekend, Becky and her husband Vilmos finished a wall that I got to put up yesterday and tie the bottles together for support.

Today, another wall frame was finished and the door put on with Zach (in the picture with the door).

So this thing is coming along. For me, the coolest thing has been talking to people about why I came up with this hair-brained idea and why we started doing it. We live with these bottles and really wish we could get rid of them. Barring that at this point, maybe we can exapt them for an educational, social, and ecological good. Why not use them to try to help grow food and increase awareness about the waste cycle and show how to reduce-reuse-recycle. Every teacher and parent that has talked to Becky or me about this is really into it. All of them want to make something that is both "cool" and instructive for sustainability.

In a few more installments of work, we'll have all the walls up and then we'll get to work on the roof. Enjoy the pictures.

A small taste of Cuban urban agriculture

2010-06-03T12:01:00.006-04:00

Cuba is at the forefront of urban agriculture. Watch and learn. "If we could bring this same attitude to our millions of back gardens back at home, our millions of back gardens and allotments, producing wonderful vegetables just think of what that could do to change the whole structure of our approach to food."

Spill. Plume. Geyser. Wound.

2010-06-03T10:30:00.001-04:00

Once again this morning on NPR, I heard about the “biggest oil spill in U.S. history.” I don't know about you, but the word "spill" just seems so inadequate, so insultingly paltry, to describe what's happened since the TransOcean/British Petroleum Deepwater Horizon oil platform exploded in the Gulf of Mexico six weeks ago. "Spill" is what I do when I accidentally dump juice, coffee, or water on the table when I'm eating. It's what happens when something pours out of something else because of gravity. "Spills" are usually little things that we might swear about and apologize for at dinner. They are worth an "Oh crap" followed by "I'm sorry."

Somehow, I think that what's unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico is hardly a "spill." Tar balls are on their way to the Florida panhandle hundreds of miles away from this “spill.” Pelicans are being covered in oil (image from Associated Press). Sea turtles are dying. British Petroleum has used thousands of gallons of ultra-toxic Corexit to disperse oil. Corexit contains arsenic, chromium, and copper and the EPA has advised BP to stop using it. It's likely to worsen the oil "spill."

Words like "plume" or "geyser" come a little closer. When they are coupled with “disaster” or “catastrophe” they start to make sense. This “disastrous plume” of oil or “catastrophic geyser” words might work for us.

Starting with plume, let's consult the Oxford English Dictonary for some guidance:

plume, n 7. a. A trail or cloud of smoke, vapour, etc., issuing from a localized source and spreading or billowing out as it travels.

That's a bit more like it. I think that more or less describes this now (tragically) standard footage.

If you go to Alexander Higgins' blog you can watch lots of video footage at how ineffectively an "oil spill robot" tries to deal with a "massive plume." But I don't really like this word "plume" much either because in its best associations we think of plumes as linked to plumage, the beautiful mating displays of birds. There is nothing beautiful about this. This is pure ugliness threatening so many lives, human and non-human. Let’s face it, the already deteriorating and atrophied shrimp populations of the Gulf of Mexico are in for more devastation. As Zach noted in an earlier entry, this will compound the problems caused by chemical fertilizer, pesticide, and organic run-off that brought about the enormous Gulf dead zone. Put this plume on the dead zone Gulf and we have a peacock plucked of a third of its feathers and fanning a tail bathed in oil. Nice.

So what about "geyser"? Once again, the OED.

geyser, n. 1. An intermittent hot spring, throwing up water, etc. in a fountain-like column.

2. The name given to an apparatus for rapidly heating water attached to a bath. Also for the heating of water for use in wash-basins, sinks, etc.

This thing is hardly intermittent. At about 70,000 barrels a day, we are approaching 2,1000,000 gallons of oil in the Gulf. It is a column. It is a fountain. But it lacks the majesty of Old Faithful in Yellowstone. Like "plume," “geyser” and “fountain” hardly express this rupture...

this inundation...

this deluge...

this thing that shows us how small we are even with our awesome tools and how criminal we are in our acceptance of ugliness and collateral damage in the name of technocratic progress that wants to believe it should not and must not be limited. No matter how greedy, how negligent, nor how ill-informed this whole process is, it continues.

I am reminded of the children behind the Spirit of Christmas Present's robes in Dickens' A Christmas Carol.

From the foldings of its robe, it brought two children; wretched, abject, frightful, hideous, miserable. They knelt down at its feet, and clung upon the outside of its garment.

"Oh, Man, look here! Look, look, down here!" exclaimed the Ghost.

They were a boy and a girl. Yellow, meagre, ragged, scowling, wolfish; but prostrate, too, in their humility. Where graceful youth should have filled their features out, and touched them with its freshest tints, a stale and shrivelled hand, like that of age, had pinched, and twisted them, and pulled them into shreds. Where angels might have sat enthroned, devils lurked, and glared out menacing. No change, no degradation, no perversion of humanity, in any grade, through all the mysteries of wonderful creation, has monsters half so horrible and dread.

Scrooge started back, appalled. Having them shown to him in this way, he tried to say they were fine children, but the words choked themselves, rather than be parties to a lie of such enormous magnitude.

"Spirit, are they yours?" Scrooge could say no more.

"They are Man's," said the Spirit, looking down upon them. "And they cling to me, appealing from their fathers. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased. Deny it!" cried the Spirit, stretching out its hand towards the city. "Slander those who tell it ye. Admit it for your factious purposes, and make it worse. And abide the end."

"Have they no refuge or resource?" cried Scrooge.

"Are there no prisons?" said the Spirit, turning on him for the last time with his own words. "Are there no workhouses?"

The bell struck twelve.

Ignorance and Want. If you know anything about Dickens’s London, you know that it was a smoggy soot-coated city. It was the seat of British might. It was ugly and toxic. It killed the countryside. It was addicted to coal. Are we so different? A little. But not enough.

I think that in our hubristic belief in the "progress" of our industrial economy, our "enlightened" political systems, and our concomitant educational system(s) we have bred ourselves into being wanting and dependent creatures endlessly filled with "needs." This needy person (as the philosopher Ivan Illich called us) has educated himself into believing that his own "needs" are rights owed to itself and that the pursuit of those needs is the path to enlightenment. The enlightened person consumes their way to happiness through the acquisition of material wealth and the extraction, movement, and transformation of "resources" through "advanced" technology. The human product of this globalized state's market's school is, perhaps, the most parasitic organism on the planet. It wants as much as it can get, calls those wants needs, declares that those needs are owed to it by alleged rights and the person who understands that they have these rights is educated, enlightened, and progressed.

This needy person ignores and relabels the rights of the non-progressed people of the world. It pretends that they don’t exist as externalities to the economy or it calls them ignorant and in need of education. It forces them out one way or another: by climate change if your are an Inuit; by poisoning if you live on or near natural resources like coal or natural gas; by coercion if you are Filipino rice farmer, Jamaican banana farmer, or Indian farmer who refused the Green Revolution; or by military force if you refuse compliance. People are pushed and pulled from their historically evolved niches and places and moved into slums where they are neglected in high concentrations. Those historically evolved niches are transformed into places for resource development, into dumps, or into the homes for our waste. Of course the slums are polluted. At least in the slums they are within the bounds of civilization where they can be taken care of. Because people who do not work within the cash economy and have lived within the economy of nature cannot be trusted to take care of themselves because they don’t have access to things that they “need.” No. They are too ignorant. They must be hurting themselves.

Not only has our “progress” shunted people into slums, but it has ghettoized nature. Those niches and places fall to our ignorance and serve our want. The Gulf now falls rapidly to them. There has been no large lesson learned from the Exxon Valdez and comparable disasters. Chernobyl meant nothing. We are addicted to power, will, and appetite as Ulysses speaks in Shakespeare’s Troillus and Cressida:

Then every thing includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, an universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce an universal prey,
And last eat up himself.

We are those children and, as the Spirit of Christmas Present says, on our brows is written Doom. Can we call ourselves fine children? I would choke on the lie if I were to try. We eat ourselves as we eat that oil, both literally and figuratively. We are the ignorant universal wolf so needy and wanting we have made ourselves and every thing around us a universal prey. We bite and bite and bite. We wound.

There is the word. “Wound.” The Gulf rupture is a wound that we have punctured into the Earth.

Once again, the OED:
wound, n.
1. a. A hurt caused by the laceration or separation of the tissues of the body by a hard or sharp instrument, a bullet, etc.; an external injury.
2. transf. a. An incision, abrasion, or other injury due to external violence, in any part of a tree or plant.

5. (= L. plaga.) a. A blow, a stroke. (Cf. PLAGUE n. 1.) Obs.
b. A plague. Obs.

As Earth is a body of tissues, much of it living and all of it involved in the great processes of life and living. The sea and the seabed support life. This Gulf wound is a great laceration and separation of those tissues due to external violence. That violence came from a series of blow from our own plague for power.

I believe our hour has struck twelve. The night now deepens. Perhaps we will move into a new day, a day of sunlight, that greatest of disinfectants and the universal wolf will temper itself and stopping it up itself and find a more sustainable way of being. But right now it is very dark, and the wolf’s stomach is rumbling.

Reflections on a Spill

2010-05-30T17:15:00.012-04:00

"Spill is 'worst US eco-disaster.'"

This was a BBC headline gracing my iGoogle homepage when I logged onto the internet this morning.

Sure. I get it.

I have found it easy to reach new levels of despair and panic in the wake of the unrelenting flow of oil and gas entering the Gulf of Mexico from the now infamous BP Horizon oil rig. But is this incident the "worst" ecological disaster in United States history? And, if it is the worst, what does that tell us about how we identify an "eco-disaster"? And how do we respond?

The "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico well predates the BP oil spill, and could this not also be considered an eco-disaster of similar proportions? No doubt, the continuing flow of oil from the collapsed Horizon rig, at some 25,000 barrels a day, will no doubt contribute, if not well expand, the size of that dead zone in the Gulf, most noticeably along the coast of Gulf-bordering countries like the United States and Cuba.

Or take one of the leading contributors of greenhouse gases in the United States: industrial agriculture. Is this not an "eco-disaster" of similar proportions to the on-going BP oil spill?

Or take our own bodies, with diseases increasingly linked to the pollutants we encounter on a regular basis. Is this not a contender for the "worst 'US eco-disaster'" in history?

The current attention paid to the callous disregard for Life exemplified by BP and the federal government, the latter in the form of the Minerals Management Service, is little more than a high-profile acknowledgment of the pestiferous wake of an institutional juggernaut in which we are, for the most part, passengers.

As I and many others see it, the immediate challenge posed by the BP oil spill is its containment and the minimization of its negative environmental and economic impact. As of today, this challenge has been confronted with what appears to be a sad farce of human energy, imagination, and technology.

The next challenge is to reflect on what this oil spill shows us about how we live, and the societal and environmental conditions under which that life is possible. In short, our lifestyles, at least my own, depend largely on pollution and environmental and human exploitation. In response, action must be taken to increase the amount of mutually beneficial relationships between human beings as well as between humans and all that our activity relies upon and affects.

For some of us, this conclusion was made long before the BP oil spill occurred, and appropriate actions, both individual and collective, are underway. Some who have not yet drawn this conclusion, may still not draw it. But that should perhaps be of little concern to those of us who are committed to positive social change and real hope for the future.

No majority of the general population, as near as I can tell, has ever effectively struggled for democracy or has aspired toward "beloved community." Indeed, it has only been effectively organized and well-positioned minorities that have done, and continue to do, so. Therefore, keep the faith, and keep to the work.

On a personal level, perhaps the best immediate response to the present oil spill, in full awareness of its implications for human, animal, and plant life alike, may be to tell a dear friend that you love them, and to affirm, in thought or deed, that we are staying the course.

Greenhouse update...weeks later

2010-05-17T16:13:00.004-04:00

The saga of our plastic bottle greenhouse continues...

Today, about 10 parents of children who attned the Corl Street Elementary School in State College worked with 2 members of 3E and a scad of third graders to get us to the next phase. We washed, cut, and sorted a few thousand more bottles while the physical plant guys for the district planted the posts and poured the concrete to set them in. Because the concrete has to set and part of the wall frame was used for it, we couldn't carry on with the frame and fix bottles to it.Kind of a bummer but so it goes. It started raining heavily anyway so it's not so bad that I've gotten to come back in.

That said, I am blown away by two things

1. Those third graders are awesome. They were enthusiastic while they washed and cut bottles, sorted them, and cut dowel rods. Our own Becky M. made this whole fun workstation thing and the children worked together on it so well. Some of them came back during recess to help us. I was personally pretty touched.

2. Holy giant amount of work that uses a giant amount of junk! I said in a previous post, "I am personally dumbfounded by the sheer volume of bottles we’ve gotten from the Office of Physical Plant’s bar pit. And these are the bottles that have been recycled. For every bottle that we’ve gotten from the recycling here, another one was probably thrown away." Putting that sheer volume into workable shape using just ordinary tools (water, soap, scissors, razors, dowel rods, nails/fencing staples, hammer, nails, screws, and power drill) is pretty crazy. I'm thinking that today's pure human work hours is somewhere around 50.

We should have some pictures pretty soon to show some more of this. Once the weather clears, I'll be heading over in the mornings to put the frame up piece by piece.

[To track back go here, here, and here.]

In case you ever wonder why school lunch is so bad for you...

2010-04-28T06:19:00.004-04:00

...and fast food is so cheap you can just look at what our tax dollars subsidize. People who talk about the personal responsibility of our diets are right. We need to own what we eat and be responsible for it. Maybe we can start with what we subsidize as a nation.

Another great image of the bottle greenhouse door

2010-04-26T19:03:00.002-04:00

Pic is courtesy of Garrett Eisenhour.

Plastic bottle greenhouse door: Update #3

2010-04-24T22:11:00.007-04:00

So we have a door for this plastic bottle greenhouse now (see the explanation video here). Here it is on the ground of the HUB lawn. Monday, I'll be working on sides, crossbars, and the larger frame. Phew!

Look at how many bottles are in that picture alone...about 200-250. All told, we will end up reusing something like 2000 in this project which is somewhere near half of of the daily recycled bottles that Penn State University Park's Office of Physical Plant collects, which is itself just over 1/2 of the total that PSU University Park disposes of every day. This total rough estimate leads me to believe that we could make 600-700 of these 5'x5'x6' gabled plastic bottle greenhouses out of just PSU University Park's recycling. That's a lot of waste.

We met a few parents today who were really into this thing. A few were from the Corl Street Elementary School who had heard about it and thought that it at least looked cool. Moreover, they said that they thought it was a really interesting way for their kids to engage their schooling. They were also quite interested in sharing, and having their kids share, how they are engaging the natural environment at school via the garden, the 3 Rs of Reduce-Reuse-Recycle, and composting. One girl said that she wants one at her school - the Gray Wood's Elementary. That sounds great, but we might need this to be a full-time job with benefits if it gets to that point.

Stay tuned for more.

Pic courtesy of Garrett.

Kid's Earth Day

2010-04-24T07:10:00.003-04:00

Come on out and bring kids for a fun and beautiful day. Like the flier says, there are some great activities in store for everyone, including an enactment of Dr. Seuss's The Lorax. We'll be there, putting a portion of the plastic bottle greenhouse together. More pictures will be on the way.

Bottle greenhouse update #2

2010-04-23T10:05:00.003-04:00

Wow! This thing is incredible and it's taking SOOOO much time. We've cut and washed well over a thousand bottles and have more to go. The frame is still unfinished and won't be for a few days just because the sheer size of the project required more people than we were able to muster. But you know what? We're moving along and we'll keep plugging away for the rest of the semester.

We will post more pictures soon and possible video soon.

To hear a story on some Earth Day activities, listen to this story put together by the Ohio River Radio Consortium that includes two of our members, Garrett Eisenhour and Jason Usdin, as well as people in Indiana and Kentucky.

To see some more of it come alive, come to Kid's Earth Day tomorrow, April, 24th, at the HUB lawn.

Who knew that such malcontents would win Outstanding Student Organization?

2010-04-22T20:31:00.004-04:00

We won the Outstanding Student Organization award last night for "Collaboration with other student organizations, faculty, and staff," "Programming a variety of purposeful events, "Positive promotion of mission/purpose of organization to University community," and "Building a sense of community." This is something that shows that if you are motivated, purposeful, a little organized, and full of good information that you can get some recognition. And we are a small group. Who knows what would happen if there were more of us?

I have to say that we owe this, in large part, to Alex for getting the ball rolling on this water bottle thing. She is the queen. This one's for you...even if it's Garrett, Peter, Jared, and Zach in the picture (left to right).

I also want to say that I think it's so cool that we won this award given the range of people in our group. Garrett is in his early 20s and a dad of two. I am in my 30s and a father of 1. We've had an atypical amount of graduate student involvement in the group. And we have a 40+ mom of three girl who comes out and bangs it home when it counts. I love you people.

The bottle house! Update one

2010-04-22T13:03:00.004-04:00

Our greenhouse is really in full swing. We have THOUSANDS of bottles that we’ve been washing, cutting, and arraying into lines to form the house’s walls. We’ve done just some starts to fix them to the frame to start and it’s looking promising.

A few things are striking at this point:
1. People are impressed by this idea. Moms have walked by with kids and given us bottles to use.
2. Everyone who we tell that this is going to be used by a school has congratulated us. This is smart. A lot smarter than the intended use of the bottles themselves.
3. Wow! People at Penn State create a lot of waste. I am personally dumbfounded by the sheer volume of bottles we’ve gotten from the Office of Physical Plant’s bar pit. And these are the bottles that have been recycled. For every bottle that we’ve gotten from the recycling here, another one was probably thrown away.
4. This is fun and it’s community-building. We’re meeting people we haven’t met before. A Corl Street School mother and her 14-year-old son came by and helped. We have future teachers. We have passersby. The HUB lawn today has been a commons for people interested in furthering sustainability and education for sustainability.
5. Our group has rerouted something from upstream that would have gone downstream to further commodififcation or ugliness and turned it into something that can be potentially beautiful, useful, and good!

So come on by today and/or Saturday April 24th to the HUB lawn and help us reuse for a better tomorrow.

Our plastic bottle greenhouse in the works

2010-04-20T10:40:00.000-04:00

Since we started this club we've wanted to develop a way that the whole group could help local schools integrate a garden or natural area into their curriculum. We've also been doing so much on the water bottle and sustainable water use issue. So why not combine them?

Let's help teachers, administrators, parents, and students learn about our relationship to the Earth by building a greenhouse out of plastic water bottles? Let's take what was going to be pure waste and turn it into a way to create a growing environment...something that bottle companies never intended and don't care about anyway. And let's see something grow in spite of pollution by reusing bottles, reducing waste, and recycling wood and some other materials. From all of this all involved see the waste cycle before them and the life cycle. Amazing!

Check out the preview video!

Join us on Earth Day, April 22, 2010 on PSU's HUB lawn to help us bring the cycles of life to schools.

Filtering for good

2010-04-19T09:30:00.005-04:00

Even though we didn't get the Filter for Good grant for $10,000, Brita and Nalgene sent us a few Brita pitchers and a bunch of reusable bottles because we are doing the kind of work that reduces waste in the long run and, we have to admit, can bring Brita and Nalgene some business by promoting clean, fresh, and filtered water that can be enjoyed with reusable bottles when you are on the go from here to there. I used one of the Nalgene's this morning at the Elkay EZH2O downstairs in Chambers Building at University Park.

No One Left Inside

2010-04-19T00:22:00.002-04:00

It's not often that teachers like us can grab onto something a president says and run with it. We want nature to be important? This is part of our climate so here we go. Use it for what it's worth. This is the best we've gotten from a high elected official in a long time:

The White House

Office of the Press Secretary

For Immediate Release

April 16, 2010

Presidential Memorandum -- America's Great Outdoors

MEMORANDUM FOR THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR
THE SECRETARY OF AGRICULTURE
THE ADMINISTRATOR OF THE ENVIRONMENTAL
PROTECTION AGENCY
THE CHAIR OF THE COUNCIL ON ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

SUBJECT: A 21st Century Strategy for America's Great Outdoors

Americans are blessed with a vast and varied natural heritage. From mountains to deserts and from sea to shining sea, America's great outdoors have shaped the rugged independence and sense of community that define the American spirit. Our working landscapes, cultural sites, parks, coasts, wild lands, rivers, and streams are gifts that we have inherited from previous generations. They are the places that offer us refuge from daily demands, renew our spirits, and enhance our fondest
memories, whether they are fishing with a grandchild in a favorite spot, hiking a trail with a friend, or enjoying a family picnic in a neighborhood park. They also are our farms, ranches, and forests -- the working lands that have fed and sustained us for generations. Americans take pride in these places, and share a responsibility to preserve them for our children and grandchildren.

Today, however, we are losing touch with too many of the places and proud traditions that have helped to make America special. Farms, ranches, forests, and other valuable natural resources are disappearing at an alarming rate. Families are spending less time together enjoying their natural surroundings. Despite our conservation efforts, too many of our fields are becoming fragmented, too many of our rivers and streams are becoming polluted, and we are losing our connection to the parks, wild places, and open spaces we grew up with and cherish. Children, especially, are spending less time outside running and playing, fishing and hunting, and connecting to the outdoors just down the street or outside of town.

Across America, communities are uniting to protect the places they love, and developing new approaches to saving and enjoying the outdoors. They are bringing together farmers and ranchers, land trusts, recreation and conservation groups, sportsmen, community park groups, governments and industry, and people from
all over the country to develop new partnerships and innovative programs to protect and restore our outdoors legacy. However, these efforts are often scattered and sometimes insufficient. The Federal Government, the Nation's largest land manager, has a responsibility to engage with these partners to help develop a conservation agenda worthy of the 21st Century. We must look to the private sector and nonprofit organizations, as well as towns, cities, and States, and the people who live and work in them, to identify the places that mean the most to Americans, and leverage the support of the Federal Government to help these community-driven efforts to succeed. Through these partnerships, we will work to connect these outdoor spaces to each other, and to reconnect Americans to them.

For these reasons, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Establishment.

(a) There is established the America's Great Outdoors Initiative (Initiative), to be led by the Secretaries of the Interior and Agriculture, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Chair of the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and implemented in coordination with the agencies listed in section 2(b) of this memorandum. The Initiative may include the heads of other executive branch departments, agencies, and offices (agencies) as the President may, from time to time, designate.

(b) The goals of the Initiative shall be to:

(i) Reconnect Americans, especially children, to America's rivers and waterways, landscapes of national significance, ranches, farms and forests, great parks,
and coasts and beaches by exploring a variety of efforts, including:

(A) promoting community-based recreation and conservation, including local parks, greenways, beaches, and waterways;

(B) advancing job and volunteer opportunities related to conservation and outdoor recreation; and

(C) supporting existing programs and projects that educate and engage Americans in our history, culture, and natural bounty.

(ii) Build upon State, local, private, and tribal priorities for the conservation of land, water, wildlife, historic, and cultural resources, creating corridors and connectivity across these outdoor spaces, and for enhancing neighborhood parks; and determine how the Federal Government can best advance those priorities through public private partnerships and locally supported conservation strategies.

(iii) Use science-based management practices to restore and protect our lands and waters for future generations.

Sec. 2. Functions. The functions of the Initiative shall include:

(a) Outreach. The Initiative shall conduct listening and learning sessions around the country where land and waters are being conserved and community parks are being established in innovative ways. These sessions should engage the full range of interested groups, including tribal leaders, farmers and ranchers, sportsmen, community park groups, foresters, youth groups, businesspeople, educators, State and local governments, and recreation and conservation groups. Special attention
should be given to bringing young Americans into the conversation. These listening sessions will inform the reports required in subsection (c) of this section.

(b) Interagency Coordination. The following agencies shall work with the Initiative to identify existing resources and align policies and programs to achieve its goals:

(i) the Department of Defense;

(ii) the Department of Commerce;

(iii) the Department of Housing and Urban Development;

(iv) the Department of Health and Human Services;

(v) the Department of Labor;

(vi) the Department of Transportation;

(vii) the Department of Education; and

(viii) the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

(c) Reports. The Initiative shall submit, through the Chair of the CEQ, the following reports to the President:

(i) Report on America's Great Outdoors. By November 15, 2010, the Initiative shall submit a report that includes the following:

(A) a review of successful and promising nonfederal conservation approaches;

(B) an analysis of existing Federal resources and programs that could be used to complement those approaches;

(C) proposed strategies and activities to achieve the goals of the Initiative; and

(D) an action plan to meet the goals of the Initiative.

The report should reflect the constraints in resources available in, and be consistent with, the Federal budget. It should recommend efficient and effective use of existing resources, as well as opportunities to leverage nonfederal public and private resources and nontraditional conservation programs.

(ii) Annual reports. By September 30, 2011, and September 30, 2012, the Initiative shall submit reports on its progress in implementing the action plan developed pursuant to subsection (c)(i)(D) of this section.

Sec. 3. General Provisions.

(a) This memorandum shall be implemented consistent with applicable law and subject to the availability of any necessary appropriations.

(b) This memorandum does not create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or in equity by any party against the United States, its departments, agencies, or entities, its officers, employees, or agents, or any other person.

(c) The heads of executive departments and agencies shall assist and provide information to the Initiative, consistent with applicable law, as may be necessary to carry out the functions of the Initiative. Each executive department and agency shall bear its own expenses of participating in the Initiative.

(d) Nothing in this memorandum shall be construed to impair or otherwise affect the functions of the Director of the OMB relating to budgetary, administrative, or legislative proposals.

(e) The Chair of the CEQ is authorized and directed to publish this memorandum in the Federal Register.

BARACK OBAMA

For some analysis go to DotEarth and see what Andy Revkin has to say.

Frustration with college rankings

2010-04-16T09:44:00.002-04:00

If any of you follow the college rankings by U.S. News and World Report and Princeton Review you might also know that environmental report cards are out there now too. But not everyone is happy about them, how they are tabulated, and what the publicity could mean when the methods behind them are unclear, not to mention time consuming for people who have to fill them out.

The Chronicle of Higher Education has a piece in its current issue about it:

Colleges have been subjected to all sorts of ratings, rankings, and grades on their green sensibilities in recent years—and not all of them have been welcome. Sustainability directors increasingly find themselves filling out surveys from organizations like the Sustainable Endowments Institute, Sierra magazine, and the Princeton Review Inc., each with its own twist on questions about energy use, mass transit, water conservation, and so on. The data collection is becoming a real burden, they say.

Now, in a recent letter to colleges, the Sustainable Endowments Institute has floated a proposal: How would you like to pay $700 for the pleasure of filling out a survey? That money would help the institute render a grade—it could be an A-minus, or maybe a D-plus—for its highly publicized College Sustainability Report Card.

If you find yourself saying, "No, thanks," you're not alone, as the proposition may come at a bad time. Not only are many colleges watching every penny, but sustainability directors are also suffering from green-ratings fatigue. Just ask administrators at Ithaca College, who recently publicized a letter they wrote to the editors of Sierra magazine, explaining that they would not participate in the "Cool Schools" survey because they found the process too time-consuming, opaque, and of questionable value.

We are one of several "Green Teams"

2010-04-15T21:56:00.004-04:00

Several weeks back we were asked to meet for an interview and perhaps some video. One other student showed up but didn't make the video - he had to leave. But we are one of many trying to reduce our impacts and, by extension, reduce our collective impact. See what we are saying:

Student Sustainability Statement from Penn State

2010-04-11T16:09:00.003-04:00

PSU's first Student Sustainability Summit was held about two weeks ago and we came out with a powerful statement that you can sign here if you are a Penn State student.

1. "We, the students of Penn State, are committed to environmental stewardship and sustainability. We are dedicated to becoming environmentally responsible citizens capable of protecting our natural and human resources, thereby producing a quality of life for future generations that is equal to or better than our own.

2. "Therefore, we call on the University to promote environmental initiatives, social responsibility, and sound economic stewardship in its operations, research, education, and services. We urge the University to identify opportunities for environmental sustainability in academic programs and to establish sustainability outreach programs to educate the college community. We ask that the University considers future generations in practice and policy through increased conservation and efficiency, supporting renewable energy, and reduction of greenhouse gases. Our ingenuity must be coupled with integrity, our research with respect, and our academics with action.

3. "And we call on our fellow students to be a part of the solution. We must work with all members of the Penn State community to reduce our environmental impact, support local and regional initiatives, and participate in the creation of a sustainable community. Our individual actions must reflect our broad commitment to a fair and just tomorrow.

4. "Finally, we call for the establishment of a Student Advisory Council to the Campus Sustainability Office that will encourage the adoption of policies that support the needs of all life, human and non-human. This advisory council will be an interdisciplinary group comprising students, faculty, staff, and administrators dedicated to the development of sound environmental, social, and economic decisions.

Let's get this garden growing!

Bottle stations on the local nightly news and a story in the paper all in one day

2010-04-05T21:24:00.003-04:00

Wow. When it rains, it really really pours...from our bottle-filling stations. Check out this piece on local WTAJ TV...

UNIVERSITY PARK, CENTRE COUNTY - Last year, Penn state installed its first water bottle filling station in the HUB Student Union, this year the school has added three more at Chambers Building, the Intramural Building, and Willard Building at University Park.

The university sells $2.7 million worth of bottled water each year, and is one of the first in the nation to offer this high tech thirst quenching technology.

“One of the most needless forms of waste that we have comes from non-reusable disposable plastic water bottles,” Peter Buckland, a PhD candidate at Penn State who helped spearhead the initiative to get the filling stations on campus, said.

...and then this piece in the Centre Daily Times.

“We are using this to investigate water bottle filling stations,” said Lydia Vandenbergh, program coordinator at the campus sustainability office. “We did some testing by the environmental health and safety group to make sure the stations would not be a breeding ground for bacteria.”

A club called 3e-coe, composed of education majors and self-proclaimed Earth lovers, had urged the Office of Sustainability to stop purchasing bottled water to sell on campus.

“The club was great. They were kind of the ones that came to university and said let’s ban water bottles,” said Vandenbergh. “The university spends about $2 million on water bottles in their contract with Pepsi. ... The club came to us with a black-and-white proposal, but we were able to work with them to find what’s the best for Penn State.”

Check out the comments on the CDT page too. Some of those are real keepers.

For the record, I think that Lydia Vandenberg and I should form a band about water. Name ideas?

Have you done a Happy Thursday?

2010-04-01T19:22:00.002-04:00

Happy Thursday everyone.

Climate change education workshop

2010-03-30T06:09:00.002-04:00

Orion Magazine and Unity College in Maine are teaming up to teach us how to teach climate change. The following release explains it all:

Education in a Changing Climate Workshop
August 1 - 4, 2010

Climate change is not just for scientists to deal with. It’s a challenge for us all, and we need everybody’s skills and perspectives to confront it—now. But the scope and complexity of the issue can seem intimidating and frustrating, like trying to grasp hot air. How can we understand global and long-term problems when we live and work in the here and now? Do we need to be experts before we even mention climate change in public or add it to our teaching?

Join us at Unity College for a 4-day workshop that will give you powerful, practical ways to move past anxiety and educate yourself, your students, and the public.

We’ll offer a climate change primer on basic climate science, likely effects on ecosystems and people, some ethical, literary, and artistic responses, and a sampling of potential solutions that range from political to personal, technological to philosophical. In each case, we’ll show you where to find the best current information and teaching resources.

Through hands-on activities, we’ll explore how to combine place-based teaching with this global problem. We’ll explore outdoors with a Unity College naturalist, write, make art, and consider how to deal with the perspective-bending nature of climate change. In short, we’ll exercise our brains and imaginations in the service of practice.

Education in a Changing Climate is an annual event jointly sponsored by the Orion Magazine and Unity College. Orion is a bimonthly, advertising-free magazine that stakes out the territory of ecology, the arts, action, education, and social justice. Unity College is a learning environment where sustainability and environmental awareness are central to the school’s mission and vision and is intrinsic to all aspects of college life—ranging from the curricular focus on the environmental liberal arts, to the campus-wide emphasis on energy efficiency and local foods.

Wal-Mart and the locavores

2010-03-29T08:53:00.007-04:00

Food, Inc. does a wonderful job of complicating Wal-Mart for everyone. On the one hand, it shows how its foray into organic milk and other organic groceries correlates with the influx of the mega-food companies like Kraft into organics. But on the other hand, its investment shows two other things: first, that we as dairy eaters want more humane and healthier (for human consumption and the land) dairy and second that its desires moved to a better end can reduce ecological impacts that we have on the environment. But is that the end of it? Apparently not.

In this article on MSNBC, "The great grocery smackdown," the Wal-Mart complicates itself further. What if it invests in local or regional agriculture? Not always organic, but local. Can it give Wegman's, Whole Foods, and Trader Joe's a run for their money? Well, in the world of money, Wal-Mart's business model is still unrivaled. [pic at right from MSNBC]

As everyone who sells to or buys from (or, notoriously, works for) Walmart knows, price is where every consideration begins and ends. Even if the price Walmart pays for local produce is slightly higher than what it would pay large growers, savings in transport and the ability to order smaller quantities at a time can make up the difference. Contracting directly with farmers, which Walmart intends to do in the future as much as possible, can help eliminate middlemen, who sometimes misrepresent prices. Heritage produce currently accounts for only 4 to 6 percent of Walmart’s produce sales, McCormick told me (already more than a chain might spend on produce in a year, as Fishman would point out), adding that he hopes the figure will get closer to 20 percent, so the program will “go from experimental to being really viable.”

What do you think? Can the Wal-Mart juggernaut be a force for good in this movement? Will it take over and turn local agriculture to its own interests? Where are its interests? I wonder if this is the corporatization and a new kind of shell game for powerful people's convenience that replaces the Department of Ag with Wal-Mart. The article's closing speaks to this indirectly:

In an ideal world, people would buy their food directly from the people who grew or caught it, or grow and catch it themselves. But most people can’t do that. If there were a Walmart closer to where I live, I would probably shop there.

But what do you think? Is this where we should be going with our food system? Is this where you want to go with your and your community's food system?

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Hat-tip to Mike for the article.

Sustainability Summit News

2010-03-25T14:30:00.004-04:00

The Collegian did a small story on the Student Sustainability Summit in today's paper.

The university already has a green building policy, uses renewable energy and has a composting facility, Foley said, but it wants to continue going green -- which is where the sustainability statement becomes important. Because of the number of groups at the summit, the statement will make an impact, he said.

"It's the students demanding a lot of the resources, so if the students demand green, then green is what we get -- in our labs, our residence halls, our parties and our classrooms," he said.

Ideas for the statement included using local food in dining commons, making campus more bike-friendly and requiring freshmen to take an environmental course.

But there was so much more to this than this reporter got. We presented and exchanged so many ideas and ways of being from the "Green Economy" to a mural to our Manifesto to community gardening to climate legislation to the inheritance of our great-great-great-grandchildren. Let me say, as the emcee and a participant, I found it energizing to learn what others are doing and want to do.

When we get the Sustainability Manifesto, you will see it here.

Spanier notes us in the Board of Trustees speech

2010-03-24T14:16:00.002-04:00

All. Check it out from President Spanier.

I'm proud to report another student accomplishment — this one on our University Park campus. Thanks to the work of a student ecology group from the College of Education, we're experimenting with new drinking water filling stations around campus. These sensor-activated filling stations accommodate reusable drinking cups and larger containers. The group collaborated with the Office of Physical Plant to install the new hydration stations as well as to upgrade some of the college's water fountains. The intention is to reduce the use of disposable plastic bottles, which will reduce our environmental footprint and keep our campus clean.

Now we're getting somewhere. Maybe we can go to a meeting sometime. That would be nice.

Greetings EDTHP 115

2010-03-24T08:26:00.002-04:00

Hello all. I want to welcome you to join us for a journey. This journey is at once about who we are, what we do, why we do it, and how what we do individually and collectively matters.

As current and future teachers, you and I probably believe that we can positively impact the world by teaching children, with those less experienced than us, or those who have learned differently than we have. I think we also probably believe that we can learn a great deal from the children with whom we work, with their families, and with our whole communities.

But what about about the places - the natural environmental places where we live? What do they teach us? What do we give to them and they give to us? These are questions at the hear of who we, in 3E-COE ask?

We focus on three things in our club with the goal of fostering more environmentally and ecologically aware people.

Our first pillar asks that we look at the natural environment and understand that it is a complex thing of which we are a part, a part that creates many side effects of which we can be both proud and ashamed. This leads to...
Our second pillar, that we are part of a web of natural relationships that the science and practice of ecology shows us. That is, by systematically examining the world(s) around us - the political, economic, social, and natural worlds - we can come to ways of understanding how we look at the natural world and are a part of it. This naturally leads us to...
Our third pillar, which is to bring our learning and doing into what John Dewey would call an "educative" mission that promotes "growth" toward a good end. In fact, many of our actions in 3E-COE create reflections on our experiences so that we can develop better practices as teachers and living people.

We focus on trying to integrate ecological thinking into the whole school system. Think about how many ways and at how many levels you could use a garden in any school.

Botany, biology, and organic and inorganic chemistry: Through the study of plants, fungus, animal, and microorganisms working in and through soil, air, water, and sunlight. We can learn about life cycles.

Meteorology and climatology: Think of the seasonality of the garden, its water and solar cycles.

English: Speaking of water. If you are a high school teacher interested in teaching Dune, you can incorporate its thoughts on water into the actual use of water where you live.

Math: From the simple arithmetic of the number of seeds you plant to fractions and proportions of how many mums we planted to how bloomed or differential equations of predator and prey relationships (that'd be a big garden and a pretty advanced class!) you can do it.

History, geography and anthropology: By growing sweet potatoes (if it's appropriate in your bioregion) you can investigate the natural evolutionary and cultural history of a kind of food used by the Incas and modern Africans.

Art and music: If you grow gourds, you can make musical instruments. Cooking. Poetry. The art of arranging the garden and its landscape.

Economics: If a garden works well, as it has at many schools from Vermont to northwest Washington state, children can sell the fruits and vegetables they grow and make a sustainable living.

Cooperative learning and team thinking: People work together and with something larger than themselves when they do this.

There is a reason that people remain lifetime gardeners. They always teach. They teach you about who and what you are in the place where you are.

This is only one petal on our "green school" flower. We have no shortage of media and natural sources to use for the development of formal and informal curriculum. From Edutopia's Climate Change Curricula to the Edible Schoolyard to the Center for Ecoliteracy to the Pennsylvania Center for Environmental Education, we have abundant resources.

As you can see, we are invested people. Our mission states, "We hope to create a way for students at Penn State to learn lessons about our natural environment, our ethical and ecological understanding of that environment, and how to create educational experiences that foster that understanding. Therefore, we strive for personal and communal sustainability defined as “the possibility that humans and other life will flourish on Earth forever.” Join us in this flourishing.

Please come to our meetings to learn and share more. First Thursday of every month at 7 pm in the Chambers PC Computer Lab. That means we have two more meetings this semester and then one more before Earth Day to shore things up for our plastic bottle greenhouse. More on that later.

April 1st @ 7 pm
April 15th @ 7 pm
Weekend of the 17-18th TBA

Please join us. Any questions or requests to be added to the mailing list, email Peter Buckland @ pdb118@psu.edu

The Story of Bottled Water

2010-03-23T06:14:00.003-04:00

From Stop Corporate Abuse, Annie Leonard, and the makers of The Story of Stuff comes The Story of Bottled Water.

Now where's "manufactured demand" for things we need like family and community? As the film shows, the plastic bottle's "life cycle" too often ends in polluting other people's backyards or downcycling the bottles into other disposable materials.

The film is a nice shot in the arm for us here. Let's take the opportunity to bring the bottle ban back to Penn State's consciousness. Take Back the Tap!

Composting is getting talked about...

2010-03-23T04:35:00.002-04:00

Hi everyone!

Am writing to you from the land of composting to power city buses and do other marvelous things. I came across a cool article in the Boston Sunday Globe Magazine called The case for composting.

Apparently some cities in the US have already made mandatory legislation in favor of composting. How cool! This is just the beginning, I think. While obviously it's a lot harder (logistically speaking) to do things in a country of 300+ million people versus a country of 9 million, nothing is impossible. If we can manage to have organized trash collections (or trash drop-offs) in so many places across the US, then composting is not an impossibility.

PSU Student Sustainability Summit on Wednesday March 24th @ 7 pm

2010-03-22T19:50:00.001-04:00

UPDATE: Reminder to one and all. You should come to this. In addition to those listed below, Ed Perry from the Global Warming Outreach team for the Pennsylvania branch of the National Wildlife Federation will be there as will some representatives from Environmental Credit and Envinity to talk environmental advocacy and green jobs.

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Sustainability Summit Targets Student Involvement

University Park, PA - March 24, 2010

Those who have an interest in learning more about what their fellow Penn State students are doing to promote sustainability on campus will come together for Penn State’s first Student Sustainability Summit on March 24, 2010 from 7:00-9:30 p.m. in the HUB’s Heritage Hall. The summit will showcase student organizations working toward environmental and social change, give participants the opportunity to collaborate on group projects, and provide a forum to share knowledge and learn about campus sustainability resources.

Summit organizers are reaching out to students who have an established interest in sustainability issues, as well as those who may be curious. “The sustainability summit is not for a type of person or member in a particular group,” said Doug Middleton, a senior in Energy and Mineral Engineering and president of Penn State Intellectual Decisions on Environmental Awareness Solutions (I.D.E.A.S.). “Sustainability reaches all kinds of people, and we are trying to bring them together under one roof,” he added.

The Student Sustainability Summit is being organized by Penn State students under the direction of Erik Foley and Milea Perry from Penn State’s Campus Sustainability Office. “I don’t think the students know how big sustainability is on this campus,” said Foley. “This is a chance for people to see and hear all of the amazing work happening around them and to build relationships as they move forward.”

Student and staff representatives from Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center, Eco-Action, Student Affairs, Penn State I.D.E.A.S., Center for Sustainability, Interfaith Power & Light, as well as others sit on the planning board.

Summit attendees are encouraged to arrive early for live music, light refreshments, and the opportunity to meet representatives from a variety of student organizations. The evening, which will be emceed by Peter Buckland, a graduate student in Penn State's Educational Theory and Policy Program and president of 3E-COE, will showcase ongoing projects and organizations and allow those in attendance to begin to work together toward addressing sustainability issues on campus.

For more information about the Student Sustainability Summit, please contact Milea Perry, Campus Sustainability Office, at MAP40@nw.opp.psu.edu.

Contact: Milea Perry, MAP40@nw.opp.psu.edu
Rob Andrejewski, rga116@psu.edu

Sustainability Now: "Climategate" Friday February 26th

2010-02-26T09:13:00.002-05:00

I am co-hosting Sustainability Now radio on the Lion 90.7 fm with Mike Shamalla (Graduate - Landscape Architecture). We air on Fridays from 4-5 pm. Last week we had three student activists including our own Jared Blumer.

Today, we will be talking to Ed Perry, the Global Warming Campaign Outreach Coordinator for the National Wildlife Federation. We'll be talking about the "Climategate" dust-up, something I obviously have some pretty strong ideas about. Read the show preview here.

You can follow our progress on our blog linked above. Tune in Fridays 4-5 pm to 90.7 or stream it online.

"Almanac" by Primo Levi

2010-02-25T20:37:00.003-05:00

"Almanac" by Primo Levi

They'll continue their flow to the sea, the indifferent rivers,
Overwhelming ancient dikes of tenacious men.
The glaciers will continue their grinding and smoothing,
Or crashing down to shorten the lives of firs.
The sea must continue to batter the lands that contain it,
More and more a skinflint with its riches.
Stars and comets continue on their courses;
Earth, too, obeys creation's immutable laws.
But we, rebellious offshoots, ingenious fools,
Destroy and corrupt, always in more of a hurry;
Spreading the desert to the forests of the Amazon;
To the living hearts of our cities; to our very own hearts.

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This poem about modern human indifference to nature and its consequences to individuals really resonates with me after talking to Gene Baur and in thinking about best conduct in a world with climate change.

Compassion. Responsibility. Respect. Human decency. A conversation with Gene Baur

2010-02-24T20:31:00.005-05:00

On February 23rd, I had the good fortune of sitting down with Farm Sanctuary’s co-founder Gene Baur. He is a friendly and healthy man with graying hair and a broad smile. Gene has been a vegan since 1985 and one of the country’s most active animal rights advocates for the last 23 years since Farm Sanctuary started. He is eager to understand modern people’s place in nature, our interaction with animals, and what the human implications are of how we treat animals in factory farms, a problem he calls “the commodification of sentient life," a concept he develops in his book Farm Sanctuary (pictured at right).

How does what we eat affect nature? What do people do to each other as a result of the way we treat animals? Do we really eat according to the ethics we say we do? And finally, what can informal and formal education do to help us understand our place in the world? [They do have a guide for teachers here.]

Gene thinks that it’s “important for people of conscience and who recognize the harm to do something about it.” Many of us agree. But some of us act on principle more than others.

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Me: I am sitting here with Gene Baur of Farm Sanctuary. How are you doing Gene?

Gene: I am well Peter. How are you?

Me: Great. So you co-started Farm Sanctuary?

Gene: I co-founded Farm Sanctuary back in 1986.

Me: What is that led you to decide to start it?

Gene: Well in the early 1980s I hitch hiked around the country and I became familiar with various concerns including what happens to them on farms. Prior to that I had been involved with environmental groups. I have a degree in sociology so I worked with kids who were having difficulties. I just always wanted to do something to make a positive difference.

As time went by I started realizing that industrialized farming really combined so many issues of concern whether it was animal cruelty, justice, truth in advertising, consumer rights issues, environmental issues. All these things converge on a factory farm so that was an area that needed attention in the 1980s. So to address it we wanted to learn and see first hand what was going on. So we started visiting stockyards and farms and finding living animals thrown in trashcans or on piles of dead animals. We rescued them and took care of them.

The organization just grew from there and we were always responding to needs. We’d see an animal on the dead pile you take them home. Now we need a sanctuary. People came and wanted to come and visit so we put in bed and breakfast cabins and a visitor program. We didn’t really have a five-year or ten-year plan. We just responded to various needs as we grew.

Me: Was there a particular instance that happened that you made you say, “Wow. This is really terrible.”

Gene: There was no real particular instance that moved me completely in this direction. There were several instances or events that got me thinking.

One of those was when I was in high school, maybe fifteen years old. I had come home from school and my mother had made a chicken dinner. And I saw the chicken on the plate on its back. I saw the legs. I saw the wings. And I didn’t like the idea of eating an animal. So through a lot of high school I was a vegetarian. I didn’t call myself a vegetarian but I just didn’t want to eat meat. But, in college as I interacted with more people who were eating meat I got back into the habit.

And then when I hitchhiked around the country in the early 80s I went to some farm areas. I learned about Francis Moore Lappé’s book Diet for a Small Planet. I saw Ralph Nader speak in college. He talked about how we grow up learning about how to market and sell things but we don’t learn how to be smart consumers. So that was another thing that I saw.

And I’ve always just wanted to make a difference. I’ve been very interested in the movement in the 1960s to challenge assumptions and challenge common behaviors. So that’s part of a framing that these other instances sort of fed and led me toward this area.

Again, this was an area that wasn’t really being looked at and citizens were unwittingly involved in and purchasing products that were raised in a way that was appalling if they looked at it, was unhealthy, was destroying the planet, and was harming rural communities.

So in 1986 there was very little attention going to industrial farming and so we wanted to learn about it and take it on.

Me: It sounds like you were an on-the-ground Peter Singer in a way. You saw this huge amount of waste and suffering and just thought it was ethically undefensible.

Gene: Absolutely. We wanted to see firsthand, not just read a book and talk about it. I wanted to see firsthand what was going on. So I spent a lot of time going to stockyards and farms and crawling around these places and it was not fun. But was important to so that we could see the reality.

Me: I know from some of Farm Sanctuary’s material that you talk about and write about social human costs, costs to animals with their suffering, and these natural environmental costs. Can you talk about those different kinds of costs that this industrial system causes?

Gene: In terms of the food and our own health, what we eat has profound consequences and most people in this country are eating in a way that is making them sick and killing them prematurely. Cancer and heart disease are the top two killers in the United States and the risk of both can be lessened significantly by eating healthier plant-based foods instead of animal-based foods. We are eating in a way that is inconsistent with our own interests.

We are also supporting an agricultural system that is inconsistent with the wellbeing of the planet. The industrial agricultural system depends on enormous quantities of land, water, and other resources including fossil fuels. A New York Times article that ran a few years ago compared the fossil fuel use that goes into producing a meat-based meal versus a vegetarian meal. It concluded that the meat meal required sixteen times more fossil fuels. So it’s an extremely wasteful system that also contributes to global warming. The United Nations found that the livestock industry contributes more to global warming than the entire transportation industry. There’s massive environmental consequences that are inconsistent with our global interests in living on a clean and healthy planet.

Then, what happens to animals today is an abomination. These animals live their whole lives in cages and crates so tightly confined that they can barely move. Sometimes they can’t turn around, they can’t walk, they can’t exercise, they can’t exhibit natural behaviors and they suffer both physically and psychologically. Finally, they are killed at a very young age.

When people see what happens to the animals they’re upset, they’re usually appalled, and sometimes they say, “I don’t want to look at it.” And I would say that people should be aware of what they are supporting and should be able to look at it and feel okay about it. But right now people are eating in a way and supporting a system that abuses animals horribly and is inconsistent with their values. So a key part of our message is to encourage citizens to make choices that are consistent with their values and consistent with their interests.

And I think that if we saw that happen, we would see factory farms’ profits plummet and we’d see a move toward a different kind of agricultural system where people are eating more plants than animals, people are getting food from local sources, from farmer’s markets, from community supported agriculture (CSAs), from community gardens where people would be growing their own food. And by doing this you feel connected and empowered and you feel better because you are eating better food as opposed to food raised in toxic environments.

Me: CSAs are becoming way more popular too.

Gene: Yes. In the last five years we’ve seen enormous growth toward community gardens and CSAs. Even the USDA has put in a community garden at its headquarters in Washington, DC. The Obamas have planted a garden at the White House that is an example of eating healthy food.

This issue touches on so many aspects of how we live on this planet. What we eat has profound ramifications.

And it’s an emotional issue because we grow up eating a certain way and we develop certain habits. We were taught this by our parents and we share food with family and friends so it has a lot of emotional components. But when those foods are harmful we need to look at them with an open mind and make changes despite the fact that often doing so often causes some social distress.

Often when people become vegan, their families think that they are being rejected, that the person who becomes vegan is rejecting their family. But I would argue that the person choosing the vegan lifestyle is actually making choices for compassion and against cruelty and exhibiting values that they were taught by their parents. They are positive values.

Me: Are you saying that vegans are embracing something that people say they want to believe in but that a vegan is actually acting on it?

Gene: That’s right. They are acting on it in a way that is consistent with their values and with most people’s values. Most people don’t think that it’s okay for animals to be abused.

Me: The Michael Vick dog incident for example.

Gene: Oh gosh. When people heard about that they were appalled and they wanted him penalized and he was penalized. But what happens on factory farms is all over the place and it is much worse frankly when you look at all of the ramifications.

On factory farms you have the commodification of sentient life. The animals are seen as pieces of meat from the day they are born until the day they die. They are denigrated, disrespected, and abused. That’s bad for the animals but it’s also bad for the people.

Me: So I hope that you can say a little about that. You can say, “Oh. The animals are treated so badly and the people who work there must be treated badly.” But can you give an example with hens or cattle?

Gene: Well, with hens who are used in egg production live their whole lives in small wire battery cages where they can’t stretch their wings, develop bruises and abrasions, and when they are no longer profitable they are killed. They used to be sent to slaughterhouses. But increasingly slaughterhouses don’t want them because they are so skinny with no meat on their bones. They’re beaten up and bruised so the flesh isn’t profitable. So a lot of these “spent hens” as they’re called are just killed.

There was a case in California where an egg factory disposed of 30,000 spent hens with a wood chipper. We tried to prosecute them for cruelty to animals but they were found not guilty because this was considered to be a common practice. On farms bad has become normal. And people start to rationalize cruelty as acceptable.

We had another case in New Jersey where I found two hens thrown in a trashcan with other dead birds. They were alive. So we tried to bring a case in that situation.

The egg factory’s lawyer argued in court that they could legally treat the birds like manure. The judge asked, “Isn’t there a difference between live birds and manure and their attorney affirmed the position that there is not a difference. So you have people making these arguments that are inhumane and, I would say, out of touch with basic human decency. That’s what happens in these places. Bad has become normal. Cruelty and violence become routine and acceptable.

If you look at human history, there have been a number of instances where a lot of people have gone along and done bad things and accepted bad as normal. So when bad things are happening it’s important for people of conscience and who recognize the harm to do something about it.

Me: You’ve seen Food, Inc. right?

Gene: Yes.

Me: There’s a scene in Food, Inc. where they go to the chicken barns of a woman who has a contract with a major poultry producer. She lets the film crew into see the broiler chickens who can barely walk. And then there’s this brutalization of the animals by, it seems reasonable to infer, by a group of undocumented workers. And this treatment of workers is this whole other thing that I hope you can talk about regarding the human costs.

Gene: I think that when there’s an insensitivity to animals it can jump the species barrier. Violence and callousness is an attitude that can spread. I’d say that in factory farming it begins with a disregard for the animals’ sentience and suffering, a lack of empathy, and a lack of responsibility for one’s own conduct which is then legitimized and justified instead of observed from a humane standpoint. When you start to justify cruelty to animals you can justify other kinds of cruelty.

Animals are seen as resources to be extracted from. We take eggs from hens, milk from cows, and kill them for meat, extracting value. It’s a mindset. We extract water from underground to such an extent that we are running out of it. We act in irresponsible and short-sighted ways. We extract value out of workers in the same short-sighted way.

Me: It sounds like you’re saying it’s economic value at all costs.

Gene: That’s right – short-term economic value without a concept of the broader costs, the external costs. There are social ills where you have these factory farms.

Back in the 1940s there was an anthropologist named Glodschmidt who came up with what is called the “Goldschmidt hypothesis.” He looked at two farming communities in central California: one of them was an industrial farm town with one big operation and the other was made up of more diversified small farms. What he concluded was that in the diversified community social health was much better. Money stayed in the community. There was better healthcare and services. But in the industrial operation there lots of problems. And we’re seeing that today.

We see industrial farms getting big tax breaks. They pollute the environment and they don’t clean it up. They treat their workers badly and their workers get sick. And because they aren’t paying their fair share of taxes the healthcare system in place cannot accommodate workers. Also, workers are oftentimes in the United States illegally so there are problems with that. And agribusiness has been happy with that arrangement because these are people who will do the work and when they get sick they aren’t going to try to get protection. They’ll get their cousin to come and replace them for a little while and there’s a revolving door of workers who can stand it for a while but then leave and then come back. So there’s an underground network of labor that supports these systems that exploit animals, workers, and the environment.

I’d also say they exploit consumers too because they market things and represent them as something they are not. For example, saying that you need to drink cow’s milk to get calcium to prevent osteoperosis. That shouldn’t be said. It’s a myth. But it’s something the dairy industry promulgates because when people think that way they will buy more cow’s milk. If you look at our country, we drink a lot of cow’s milk, and we have a lot of osteoperosis. So I don’t think that’s the answer. They’re selling products that disrespect animals, workers, consumers, nature and even their neighbors because they are polluting. They’ve passed “right to farm” laws so that they can do whatever they want without any consequences.

Me: It’s a “right to farm” if you have an enormous amount of money to invest you might say.

Gene: Those are the ones that are really pushing it. It’s the golden rule. Whoever has the gold makes the rules.

Me: In the last few presidential election cycles there’s been talk about “outsourcing.” We are outsourcing jobs for this and that and sending them overseas. But it sounds as though part of what you are talking about is that we outsource jobs right here to people who have the least power and that we outsource to them our cruelty so that we don’t have to do it.

Gene: That’s part of it too. These are people who are made to do very difficult jobs. You know it results in psychological harms. Alcoholism. Violence to animals is a precursor to violence against people.

In my book, I talk about a worker at a poultry slaughterhouse. He explains how became very hardened to the suffering of the animals and how that went home with him. A lot of workers have that happen.

Me: There is a big and growing movement to develop responsibility about our food and about our relationship to animals, and to nature, and climate change and all this stuff. So I hope we can talk about that.

Gene: Sure.

Me: Farm Sanctuary has promoted forms of public education with these Green Food Resolutions and others. And the Green Food Resolution seems especially good because you can do things right where you are.

Gene: Exactly.

Me: Can you explain those?

Gene: Sure. The Green Food Resolutions are urging cities to make a statement that they want to promote more local plant-based agriculture and local plant-based food consumption. The way we eat affects our health in huge ways. One of the reasons that our healthcare costs are so high is that we are eating so poorly. We are so disconnected from our food and making choices that are bad and not aligned with your own values and interests. So a Green Food Resolution puts it out there that we should be eating food that is grown responsibly and sustainably and healthy for ourselves that supports a healthy economic community.

We’ve had one passed in Tennessee and we anticipate others being passed. Hopefully, they will encourage expanding farmer’s markets, CSAs, community gardens.

We are in the midst of a growing grass-roots movement where people are tired of eating junk. They are tired of eating food that makes them feel ill and being tired.

Me: This food makes you tired.

Gene: It’s awful. It’s crazy that we are eating the way we are. If you think about it logically why would you eat food that makes you feel bad and makes you sick.

Me: There has been a study done by an anthropologist I believe that showed how far from our evolved diet, from say a human thousands of years ago in the Pacific Northwest, we have come. So from our evolutionary history all these buttons are being pushed in us when we eat Doritos. Don’t get me wrong. Sometimes I eat Doritos. But the kinds of things that happen to people are not things that we have adapted to in these quantities.

Gene: We have certain old evolutionary tendencies to eat a lot because we have come from a place of scarcity. But now we have so much around us that we are continuing to eat and obesity is an epidemic. Right. So we have certain historic propensities…

Me: Michael Pollan talks about salt, fat, and sugar.

Gene: Right. We have a real strong desire for those things and in certain environments those might work. But in a different environment we have a problem. So today we have a convergence of those historical roots leading to problems. And the environment we’ve created needs to be assessed. We have to decide what works and what doesn’t. Most of what we’ve done today in farming doesn’t work.

Me: And a Green Food Resolution is a way for people to bring that into their local commerce then.

Gene: Bring it into the community. Absolutely.

You know there are a lot of problems in the world and there are lots of things we can’t do very much about. But when it comes to what we eat, each of us has a lot of control. Each of us can decide, for example, not to buy hamburgers from McDonald’s. We can decide to get a veggie burger or something from the farmer’s market.

We vote to choose politicians. And that’s important. But that only happens a couple times a year or less. But every time we eat and spend a dollar, we are supporting something in the food system. So every time you give a dollar to McDonald’s you are supporting their activities. But every time you give a dollar to a farmer at a market or CSA you are supporting that. Each time you do that, it grows. I think consumers now have had enough and are moving toward a system that makes more sense. It makes me very optimistic.

Me: I’m a teacher. I study education and schools and I work with future teachers. Everyone agrees that school is an important place and has been a really important place in the U.S. since at least child labor laws came into effect. We shape people in school.

Gene: Yeah.

Me: So the kinds of activity that go on in there regarding food are kind of important.

Gene: I’d say very important, yes.

Me: I know that something that happened with Farm Sanctuary that I hope you can help me understand.

Gene: Sure.

Me: Farm Sanctuary rescued twenty chickens from the Conendegua Academy in New York. They had an ecology program. One of the ecology program’s goals was to teach their students about where their food came from. And their way of doing this was to take twenty broiler chickens, rear them in cages, and I think students were going to do this, and then they were going to kill them at the end. This caused an uproar and Farm Sanctuary came in at the end and you got twenty chickens. Two are named Andre and Albert. This was in 2008.

So I wonder what could be good in that lesson and what’s not good in that lesson?

Gene: What could be good is for people to realize where their food comes from because we are so disconnected from it. What is bad, though, is that in this instance they were teaching a form of violence and callousness against birds. Those birds are individuals with feelings that want to live.

I think schools are places where children should learn to live as humanely and sensibly as possible and make choices that are as healthy as possible. Unfortunately, the school system as it operates teaches kids many bad habits regarding food.

Food served through the school lunch program is leading to our health problems. What happened at the Conendegua Academy was not as bad like that. Students were learning about food. But it would be better to learn about plant foods by growing gardens. That doesn’t require violence or killing.

When you have to give a kid a knife and say, “Kill that bird,” I think that that could border on child abuse. If the child doesn’t want to kill is being forced to kill…

Me: Or even watch killing?

Gene: Or even watch killing. That could be traumatizing and I think that’s wrong.

Me: But I think it’s kind of interesting that the industrial food system we’ve been talking about and you criticize does this exact thing and then still expects those children to eat a chicken. But we can’t ask kids to do it themselves because it might be sort of traumatizing. So maybe it’s what you were saying earlier that it’s a values conflict.

Gene: It is absolutely a values conflict. People say they love animals and they care about animals and they want to believe that they love animals and care about them but ironically most people are still eating animals raised in brutal conditions and then killed in inhuman ways. It is a values conflict and that’s why we think it’s important for people to examine where their food comes from and then make choices consistent with their actual values.

As that happens, I think we will see a shift away from industrial models to a new kind of food production system. One that doesn’t abuse animals. One that does not exploit workers. One that does not mistreat the environment with callous disregard. One that is respectful of consumers where there is transparency and citizens can see how their food is produced and feel good about it. I think we need to push for transparency and encourage people to make choices that they can feel good about by aligning them with their values and interests.

Me: So it sounds like in some way that if we were to have The Gene Baur School that it would be a school about compassion.

Gene: It would be a school system about compassion. It would be a school system about responsibility, and respect, and about human decency. I think most people hold the same values but that we have developed some really bad habits. And as we become uncomfortable with them we get good at rationalizing them. People are really good at rationalizing bad behavior. [laughs]

Me: We sure are. [laughs]

Gene: If you look at human history we’ve done a lot of really bad things and come up with good reasons to do them. But we need to step back and examine our conduct and make sensible choices. It would be about compassion, responsibility, and what is appropriate. What we are doing is just out of whack.

Me: But we might be moving in the right direction.

Gene: There are some very positive signs that people are showing. But industrial farming is entrenched and holding on and trying to expand. There’s a battle going on but there are some really positive signs.

Me: Cool. I want to thank you a lot Gene.

Gene: Thank you Peter. I really enjoyed it.

UPDATE: Farming and our relationships to animals

2010-02-22T18:55:00.000-05:00

UPDATE: We have the opportunity to meet with Gene on Tuesday, February 23 at 10 am in 221 Chambers Building. Mark your calendars.

What do we owe animals if anything? Gene Baur, the president of Farm Sanctuary, will be coming to Penn State to give a presentation on this issue on February 22nd. Farm Sanctuary "works to end cruelty to farm animals and promotes compassionate living through rescue, education and advocacy. We envision a world where the violence that animal agriculture inflicts upon people, animals and the environment has ended, and where instead we exercise values of compassion." The presentation is sponsored by the PSU Vegetarian Club.

Brooklyn School Farmyard

2010-02-19T09:27:00.001-05:00

Check this out guys.

Food. We love it and can’t live without it. It keeps us happy, healthy, and smart. We’re making local, organic food available to everyone, one yard at a time. And we need your help to keep the mission alive.

Based in Brooklyn, BK Farmyards transforms under-utilized land into tasty edible landscapes. We partner with homeowners, schools, developers, and community members to build micro-farms and distribute produce weekly. Not only can the community follow the food from seed to table, they are helping us build a much-needed alternative to the abundance of cheap processed foods and fast-food restaurants. We rely exclusively on the power of volunteers and the endless energy of the bk team instead of gas-guzzling machinery. We strive to make our food so affordable that anyone can access fresh food.

In 2009, we have done so much with so little, feeding 6 people for 12 weeks off of 600 square feet in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn. A lot of people really loved the idea: visit a video of Foxtrot, our first micro-farm http://www.vimeo.com/6137263

If you'd like to donate to the project or learn more go to this link.

The NEWS on this rally

2010-02-13T00:46:00.003-05:00

Well I guess we have some news coverage on this too. Watch the local NBC clip (yours truly and all). As I say in the clip, "I love me some ignorance." But I have mixed feelings about this actually knowing that I am fully a press hound.

On the one hand, I am glad that our voice and my voice gets to get into the media. If it's just this denialistic caricature of science, the peer review process in natural sciences, and checks and balances by vested interests, we might as well just get whatever sort of YAF realism ideology in order to review the work of scientists.

On the other hand, I think it's ridiculous that the press doesn't just look at the available scientific literature and say, "Wow! What a bunch of fringe whackaloonery we are attending to." Sigh. So it goes.

Transparency and transparent ignorance

2010-02-12T14:05:00.006-05:00

That "Climategate"protest held by the Young Americans for Freedom (YAF) and the 9.12 Project was about at least two things: transparency and ignorance. On the one hand, they called for transparency from Penn State in Michael Mann's case surrounding these leaked emails from East Anglia University Climate Research Unit hoping for an independent investigation. On the other hand, it was also an appalling display of ignorance by people invested, for whatever reason, in denying climate change. We'll tackle these two things as we move through a loose narration and description of the event.

Just before the protest started, I met up with several members of Penn State's Eco-Action and a couple of the College Democrats to get IPCC handouts in order and a couple of signs. A young woman was also there gearing up a camera with which to interview YAF and 9.12 members to sort of see why they were there and what not. I take it that video will be coming out soonish. We'll be posted I'm sure.

Outside of the HUB the protesters geared up a little banner decrying "Mann's Nature trick...to hide the decline." That's a reference to one of the stolen emails from the East Anglia database regarding some research methods. As RealClimate.org reports it (one of whose contributors is Mann himself):

“Declines” in the MXD record. This decline was ~~hidden~~ written up in Nature in 1998 where the authors suggested not using the post 1960 data. Their actual programs (in IDL script), unsurprisingly warn against using post 1960 data. Added: Note that the ‘hide the decline’ comment was made in 1999 – 10 years ago, and has no connection whatsoever to more recent instrumental records.

So this alleged "hidden" decline was reported in the scientific literature itself, the method was written up and included in peer-review, and happened more than 10 years ago, during which time climate science has only found more empirical data to support human-induced climate change.

One of YAF's members stood on a milk crate and gave a speech. He decried Penn State's investigation on this matter (here in pdf). They have not been thorough enough. They are playing semantic games with the word "trick" that remind him of Clinton's squabbles over the definition of "is." Look, the context matters. What one guy calls a "trick" in an informal email that relates to something vetted through years of scientific work is not like a magic trick used for deception by Penn & Teller or the Houdini. Once again on this matter I defer to the editor of Nature on this matter:

One e-mail talked of displaying the data using a 'trick' — slang for a clever (and legitimate) technique, but a word that denialists have used to accuse the researchers of fabricating their results. It is Nature's policy to investigate such matters if there are substantive reasons for concern, but nothing we have seen so far in the e-mails qualifies.

Not many organizations out there will have that much more interest in protecting science's integrity than Nature. And Penn State, whose reputation has come to be built on a very strong research and development program, is not so interested in crashing itself to save one guy. Who conducted the last investigation?

The Collegian reports that "[t]hree Penn State employees, Henry C. "Hank" Foley, vice president for research and dean of the graduate school; William Brune, head of the meteorology department; and Candice Yekel, director of the Office of Research Protections, sat on the inquiry panel." One of the original possible panel members, Dean of Earth and Mineral Sciences William Easterling, recused himself because of conflicts of interest. Office of Research Protections must protect the research integrity of the university. They are the biggest pain for researchers because they oversee so much and examine the ethical ramifications of what people do and they have to be responsive to government agencies like the National Institutes for Health and the like. I'd think that Candice Yekel (who I also know personally) isn't about to jeopardize her position for Michael Mann.

The good of the one does not outweigh the good of the many and it is not in the investigating panel's interest to clear Mann of charges of which he is guilty. As our own Collegian reported, "the panel concluded there is "no substance" to the first three allegations: falsifying or suppressing data, intending to delete or conceal information and misusing privileged or confidential information." They reached this conclusion after doing the following (see report pdf link above):

• 206 emails that contained a message/text from Dr. Mann somewhere in the chain;
• 92 emails that were received by Dr. Mann, but in which he did not write/participate in the discussion; and
• 79 that dealt with Dr. Mann, his work or publications; he neither authored nor was he copied on any of these.

From among these 377 emails, the inquiry committee focused on 47 emails that were deemed relevant.

Now this made the YAF speaker nuts. He had this 10-page mind-numbing (he used some term like that) document from Penn State on the Mann investigation. "47 emails! Just 47 emails out of more than 1,000 emails." He then made fun of this process and the university for focusing on "47 emails!" This is what we call selective quoting or "quote mining." Tell people that more than 1,000 emails were taken in and then make it about 47 emails without noting at all how the panel decided to get to it. So the context of the process of the panel is annihilated and misrepresented for political points. Isn't there something almost beautifully hypocritical and paradoxical about a group who is out for the truth about documentation, transparency, and process misrepresenting documentation, transparency, and process? I think so. What about the fourth allegation?

The committee have punted on the fourth accusations so that it can be taken up by good people who are qualified to assess it. They write:

Given that information emerged in the form of the emails purloined from CRU in November 2009, which have raised questions in the public’s mind about Dr. Mann’s conduct of his research activity, given that this may be undermining confidence in his findings as a scientist, and given that it may be undermining public trust in science in general and climate science specifically, the inquiry committee believes an investigatory committee of faculty peers from diverse fields should be constituted under RA-10 to further consider this allegation.

In sum, the overriding sentiment of this committee, which is composed of University administrators, is that allegation #4 revolves around the question of accepted faculty conduct surrounding scientific discourse and thus merits a review by a committee of faculty scientists. Only with such a review will the academic community and other interested parties likely feel that Penn State has discharged it responsibility on this matter.

So they appointed five investigators unattached to this climate business. The Collegian reports:

Five Penn State faculty members will sit on the investigation committee into the fourth allegation: Mary Jane Irwin, a computer science and electrical engineering professor; Alan Walker, an anthropology and biology professor; Albert Welford Castleman, a chemistry and physics professor; Nina Jablonski, an anthropology professor; and Sarah Assmann, a biology professor.

[Candice] Yekel [of the Office of Research Protections] will provide administrative assistance to the committee, according to the report. The investigation will take 120 days from initiation to completion, university spokeswoman Lisa Powers said.

So now you have five high-powered nationally and internationally respected scientists determining whether Mann's actions undermined "public trust in science." Seems to me that we have very good people working on this. But it's not enough for YAF and the 9.12 guys. They want to "Turn up the HEAT on Mann!" They want independent investigators. According to one of the protesters, the National Science Foundation is available for this investigation. Once again, I find it odd that an essentially anti-government group wants a government organization that works with funding on this issue to investigate Mann.

This group says they want "transparency." Me too. You should too. Science should be quite transparent within the limits that organization's put on the availability of their data. Sadly, the public cannot always see behind the process because nations, states, corporations, and other institutions simply make things confidential. As a sidenote, I don't see Pfizer or Exxon Mobil making their R&D transparent.

But this is beyond transparency. It's hounding of a very old kind that Chris Mooney documents quite well in The Republican War on Science. Pro-economic growth big business interests aligned with libertarians aligned with anti-science religious conservatives just can't take climate change so they call for "transparency" to serve their obstructionist tactics. That's Orwellian.

I, personally, do not find any of this to warrant much more investigation. In general, this is just more denialism being legitimated by the media. I don't object to the NSF doing an investigation in principle, but it seems a waste of time and more ways for climate denialists to keep their incredible celebration of ignorance in the media spotlight.

And what a celebration of ignorance it was. There was a guy holding up an American flag and saying things like, "Global warming? Haven't you noticed how cold it is?" Another guy said, "I want all those people to go stand in the ice and snow over there and tell me about global warming" or something very close to that. [Sadly, I didn't have my recorder out for this so my quoting is slightly off.] Both of these guys show that they fundamentally do not understand climate change, that they are deluded on the subject, or want to just lie about it. I point you all to the National Science Foundation's materials on it; you know, that group these denialists want to investigate Mann. The NSF calls climate change "the most important puzzle that humankind has attempted to solve."

The Nobel-Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) Climate Change 2007: Synthesis Report from its Fourth Annual Report warns us that the problem’s severity is escalating and accelerating:

Warming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice and rising global average sea level” and that “observational evidence from all continents and most oceans shows that many natural systems are being affected by regional climate changes, particularly temperature increases.

Grounds for “skepticism” have been soundly refuted. According to Naomi Oreskes' literature review on the subject, of 928 papers on climate science published between 1993 and 2003, there was no significant dissent from “the consensus view…[that] climate change is caused by human activity” leading to the conclusion that the evidence for human-induced climate change is “clear and unambiguous." In the five years since her paper was published, that consensus strengthened.

It's pretty stunning to watch this kind of entrenched anti-reason at work. In our work as teachers of ecological literacy, I hope to do better for a better tomorrow.

---

In a closing note: There were multiple media outlets there. I was interviewed by a Collegian reporter and someone from one cable news channel. The YAF and 9.12 Project folks and people from some environmental groups including Eco-Action were interviewed as well. Watch local stations and check the paper next week.

Counter the YAFhoos

2010-02-11T16:44:00.001-05:00

This just in from Eco-Action:

EcoAction is going to work to defend Dr. Michael Mann and the entire Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change tomorrow out front of the HUB. We will be meeting outside of our office in the HUB at 11:30 AM tomorrow (Friday) in order to distribute fact-filled hand bills to people who want to help pass them out outside of the HUB. Please come and help speak out in the name of science.

Come on out!

So what do you say to this denialists?

2010-02-11T15:02:00.003-05:00

As I posted in the last piece, there is a cavalcade of climate conspiracy theorists out there. "Climate change is a hoax!" they cry.

So I just wonder what they think of this story from Penn State Live: 'Supra-glacial lakes' are the focus of a new Penn State study. They write the following:

University Park, Pa. -- Rising temperatures on the Greenland ice sheet cause the creation of large surface lakes called supra-glacial lakes. Now a Penn State geographer will investigate why these lakes form and their implications...

"Learning where lakes are, how they form, and how that changes through the melt season can help us really understand a lot about important processes that control how the Greenland ice sheet responds to warming," Lampkin said.

Supra-glacial lakes form when melting water collects in pools in the lower levels of the ice sheet in melt or ablation zones. These lakes drain rapidly through cracks in the ice channeling water to beneath the ice sheet, affecting how ice sheets move and how pieces calve off into the ocean.

I wonder what tomorrow's Young Americans for Freedom and 9/12 Project protesters about so-called "Climategate" think of this direct empirical evidence positively correlated with rising human-produced atmospheric greenhouse gases. Is this a joke to them? To my mind, that is willful ignorance. When will there be enough evidence for them?

Yahoos are going to protest "Climategate"

2010-02-11T09:51:00.005-05:00

Warning: This post is a piece of political activism written on the author's behalf and do not necessarily represent the views of all the 3E-COE's members.

In case you haven't heard, climate change denialists in the United States are all atwitter over thousands of emails stolen from East Anglia University's climate program. One of their prime targets has been Michael Mann at Penn State University who some have alleged has fabricated conclusions by using a "trick" commonly used in sciences that use statistics. They call it Climategate!

Do they even understand what the science is? I can't tell. They should get into the peer review process of science journals and learn how climate science is actually done by climate scientists.

The editor of Nature, one of the world's two most prestigious and rigorous scientific journals (Science is the other) wrote the following:

Nothing in the e-mails undermines the scientific case that global warming is real — or that human activities are almost certainly the cause. That case is supported by multiple, robust lines of evidence, including several that are completely independent of the climate reconstructions debated in the e-mails.
First, Earth's cryosphere is changing as one would expect in a warming climate. These changes include glacier retreat, thinning and areal reduction of Arctic sea ice, reductions in permafrost and accelerated loss of mass from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Second, the global sea level is rising. The rise is caused in part by water pouring in from melting glaciers and ice sheets, but also by thermal expansion as the oceans warm. Third, decades of biological data on blooming dates and the like suggest that spring is arriving earlier each year.

Denialists are against this stuff because it is the clearest evidence out there that the following equation is true:

Fossil-fuel intensive industrial technological activity x Growth economy = Ecocide

The plain truth of this equation is too obvious to ignore as Nature's editor pointed out above. Michael Mann's statistical trick may be a way to play with data; that's what research can be: playing with data to see what's in it. But people want Mann's head on a platter.

Here at Penn State, a group of notable denialists, The Young Americans for Freedom, are going to protest. Good. I am eager to see this public display of intense ignorance and brow-beating. Here's what their press release says for the Climate Gate protest:

Do you care about academic integrity? Today, a group of three Penn State employees are supposed to conclude an inquiry into whether PSU professor Michael Mann violated university policy. If these three employees so choose, they can clear Mann of wrongdoing, and cut off any further investigation.

A PSU professor is involved in an international, climate-related scandal, and the internal inquiry involves only three people, all of whom are Penn State employees. No outsiders will monitor the proceedings. Does this seem right to you?

If the initial inquiry decides that Mann needs to be investigated further, a committee of five tenured Penn State professors will be appointed to do the job. Again, there will be no external oversight. Does this seem right to you?

Even if the Penn State investigation committee finds that Mann did wrong, they are under n! o obligation to inform the public—the only people they are required to inform are Mann’s donors. Again, does this seem right to you?

Penn State is the ninth ranked university in the country for receiving government research and development grants. Don’t you think they should be held to a high standard?

Come join us when we take a stand for honesty, integrity and truth on February 12th, at noon, in front of the Hetzel Union Building on Penn State’s University Park Campus (Pollock Road entrance). Your commitment and concern will make a difference! This demonstration is jointly sponsored by PSU Young Americans for Freedom and The 9-12 Project of Central PA.

High standard? Do they know anything about the people investigating him or for what the final charge is? I have met two of them: Nina Jablonski is an anthropology professor and head of Department of Anthropology at Penn State. She was on the Colbert Report too for her book Skin. and Alan Walker. Walker is a fellow in the National Academy of Sciences. He's one of the most vetted and admired anthropologists in the world writing on human evolution. You think they want science to suffer as a discipline? I think not. What external oversight committee do these people want? Exxon Mobil's front groups? The FBI? Lehman Brothers and all their "free market" friends?

I think I will try to make it. So will some of the folks from Eco-Action. If you go, bring some counter-signage and be prepared for a bit of spectacle. If you feel so compelled, please write letters to the editor of The Collegian decrying this as nothing short of denialist tragedy.

More tasty water for my bottle

2010-02-03T08:23:00.005-05:00

Today I went back to the Chambers water bottle filling fountain. It made me happy to be there.

So in all of my glee, I filled up my Freeze Thaw Cycles bottle with water. [@ Freeze Thaw you can buy a reused and recycled bike to go with your reusable bottle and reduce your carbon footprint and shop locally!]

And look how much waste people have saved by using this machine. 2318 bottles! Wow. That's a lot of petroleum saved from bottle production, transport to consumption, transport to down- or recycling or to a landfill, social problems avoided, and potential pollution reduced. Reduction is the first of the ecological R's.

This might actually be pattern solving (pdf). Hmmmm.

When The Onion wins...

2010-02-03T00:13:00.001-05:00

...they really win.

WASHINGTON—Wishing to dispose of the empty plastic container, and failing to spot a recycling bin nearby, an estimated 30 million Americans asked themselves Monday how bad throwing away a single bottle of water could really be.
"It's fine, it's fine," thought Maine native Sheila Hodge, echoing the exact sentiments of Chicago-area resident Phillip Ragowski, recent Florida transplant Margaret Lowery, and Kansas City business owner Brian McMillan, as they tossed the polyethylene terephthalate object into an awaiting trash can. "It's just one bottle. And I'm usually pretty good about this sort of thing."

"Not a big deal," continued roughly one-tenth of the nation's population.

What is the most important thing?

2010-02-02T22:23:00.002-05:00

Watch this and at least enjoy the sentiment.

Now ask yourself, "What is the purpose of education?" and watch the video again.

I wonder, if we have already past the point the video seems to think we are yet to reach.

Family erosion by the market. Check.

Environmental degradation. Check.

Money as the motivator of modern life? Dewey wrote about it more than 80 years ago in Individualism Old & New when he wrote about "the pecuniary man." Jesus railed against it with the money changers in the temple.

In all of the wrappings of the No Child Left Behind Act and "standards" this and "accountability" that and "global economy" here and "competitiveness" there shouldn't we ask, "Who do I serve? How does what I offer people through my role as a teacher help them be themselves in their communities? Can we do this without deluding ourselves?"

Fun ideas for making new items out of old ones

2010-02-01T05:29:00.004-05:00

The Boston Globe had a cool photo slide show of used items turned into new ones, like a fruit basket made of sterilized chopsticks. While making new items out of reclaimed ones isn't a novel idea, I always find it refreshing to see what other people are doing in terms of making new out of old.

Will Penn State be one of the STARS?

2010-01-30T17:38:00.003-05:00

The American Association for the Advancement for Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE...what a mouthful) is starting to pilot its STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System) program. According to AASHE, the program's goals are:

Provide a framework for understanding sustainability in all sectors of higher education.
Enable meaningful comparisons over time and across institutions using a common set of measurements developed with broad participation from the campus sustainability community.
Create incentives for continual improvement toward sustainability.
Facilitate information sharing about higher education sustainability practices and performance.
Build a stronger, more diverse campus sustainability community.

I am both very excited and a tad worried about this. I am excited because this might give us some really meaningful information about programs. However, standards and such can turn into some pretty ugly political sticks. I just like to keep in the back of my mind what "standards" adopted from "a common set of measurement" have done to teachers and students in light of the No Child Left Behind act. I'm cautiously optimistic though.

Guess what. Penn State is one of the early sites for evaluation.

As national and global attention to environmental sustainability increases, many in higher education, industry and government are unsure of how to actually quantify and measure progress in this new area. Penn State is taking a leadership role as a charter participant in the STARS (Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and Rating System) program, a new sustainability tracking system developed by the Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE). This year, data will be collected in key sustainability "credit areas," spanning student life, curriculum, research, operations, planning, administration and outreach.

"STARS will provide Penn State with a key missing link in our efforts," said Erik Foley, director of the Campus Sustainability Office, "comprehensive baseline sustainability performance data. AASHE developed the tool over three years and tested it on 70 institutions, so we feel it is a well-tested, rigorous tool for supporting Penn State?s sustainability efforts."

As a charter participant in STARS, Penn State will have an improved ability to measure progress, make better informed resource allocation decisions, benchmark performance with other similar institutions and be a leader in the development of sustainability metrics. Early participation also will position Penn State to be an active contributor to the evolution of STARS, which is expected to evolve as universities continuously expand the adoption of innovative sustainable practices.

Read the whole story here. I really hope this goes well.

A song about "development": Gaon Chodab Nahi

2010-01-29T15:29:00.003-05:00

This video was forwarded to us from Madhu Suri Prakash in Penn State's Educational Theory and Policy program (and my adviser). The YouTube host explains that "the song describes the present day exploitation of tribal land and forests in the name of development." Development, that chimera of "progress."

Madhu recently went to Bhutan to work with them on developing an integrated educational system for Gross National Happiness instead of Gross Domestic Product. Imagine that: a school system that seeks to help people's conviviality and economic, social, and ecological sustainability.

The Love Police

2010-01-29T10:43:00.002-05:00

How's this for some public education?

Moral and Ethical Dimensions of Climate Change

2010-01-29T09:43:00.004-05:00

As reported here a few days ago, three Penn State professors gave a talk about the few successes and many failures that emerged from COP 15. Dr. Don Brown, Dr. Nancy Tuana, and Dr. Petra Tschakert went as observers for Penn State. They provided a rundown of the ethical issues involved, generally referring to it as “climate justice,” “climate ethics,” or “the moral and ethical dimensions of climate change.”

386.7 parts per million: the Earth’s current atmospheric concentration of CO2. Based various data sources, that CO2 concentration is ~100 ppm higher than pre-industrial levels of ~280 ppm. Combined with other greenhouse gases (GHG) such as methane, water vapor, and refrigerants, CO2 causes climate change by warming the atmosphere on average. These effects disrupt longstanding climatic forces which in turn disrupt ecosystems – from rainforests to high tundra – which disrupt non-human and human communities which in turn harm an uncountable number of organisms. Climate scientists practically universally agree that industrial humanity has caused this problem and must act responsibly for the biosphere’s welfare, primarily for human welfare (watch this video made by the Rock Ethics Institute).

Politically and economically powerful people must positively answer the moral and ethical call to understand the many problems that we have caused and must work to curb damages, support the poor people who are and will be affected, must develop mitigation and adaptation behavioral and technological strategies, and must conserve much of the natural world. Many hoped that some meaningful action in this direction could come from COP 15, the 19th international climate summit held in Copenhagen, Denmark at the end of last year.

Issues include: How much money has been put in and should be put into adaptation funding and who should control that money? How should we deal with climate exiles such as people who will be displaced by rising sea levels such as people who live in the Maldives, Florida, Louisiana, India, and Bangledesh? How do notions of human rights play into this? What land should be set aside and who should control that land? How much risk should we put on future people? Are we worth more than them? What should their quality of life be?

Most contentiously in the United States, who should be responsible and who should pay? I note that the final question is most contentious in the U.S. because the U.S. is responsible for the emission of 27% of GHGs through history and by most standards of justice, the U.S. would pay for the humanitarian and ecological costs others are forced to take because of our economic "progress." Not that some of those costs are unquantified by current economics and maybe should remain that way. These would call for qualitative changes in life as well such as dietary and consumer habit shifts.

All of those "shoulds" or "oughts" show that these are moral and ethical questions. What is right and wrong and what beliefs and actions ought to follow?

Don Brown, Nancy Tuana, and Petra Tschakert all agreed at the end of the panel on a few things. First, we are responsible and should be acting in ways that are more sustainable. In daily life, we can consume less by just walking or cycling more and driving less. To extend this rather obvious idea, the simple act of slight reduction in the United States can have the effect of drastic change in a "less-developed" country. About 20% of our carbon footprint comes from diet much of which comes from food transportation, effectively equaling the footprint of an entire Pakistani family or Cameroon village. Efficient local food eating can greatly reduce that portion of our footprint as can simply eating less meat.

Second, we should "turn up the volume on the moral and ethical dimensions of climate change." Powerful people will not change policies and practices without pressure. That pressure can be through letters to politicians, phone calls, visits to offices, discussion with our friends and family, changes in buying habits, or activism which could well include civil disobedience. But if this is a justice issue that calls us to be responsible and responsive to the rights of others then we must act responsibly and loudly and clearly call on others. Pump up the volume.

Third, we must educate well. It is my (and I suspect the three panelists') firm belief that as teachers in the Deweyan sense that we need to guide students toward their understanding of their own moral duties and responsibilities by teaching morality instead of teaching about morality. What we do and how we do it in our formal schooling matters. The creation of more sustainable schools will shape behavior and moral sense. This is our place to be what we believe as ecologically-minded educators.

Our road is in front of us and this semester we will be going this way. We will join one another to consider Wendell Berry's work from "solving for pattern" (.pdf) and consider how to use the Center for Ecoliteracy's curricular companion for Food, Inc. We will keep pressing the water bottle issue and open people's minds to greater good through less use and waste in the place where we live.

Join us every first and third Thursday this semester in 134 Cedar Building at 7:30 pm. Be the good we need in this world. Help us raise the volume.

In Memoriam Howard Zinn

2010-01-28T14:53:00.003-05:00

Howard Zinn was one of the greatest historians, public intellectuals, teachers, and activists of the last 50 years. He died January 27th, 2010. He is probably most well-known for his numerous public lectures and books on history that raise our critical consciousness, most notably People's History of the United States.

Our own Jacqueline Edmondson connected me with Truthout's eulogy to Zinn written by former Penn State professor Henry Giroux who is now at McMaster. It's both fierce and lovely.

Contained within it is a kernel from Zinn's autobiography that I think we all hope for.

"From the start, my teaching was infused with my own history. I would try to be fair to other points of view, but I wanted more than 'objectivity'; I wanted students to leave my classes not just better informed, but more prepared to relinquish the safety of silence, more prepared to speak up, to act against injustice wherever they saw it. This, of course, was a recipe for trouble."

But what brilliant trouble it is to enable people to become agents of good instead of reliquaries for the status quo's most prized assumptions and sacred cows. Where would the civil rights movement have gone?

I relish the trouble that recognizes the power of not just standing for something, but moving for it and inviting our students to move for good. That is the path of ecological literacy, ecological justice, and ecopedagogy. It is a path that is not objective but recognizes that the facts of history, science, politics, economics, literature, and art have to serve someone. To follow in Zinn's footsteps would be to have these disciplines serve our good, not to have us serve them nor to have us serve unjust masters. This is "trouble" that comes from people who "believe that addressing human suffering and social issues matter[s], and never flinche[s] from that belief." We should add the Earth's suffering to that.

But in this suffering we can find our greatest meaning and greatest joy. This is not pie-in-the-sky thinking and Polly Anna smiling stupidly in the face of the overwhelming. It is the recognition of constant and chronic suffering, that we are a part of it, and that as we move on this Earth and in our lives in the most economically and militarily powerful nation the Earth has ever had, that we can do something about it where and when we are. As a teacher, we can do great things. Just look at Zinn!

We miss you Howard Zinn. Most of all, we thank you for your great work and shining example. May we be accomplish some portion of your good in our quest for justice.

Hydration stations in the Collegian

2010-01-28T09:18:00.003-05:00

The water-bottle filling stations are getting more press in today's Daily Collegian. Best of all, it contains an argument from a university employee disparaging bottled water.

Eco-Action joined forces with 3E-COE, another on-campus environmental group, and OPP to bring the hydration stations to campus. There are multiple reasons to stop using bottled water, OPP spokesman Paul Ruskin said. Bottled water is not guaranteed to be good drinking water, unlike the water from the hydration stations. In addition, plastic water bottles are expensive and contribute to waste. Plastic bottles even drain fossil fuels because of how heavy they are to ship. The university is not planning on banning bottled water, but Ruskin said OPP wants to make another option available.

"Bottled water is convenient, but it's unnecessary," Ruskin said. "In the long term, bottled water is not a good thing."

That's what we like to hear. Even if the change comes slowly, we now have it from the horse's mouth so to speak. Bottled water is not sustainable.

Our water efforts in the PSU Newswire

2010-01-25T20:24:00.005-05:00

Here we have it from the source itself: the Penn State Newswire.

University Park, Pa. -- New drinking water filling stations around campus are giving ecoconscious students, staff and faculty another good reason to pack their own water bottles.

The sensor-activated filling stations easily accommodate reusable drinking cups and larger containers. They feature a touchless dispenser with an automatic shutoff timer. The filling stations diminish the convenience of using plastic water bottles that are taking over landfills and littering roadways. Plastic bottles, which decompose poorly, have been the target of numerous ecology-interest groups, including 3E-COE (Environment, Ecology, Education in the College of Education).

The piece goes on to detail some of our efforts including our consciousness raising, water testing in the College of Education, and our collaboration with OPP. It's good to see that our activism has made a difference. What we do matters. As a teacher, that's deeply satisfying.

Good job guys!
---
UPDATE: Not minutes after posting this I received an email from someone in the library who wants to get the refillable stations there! News can spread fast.

Mmm. Tasty water!

2010-01-19T09:09:00.008-05:00

I went down to the Penn State College of Education Chambers Building Elkay water filling station this morning...
...got some water in my coffee cup and drank it......and it told me how many plastic water bottles have been saved by people using this station: 674......and it made me smile......so I got some more. That was refreshing. Why would I ever use an Aquafina bottle? I've already used that ceramic mug hundreds of times and that water has virtually no travel cost. And no plastic. Talk about convenience!

Do you want some? I think you do.

Mark your calendars! Panel discussion on Climate Change and Justice

2010-01-19T08:40:00.009-05:00

We have the amazing good fortune to have people who can talk substantively about the climate change talks and (in)justice issues that climate change brings to the forefront. I really encourage everyone to go to this talk.

Last fall I served on a panel with Dr. Tuana about sustainability and the need for interdisciplinary work at the Educating for Sustainability Conference. Dr. Brown was the moderator. It was a pretty interesting panel that reinforced my strong conviction that we need to integrate traditional disciplines, examine our assumptions about what we do as citizens and professionals, and evaluate our collected work with conviviality and the common ecological good in heart and mind. Additionally, I have had the good fortune of working with Don Brown (a regular contributor to Climate Ethics) as an assistant for the Pennsylvania Environmental Resource Consortium. Dr. Brown is the current chair. Erik Foley is our new sustainability coordinator at Penn State. I've had several meetings with him and he has quite a job to do - "greening" our university so to speak. I have not yet met Dr. Tschakert.

Check it out.

Film Series might raise Natural Environmental Awareness

2010-01-19T08:32:00.003-05:00

This just in from the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences:

The Earth and Mineral Sciences Library Spring 2010 Film Series kicks off on Jan. 20, with a documentary on geologic changes in the Great Lakes. All films are screened at 12:15 p.m. on Wednesdays in room 105 of the Deike Building on Penn State's University Park campus. The films feature a diverse mix of topics related to Earth and the environment.

The schedule is as follows with descriptions of those films that seem most pertinent to our emphasis on social and natural environmental sustainability:

Jan. 20: "Geologic Journey -- Part 1: The Great Lakes" (45 min.)

Jan. 27: "The Hurricane of ’38" (53 min.)
In September 1938, the National Weather Bureau predicted this storm would blow itself out. Instead it began an unexpected sprint north along the coast. Over 600 people were killed. Another 100 were never found.

Feb. 3: "Petroapocalypse Now?" (48 min.)
This documentary asks whether Earth's oil resources are beginning to run out, discusses the accuracy of petroleum reserves estimates and the potentially disastrous effects if oil production falls, and asks what steps we can take to prevent this.

Feb. 10: "Geologic Journey – Part 2: The Rockies" (45 min.)

Feb. 17: "Tornado Glory: Experience the Real Chase" (56 min.)

Feb. 24: "Power Paths" (56 min.)
This documentary follows the Navajo, Hopi and Lakota Sioux tribes, as they find ways to introduce renewable energy projects into their communities through a grassroots movement.

March 3: "Geologic Journey – Part 3: The Canadian Shield" (45 min.)

March 17: "Hurricane Katrina: The Storm that Drowned a City" (56 min.)
Nova takes an in-depth look at what made Hurricane Katrina so deadly and analyzes how this event has resulted in unprecedented destruction for the Gulf Coast.

March 24: "Earth Energy" (46 min.)
Sculptor, aviator, inventor, and filmmaker Bill Lishman is concerned by our dependence on central energy sources and fossil fuels so he takes a journey in search of Earth's renewable energy.

March 31: "Geologic Journey – Part 4: The Appalachians" (45 min.)

April 7: "The Big Chill: A Looming Ice Age?" (50 min.)
This program investigates the likelihood of the biggest climate change in more than 10,000 years.

April 14: "Gold Futures: Open-Pit Mining in Romania" (57 min.)

April 21: "Geologic Journey – Part 5: The Atlantic Coast" (45 min.)

April 28: "Is there Life on Mars?" (56 min.)

See the PSU Green New Year's Resolutions

2010-01-17T11:46:00.004-05:00

Green.psu.edu ran a little greening of resolutions for the New Year. You can join in by going there. They write,

At work, in class or in your living space, the resolutions aim to save us money, make us healthier AND protect our environment by saving energy, reducing waste, saving water, and supporting green business practices (such as local and organic farmers). The Campus Sustainability Office will publish all green resolutions at green.psu.edu. Watch for the new page! We will feature some resolutions in a Penn State Newswire article in mid-January. For article to be great green story, we need hundreds of resolutions!

Go and do it.

My favorite so far:

I will go tie less this summer to reduce my carbon footprint and the cost of air conditioning Penn State offices. An open neck is a cool neck!

Wise guy. Some relate to electricity use, riding bikes, using refillable water bottles instead of disposables, being more efficient drivers, and losing weight. What will you do?

Drinking water in the College of Education

2010-01-13T13:58:00.003-05:00

Last fall we in 3E-COE performed water tests to ascertain the quality of our drinking water. Our club along with the administration of the College of Education including Deans Monk and Edmondson that if we want to move people away from disposable single-use Aquafina (and others too), then we should know some things about how our water tastes within the confines of the College of Education.

So we did "objective" tests that measured hardness, pH, iron, and temperature to gauge the taste of the water. The results from our Office of Physical Plant (OPP) have come back and some switches have been done.

Steve Maruszewski of our OPP writes, "As it turns out there were only a couple of locations that were found to be of concern and the concern was over temperature and not quality. Two of those locations could not be changed because of the pipe runs, so contrary to our desired approach we had to install water coolers with mechanical refrigeration. In addition the water bottle filling station has been installed on the first floor. Aside from some electrical work associated with one of the water coolers, the facilities have suitable drinking water available at all kitchenettes, drinking fountains and water coolers."

There you go. Drink the water at the College of Education. It tastes good. And, as I learned from the water operations folks at OPP, it's tested several times a day by professional staff who report to operations. Penn State has more people securing and testing water than the entire FDA does for all of the bottled water industry. PSU water sounds good to me.

Drink up.

Attack coal on the triple-bottom line

2010-01-13T08:39:00.003-05:00

Take some action for the future triple-bottom line. Work for the health of broader community, for a new economy, and for the natural environment. Let's get the EPA to recognize coal ash as a hazardous waste. You might wonder how it hasn't been for all this time but...well...the power of the coal lobby is amazing.

Coal combustion and its waste products generate some of the worst pollution today. There is no getting around the facts of the matter. It defiles ecosystems. Destroys watersheds. Creates filthy poisonous rivers and lakes. It spits ash into the air. Communities that are built upon its alleged economic benefits live with cancer, emphyzema, and more. [For a backtrack at this blog see posts here, here, here, and here.]

For generations we, as a people, have generally accepted this uglification as "the cost of doing business." It happens over there to those people, too often caricatured as "white trash" in Appalachia, undereducated rednecks who keep choosing that life. If they want to be poisoned, so be it.

Perhaps, no more. I just got the following (paraphrased) in my email.

One of the head attorneys working with the EPA has said that EPA could classify coal ash as a hazardous waste. He met with Lisa Jackson, Administrator of the EPA, who has postponed their decision until the end of January. They are under extreme pressure from the coal industry to compromise the hazardous classification for a weaker "hybrid-hazardous" classification that allows dangerous loopholes. If there were ever a time that our calls and emails could make a difference, the time is now.

There are two numbers to call to press Lisa Jackson to go ahead.
202-395-3080 - Office of Management and Budget
202-564-4700 - Lisa Jackson's Office

Call and say: "I support classification of fly ash as a hazardous waste."

To move toward a more sustainable society and one that not only says it values clean water, air, and soil but one that shows that it values clean water, air, and soil, we need to take this step. Please call.

The Farm School

2010-01-12T19:27:00.008-05:00

There is something to be said for names that tell you in simple language what it refers to. So it is with The Farm School. The Farm School is a school that teaches agricultural practices so that students, both children and adults, can "experience first hand what it means to be a steward of the earth."

The school has four distinct programs. Fundamentally, The Farm School allows middle-school students time to work on a farm. Originally, the program allowed middle-school students to work on the farm for 3-5 day stretches during the school year. More recently, the school established a full-time middle school for local children. For its adult students, the school provides a year-long residential training program in organic agriculture. Additionally, The Farm School runs summer programs to provide students with additional time on the farm once the school year officially ends.

There is a multitude of independent schools in these United States, but schools like this really harness the potential that such independence affords. Additionally, the partnership that this school seems to have with nearby traditional public schools is a promising instance of the healthy relationships that could be built between different kinds of schools, different kinds of educators, and different kinds of kids.

You can visit The Farm School here: http://www.farmschool.org/index.html

Lead the Green Challenge

2009-12-25T08:25:00.000-05:00

Happy Yule! Water in Chambers!

2009-12-25T08:11:00.003-05:00

One of the most tangible results of our efforts has arrived. There is now a water bottle filling station in place between 116 and 121 Chambers Building in the College of Education. Use it. As one staff member wrote to me in an email, "I'm sure that countless students, faculty & staff will appreciate your efforts to bring this eco-friendly and healthy service to Chambers Building." Hear here!

Happy Yule! Merry Christmas! Happy Festivus for the rest of us!

Film competition on sustainability

2009-12-18T11:20:00.001-05:00

The Rock Ethics Institute at Penn State has a video challenge on sustainability up. Do it!

THE ROCK: MEET THE CHALLENGE. STAND UP.

Here’s the Challenge:

Design a short film about ethics. Focus on an ethical issue or create a film that enhances our appreciation of the importance of being ethical. Make it serious or make it funny. Script it. Shoot it. Edit it. Submit it.

Finalists will be honored at a ceremony in April 2010 during which they will be presented with a $500 award. All finalists and semi-finalists will have their entries posted on the Rock Ethics Institute’s YouTube page.

Let's rethink the social contract

2009-12-18T11:09:00.003-05:00

Grad students and faculty at Penn State might consider this.
My first thought for 3E-COE goes something like this: We are interested in water, its use, its distribution, and how to use it to maximize human and ecological welfare. Educational institutions like Penn State relates to educational institutions state that they seek to develop ethical understandings in their future graduates so that they can be effective citizens. Does part of effective modern citizenship mean institutionalizing an understanding of the hydrologic cycle, watershed capacities, and water use? Must the social contract account for the ramifications of how we use water today?

Yes, these are nascent thoughts. Do you have any?

Would you like some coal in your water?

2009-12-15T15:08:00.003-05:00

Coal. It's awful. I am sitting here using a computer fueled by coal. By using the computer I am poisoning my air and water. How do I know we're poisoning our water? Earth Justice has just released a report on The Impacts on Water Quality From Placement of Coal Combustion Waste In Pennsylvania Coal Mines Ash.

At ten of the fifteen mines they examined, they found coal-ash polluted groundwater. This includes "hazardous chemicals including aluminum, chloride, iron, manganese, sulfate and toxic trace elements such as arsenic, selenium, lead, mercury, cadmium, nickel, copper, chromium, boron, molybdenum, and zinc."

Where? Look at the map included here that I ripped from the report itself. Why do I have to poison myself to get electricity?