Exploring Art & Science In K-12 Education

Keynote speech/workshop on Art/Science integration in K12 Education at the Wadsworth Museum Summer Teacher Institute. The talk explores three main benefits of STEAM in K12 classrooms: Close Looking/Observation, Time on Task, and Returns to Creativity. Includes results from original research by Lisa Delissio and Rebecca Rohloff

Assessing And Addressing Global Warming Impacts On The Culebra Archipelago

The climate change outlook for the small Caribbean island of Culebra. The primary text is in English. The supplemental text is translated into Spanish

Analysis Of Rainfall Data From The Island Of Culebra, Puerto Rico Over A Period Spanning 1907-2007 In Light Of Climate Change Predictions

Under conditions of human-induced climate change, the Caribbean region is predicted to experience more frequent water shortages. To determine whether rainfall amounts on the island of Culebra have already begun to change, rainfall data spanning 100 years were assessed. Rainfall data had been collected at three different locations during three time periods that did not overlap. There was no evidence of change in annual rainfall amounts or the severity of dry seasons from 1907-2007. It appears that global climate change has not yet affected precipitation on this island, suggesting that current precipitation values represent a baseline that can be used to monitor the hydrologic state of this and climactically similar regions

The 'Ideal' Climate Change Ph.D. Program

The training of the next generation of climate-change researchers is of utmost importance as climate change and its associated impacts take on increasing local, regional, and global relevance. This report seeks to address this issue by highlighting aspects of a successful climate-change Ph.D. program; a program which seeks to balance traditional disciplinary training with exposure to the broader, interdisciplinary climate-change community

Contrasting patterns of local richness of seedlings, saplings and trees may have implications for regeneration in rainforest remnants

Remnants of lowland rainforest remain following deforestation, but the longer-term effects of fragmentation remain poorly understood, partly due to the long generation times of trees. We study rainforest trees in three size classes: seedlings (5 cm), that broadly reflect pre- and post-fragmentation communities, and we examine the impacts of fragmentation on forest regeneration in Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. We found that seedling richness (measured as the number of genera per plot) in fragments was about 30 percent lower than in plots in undisturbed forest, and about 20 percent lower than in an extensive tract of selectively logged forest, providing evidence of recruitment declines in fragments. Seedling richness was lowest in small, isolated, and disturbed fragments, potentially signalling an extinction debt given that these fragmentation impacts were not observed in trees. Unlike seedlings, saplings showed no declines in richness in fragments, suggesting that density dependent mortality (where rare individuals have a higher survival rate) and/or year-to-year variation in which species are recruiting could potentially compensate for the reductions in seedling richness we observed. Longer-term studies are required to determine whether sporadic or failed recruitment in small fragments will eventually translate into reduced richness of mature trees, or whether the processes that currently retain high sapling richness will continue in fragments

Charlotte Nichols Saunders Horner, trailblazing botanist

While little known within today’s botanical community, Charlotte Nichols Saunders Horner (July 5, 1823 - July 18, 1906) was among the most highly accomplished American botanists of her time. Active during a fertile period for botany, this adventurous woman rose to become an expert on the plants of the Northeast United States and Colorado. She was one of only a handful of women in the Northeast United States to publish in scientific journals during this period, the first woman to give a scientific talk for the Massachusetts Horticultural Society which had been active for more than 50 years, and the first person to be awarded its silver medal for native plants. An active collector for longer than 30 years, more than 1300 of Horner’s herbarium specimens still exist and add value to more than a dozen scientific collections. Unusually for a woman of her time, she was paid for her expertise through her highly successful academic botanical supply business. Charlotte Horner’s contributions continue to influence science at an international scale