Niguidula+Assignment+1

Links Page:

The first link I looked at was the Wikipedia article on Gifford Pinchot. Reading about his life and political activities gave me some insight into how the conservation movement has changed. Pinchot was a friend of Theodore Roosevelt and a strong supporter of conservation, but had an aversion to setting aside land purely for recreation/preservation purposes. He thought land should be used, and so he went up against companies whose land use was unsustainable. The Pinchot-Ballinger controversy actually split the republican party, something that seems almost unthinkable today, especially over a conservation issue. I also looked at the Ecology subreddit and found it largely unpopulated. while it seems that it is posted to regularly, there is a very small amount of people actively using it. However, it did give me the idea for one of my projects. I searched the Annual Reviews database for reviews of participatory research and and found a decent article which I may use if I pursue Project #2. This also reminded me of my previous work on divestment and decided to post the link to the GoFossilFree website. Finally, the "Ecologist Goes to Washington" blog and Ecology Law Quarterly seem like very good sources I could use, if not in this class then certainly for other projects.

Project Idea #1: An analysis of depression among those working in the sustainability field It is my observation that those working in the fields of sustainability, ecology, oceanography, and other “big picture” science fields are prone to a cynical and pessimistic world view. One of the all time top posts on the Ecology subreddit is a quote by Aldo Leopold: “One of the penalties of an ecological education is that one lives alone in a world of wounds. Much of the damage inflicted on land is quite invisible to laymen. An ecologist must either harden his shell and make believe that the consequences of science are none of his business, or he must be the doctor who sees the marks of death in a community that believes itself well and does not want to be told otherwise.” Perhaps it would be worthwhile to examine the rates of depression and/or suicide among scientists whose work is directly influenced by climate change and comparing it to the general population and populations of other scientists.

Project Idea #2: An analysis of Green initiatives at undergraduate institutions I would like to know what kind of initiatives happen at this and other schools and how they are implemented. This project could include a participatory research project in which I record and analyze my own efforts to implement a sustainable policy. The policy I currently have in mind would be the divestment of RPI’s funds from fossil fuel companies as part of the growing divestment movement. This would present interesting challenges because of the School’s close relationship with many of those companies and the apparent lack of strong environmental organizations on campus.

Project Idea #3: Investigation of Violence against Park Rangers http://www.iucn.org/?17196/Rising-murder-toll-of-park-rangers-calls-for-tougher-laws Worldwide, more than 1,000 park rangers have been killed in the line of duty over the last 10 years, and that only includes figures from the 35 or so countries that voluntarily report. The article linked above explains how this has prompted the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the International Ranger Federation to call for tougher laws against wildlife crimes. Using this as a starting point, I could do a project that identifies how the ranger death toll could be reduced without compromising the safety of the parks they are assigned to protect. Policies will likely be a part of it, but I would also investigate other factors such as the combat training the rangers are given, how well staffed the parks are, and other logistical factors.