By Nadine Lymn, ESA director of public affairs When 5,000 individuals from across the United States and around the globe convene for a scientific conference such as the Ecological Society of America’s (ESA) recent meeting in Portland, Oregon it takes an environmental toll: The energy required to power the planes, trains and automobiles people use to travel to and from…
By Nadine Lymn, director of public affairs Social scientists have been weathering repeated attacks lately from congressional leaders deriding the value and validity of their work. The scientific community has responded. The Ecological Society of America is one of several scientific societies serving as a collaborator to show support for social science and its contributions to other fields and to…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA director of public affairs Yesterday’s second town hall meeting of the Non Defense Discretionary (NDD) coalition, drew an audience of 400 and featured two representatives from the Obama Adminstration. Jon Carson, who does public outreach for the White House and Robert Gordon, Acting Deputy Director of the White Office of Management and Budget (OMB). The two…
Bruce Byers wrote up his impressions of the recent ESA Annual Meeting in a recent blog post: 12th of August, 2012. Old English is full of “terms of venery,” words for groups of animals: a pod of whales, a pack of wolves, a herd of deer, a gaggle of geese, a murder of crows, a pride of lions, a leap…
By Terence Houston, science policy analyst and Nadine Lymn, director of public affairs Yesterday afternoon, several hundred individuals from organizations representing education, science, and other communities that make up the non-defense discretionary (NDD) part of the federal budget held a rally on Capitol Hill. Their objective: to raise awareness that unless Congress takes action, across-the-board federal spending cuts are slated…
Ahu Tongariki, the largest platform on the island, features fifteen restored Moais. The Moai in the foreground was likely damaged in transit and never erected. Credit: Brian Wee. This post contributed by Brian Wee, chief of external affairs for NEON, Inc. The July 2012 edition of National Geographic features Easter Island – known also as Isla de Pascua in Spanish…
Grave consequences for ecology, democracy, and environmental protection This post contributed by Sean Hoban, a post-doc in conservation biology at the University of Ferrara, Italy The past year has seen some forward-thinking environmental policies in the US: pro-science budgets, automobile fuel efficiency standards, coal power plant and fracking regulations, a recent (though rough) climate commitment, and rejection (for now)…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA director of public affairs Imagine you get up one morning and go outside to fetch your paper. As you reach to pick it up, a strange spider bites you. Your neighbor is bitten too. Now you’re both dying because no one can identify these spiders and therefore can’t administer anti-venom that might save you. This was…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA director of public affairs Many of us recognize that a large part of the solution to environmental problems lies in getting people to change their behavior. Unfortunately, altering the habits of the human animal can be especially challenging—we are intelligent but we can also be irrational and our age-old tendency to focus on immediate needs frequently…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA Director of Public Affairs Last night was the 18th consecutive year that researchers and policymakers came together over finger food and beverages to talk about the science and education projects funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF). “STEM Research and Education: Underpinning American Innovation” is sponsored by the Coalition for National Science Funding. Its goal is…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA Director of Public Affairs Extreme events such as the eruption of Mount St. Helens and the severe fires in Yellowstone National Park initially seemed to have left behind wastelands. Yet ecologists and other researchers discovered that in both cases, plants and other life rebounded much more quickly than anticipated. Now a new study of sandy beaches…
By Nadine Lymn, ESA Director of Public Affairs Families with young children, teenagers, older adults, teachers, and even a pair of young Army soldiers visited ESA’s booth over the weekend of April 28 and 29 at the USA Science & Engineering Festival and learned about the ecology of Washington, DC and its nearby suburbs. Some were drawn immediately to the…