Chile International Research Experience for Students (IRES)
The Sub-Antarctic Research Alliance (www.chile.unt.edu, www.osara.org) is an international and interdisciplinary program, coordinated by the University of North Texas (USA) and the Universidad de Magllanes in association with the Institute of Ecology and Biodiversity (Chile). Its activities focus on the integration of ecological sciences and environmental philosophy, under the rubric of biocultural conservation, in the subantarctic ecoregion of southern South America. For three years beginning in 2009, ESA SEEDS will collaborate with this program in an NSF funded grant titled International Research Experience for Students that will send up to eight students per year to southern Chile’s Cape Horn Biosphere Reserve, where they will work under the guidance of foreign mentors and in teams with Chilean and Argentine students.
Two of the eight students will come from the SEEDS Program.
This is the first time SEEDS has participated in an international activity, and according to Dr. Christopher Anderson, , Coordinator of the Sub-Antarctic Biocultural Conservation Program, “this collaboration is already turning out to be a huge opportunity for our two programs; we have come together to promote an innovative and unique experience for diverse students from across the US to not only do research abroad, but also integrate into a meaningful biocultural conservation program with colleagues from various disciplines and countries.”
We could not agree more within SEEDS. We are thrilled to see an example of interdisciplinary, international conservation in the name of both biology and culture successfully at work. SEEDS has been talking about these ideas for a long time now and our network of folks involved in biocultural conservation has just grown dramatically, not to mention across borders. This is an excellent partnership.
2009-2010 SEEDS Participants
Christopher Cheleuitte-Nieves - Texas A&M, College Station
Deborah Viera - University of North Texas
2010 – 2011 SEEDS Participants
Ana Elisa Pérez-Quintero - University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras
Diana Hernandez - Sam Houston State University
2011-2012 SEEDS Participants
For more information about projects, and the application (Deadline: March 14, 2011).
