EnviroNews
"Signs of Life in Integrated Environmental Science"

News from the Department of Integrated Environmental Science at 
Bethune-Cookman University

Welcome to the new EnviroNews website of Bethune-Cookman University! This site will give you, the reader, a look into the activities and accomplishments of the Department of Integrated Environmental Science, its faculty, and its students. I hope that you will check in from time to time to see what we are building here at BCU. And if you find any of it interesting, I hope that you will take part in our activities and programs.

 

Thanks for stopping by, and Welcome to the Department of Integrated Environmental Science at BCU!

Michael A. Reiter

Chair, IES

Spring '10

IES Reaches a Milestone

The concept at BCU is only three years old, and the department officially only one year old, but with the acquisition of a recent grant the IES Department has now obtained over a half million dollars in external support for its degree programs! Congratulations to all of those who's hard work has made this possible.

 

Dr. Reiter to Travel Again

After recent stints as Co-Chair of the IEA Roundtables and work at the NCSE conference in Washington DC, Dr. Reiter has learned that he will be taking some trips beyond the country's borders. Dr. Reiter has been invited to give research seminars and run workshops on integrated assessment methods and interdisciplinary program design at the Universidad Autónoma de Baja California in Mexico and at Ain Shams University in Egypt this semester. We tried to find Dr. Reiter for a statement, but at the time he was frantically trying to find his passport. Maybe we'll catch him later.

 

 

Fall, '09

Maybe Money Does Grow on Trees?

Dr. Reiter was recently informed that IES will receive $50,000 from the USDA as part of the U.S. Forest Service Southern Research Station Director’s Initiative, a new effort designed to create research and training opportunities for minority students and researchers in the field of natural resources. Dr. Reiter will use the funding to further develop the new undergraduate and graduate programs in IES. BCU joined Florida A&M University, Hampton University, Southern University, and Tuskegee University as universities selected for support under the program. The IES program will receive two years of support.

 

Off to DC

Dr. Reiter and a pair of students will be participating in the upcoming Educational Partnership Program conference sponsored by NOAA at Howard University in November. They will be presenting work on converting habitat-scale conceptual resource management models into watershed-scale models by utilizing land use-land cover data. Good Luck!

 

Opportunities for Masters Work

Due to some effective financial work by the Dean and Department Chair, there are masters research assistantships available for Spring, Summer, or Fall 2010. These assistantships will focus on integrated assessment and ecosystem management strategies for coastal ecosystems, with several potential sites of research focus depending on the needs of the NOAA-sponsored consortium funding the positions. Visit http://www4.cookman.edu/faculty/reiter/opportunities.htm for details.

 

New Publications

The article and book chapter recently in press are now in print!

Reiter, M. A., M. Saintil, Z. Yang, and D. Pokrajac. 2009. Derivation of a GIS-based watershed-scale conceptual model for the St. Jones River Delaware from habitat-scale conceptual models. J. Environ. Manag. 90:3253-3265.

 

Reiter, M. A., P. C. Coggins, and M. E. Howse. 2009. Designing an integrated interdisciplinary Environmental Science curriculum using an IRMA chart: An example from Bethune-Cookman University. In: Filho, W. L. ed., Environmental Education, Communication and Sustainability Vol. 31: Sustainability at Universities: Opportunities, Challenges and Trends. Peter Lang Scientific Publishers. Ch. 12, pp 153-162.

 

Summer, '09

Fun at the 15th IICE

Dr. Reiter and several students of the IES program took part in the 15th International Interdisciplinary Conference on the Environment, sponsored by the Interdisciplinary Environmental Association, in Daytona Beach. In addition to a pair of presentations, registration duty, and participation as discussants, IES also helped out with a local field trip to Blue Spring State Park, where several of the students conduct research. The presentations:

  • C. J. Bleasdale, C. K. JnBaptiste, M. A. Reiter, and A. J. Brooks-Walter. A Survey of the Endemic Snail Populations of Blue Spring, Florida in Relation to Potential Drivers Negatively Impacting their Habitat.

  • M. A. Reiter, W. Focht, K. D. Reiter, P. Barresi, S. Bumpous, and R. Smardon. Environmental Systemology and Sustainability: A Summary of the First Roundtable on Environmental Science and Study.

IES student Rashan Moss introducing the field trip participants to his research subjects. Don't blink or you might miss them!

 

Gateway Course to be Offered

Are you interested in environmental science? Are you at least a Sophomore? Do you have a gpa of 2.0 or greater? Do you enjoy more than one discipline? Would you like to work in a field that makes a difference? If so, then have we got news for you!

The Gateway Course for the new BS in Integrated Environmental Science is being offered this Fall semester! ES 241 Principles of Environmental Science will be offered TR 9:40-11:10AM, and ESL 241 Principles of Environmental Science Lab will be offered W 10AM-12PM. The two courses must be taken together, and form the access point to the BS in IES (which is a restricted major). For more information on the Gateway Course or the IES restricted major, contact Dr. Reiter at Science 107B or reiterm@cookman.edu.

 

New Resource

Students in the Department of Integrated Environmental Sciences now have access to Environmental Career Opportunities (www.ecojobs.com), a major online site for announcements regarding environmental job openings, internships, and academic positions around the country and beyond. Contact Dr. Reiter for the login information.

 

Mississampling

BCU sent a contingent to Biloxi MS and the Grand Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in early June for the ECSC remote sensing flyover of the GBNERR site. IES graduate student Kim Nowells and Soon-To-Be-IES graduate student Rashan Moss joined the field teams for groundtruthing, data acquisition, and sample collection in the bays, bayous, and marshes, while IES Chair Dr. Michael Reiter worked back on land to complete the conceptual models for the GBNERR (he is the Lead PI for the Integrated Assessment Thematic Area of the ECSC). The necessary work was completed (plus some), and by all accounts everything went smoothly (not to mention that it was a lot of fun as well!).

 

Kim Nowells (left) and Dr. Mark Woodrey (GBNERR) collect GPS data points in a marsh on the reserve.  Rashan Moss takes a Secchi Disk reading from a channel off of the MS coastal marshes. Kim Nowells takes a cooling dive into the bay during a long day in the field. No word on whether she was able to catch that dolphin.
     
A rare Clapper Rail nest the students came across while collecting data points in the marsh. Rashan, Kim, and the rest of the marsh field team getting ready to collect data at a new site. Kim Nowells practicing for her back-up career as a Blue Crab hand model. Not bad form....

 

(It is rumored that Dr. Reiter wanted to get out into the field as well. The official reason he didn't was that he couldn't complete the required model work until the last day of the flyover. The unofficial reason is that he only brought sandals on the trip....)

 

Spring '09

It's Official!

The Department of Integrated Environmental Science is born! Under its first Chair, Dr. Michael Reiter, the IES department will begin operation this coming Fall semester 2009 within the School of Science, Engineering, and Mathematics. Once the final signatures are collected, IES will offer both a BS and a thesis-based MS degree, while a non-thesis MS degree is being offered as a track in the Transformative Leadership program. Dr. Reiter says he can't wait for the innumerable hours of meetings, paperwork, and assorted administrative tasks waiting for him in the years ahead.

Yeah; we don't understand it either. It takes all kinds....

 

A Good Week

It was a good week for Dr. Reiter, the IES program director. While helping to run a successful conceptual modeling workshop for the new Mission-Aransas National Estuarine Research Reserve near Corpus Christi, Texas, he learned that a manuscript for which he was lead author was selected to become a book chapter in arguably the preeminent international book series on sustainability education, and that a second manuscript for which he was lead author was accepted to be published in a top peer-reviewed journal in the field of environmental management!

While he recovers from all the news, look for the following to come out in print in the near future:

Reiter, M. A., P. C. Coggins, and M. E. Howse. In press. Designing an integrated interdisciplinary Environmental Science curriculum using an IRMA chart: An example from Bethune-Cookman University. In: Leal, W. ed., Environmental Education, Communication and Sustainability Vol. 31: Sustainability at Universities: Opportunities, Challenges and Trends. Peter Lang Scientific Publishers.

 

Reiter, M. A., M. Saintil, Z. Yang, and D. Pokrajac. In press. Derivation of a GIS-based watershed-scale conceptual model for the St. Jones River Delaware from habitat-scale conceptual models. J. Environ. Manag.

 

Fun at the Florida Academy of Science

BCU's Integrated Environmental Science program sent a contingent to this year's FAS meeting, and introduced the state to the new research being completed at BCU. Four presentations were given by participants in the program, three by students (all undergrads). The presentations were well received, and we look forward to greater participation in the future. The presentations:

St. Leo, FL 2009. 2009 Annual Meeting of the Florida Academy of Sciences: 1) “An Integrated Assessment and Ecosystem Management Protocol for Decision Making in Coastal Habitats.” M. Reiter, J. Gentile, and M. Harwell; 2) “Potential drivers impacting the endemic snail populations of Blue Spring, Volusia County FL.”  C. Bleasdale, M. Reiter, and A. Brooks-Walter; 3) “A survey of the endemic snail populations of Blue Spring in response to habitat degradation.” C. JnBaptiste, M. Reiter, and A. Brooks-Walter; 4) “Recolonization of Blue Spring Run by the Blue Spring Hydrobe (Aphaostracon asthenes) after Hurricane Fay.” R. Moss, M. Reiter, and A. Brooks-Walter.

 

The BCU student contingent at the 2009 Florida Academy of Sciences meeting: (from left to right) Cary Bleasdale, Courtney JnBaptiste, Rashan Moss, and Kim Nowells. You can find Kim, Cary, and Rashan in the MS program of the Department of Integrated Environment Science this Fall. Courtney, ever the radical, will instead be heading off to the medical world.

 

Tiki Time

If you happen to be at the Best Western Aku Tiki Hotel on Daytona Beach during evenings the week of February 16th, don't be surprised if you hear Dr. Reiter's voice. He was invited to offer a short four-day course in Global Climate Change for Elderhostel, and while four days is barely enough to scratch the surface of this complex topic he bravely took on the assignment. Now all he has to do is figure out how to make a global issue understandable in roughly seven hours....

 

March Meeting Madness

BCU is to play host to a major meeting regarding the development of integrated environmental science as a discipline. While most students will be away for Spring Break, members of The Interdisciplinary Environmental Association, the Council of Environmental Deans and Directors, the North American Association of Environmental Educators, and others will be meeting on campus to discuss issues of curriculum, identity, overarching paradigms, and core competencies for the field of integrated environmental science. The ultimate goal of the meeting is to move toward a process for the evaluation and certification of such programs nationally. BCU's own Dr. Reiter will be a co-chair for this meeting!

Well, who really needs a break anyway...

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Last modified 1/27/10

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