Skidmore to join national environmental awareness initiative

As the spring semester gets under way, global climate change will be a continuing topic of education and action as Skidmore joins with organizations throughout the country to participate in Focus the Nation (FTN), an initiative designed to increase awareness about global warming. FTN is the brainchild of Eban Goodstein, an environmental economist at Lewis and Clark University, who taught at Skidmore during the early 1990s.

Skidmore will participate in FTN events during the week of Jan. 28. Billed by organizers as the biggest teach-in ever, with more than 10,000 volunteers bringing events to over 1,200 schools, faith and civic organizations, and businesses, FTN will begin with voter registration drives and on-campus voting for a National Student Agenda on Climate Change. The signature national event is an interactive web cast titled The 2% Solution, featuring a panel of experts and youth leaders, who will discuss global climate change and possible solutions. Scheduled at 8 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 30, in Gannett Auditorium, the event will encourage audience participation via cell-phone voting.

Sue Van Hook

The events are designed to ?wake us up and shake us up,? said Sue Van Hook, senior teaching associate in biology, chair of the Campus Environment Committee, and head of ?Focus Skidmore,? the on-campus chapter of FTN. ?My hope is that people will begin to connect the dots and see how their activities affect the world's climate. More importantly, I'm hoping this will provide a strong beginning for students to develop an awareness about global environmental issues that will follow them after they graduate.?

On Thursday, Jan. 31, a full range of activities will encourage consideration of the issue from a variety of perspectives. From 3 to 5 p.m. that day, the Dana Hall lobby (outside of Gannett Auditorium) will be the scene of a poster session of climate-related student work, which will be up all week. The featured poster will be ?Skidmore's Carbon Budget,? by students in Cathy Gibson's Urban Ecology Class.

A discussion later that day promises to be ?one of the most exciting aspects of our program,? said Van Hook. A panel of international students and students who have returned from study abroad will discuss ?Cultural Differences and Climate.? In organizing the panel, Van Hook learned how students lived with far less when they were abroad, and heard the observations of international students who find that the American way of life is excessive compared to their home lands. The panel is scheduled from 5 to 6:30 p.m. in Gannett Auditorium.

At 6:30 p.m. and again at 9:30 p.m. in Dana Hall/Gannett lobby, there will be a reception featuring local foods as refreshments.

At 8 p.m. in Gannett Auditorium, Jeff Goodell, author of Big Coal, will deliver the FTN keynote address, titled ?Cooking the Climate with Coal.?

Big Coal: The Dirty Secret Behind America's Energy Future (Houghton Mifflin), was chosen as one of the best nonfiction books of 2006 by Kirkus Reviews. Goodell also is the author of three previous books, including Sunnyvale, a memoir about growing up in Silicon Valley that was selected as a New York Times Notable Book. Another of his titles, Our Story, an account of the nine miners trapped in a Pennsylvania coal mine, was a New York Times bestseller. He is a contributing editor at Rolling Stone and a frequent contributor to the New York Times Magazine. He lives in Saratoga Springs with his wife and three children.

On Friday, Feb. 1, Skidmore students will be able to learn more by visiting an information exchange in the Murray Aiken conference rooms (second floor of the dining hall) before registering their vote for the top national climate priorities.

FTN is taking place shortly before Super Tuesday, Feb. 5, when presidential primary contests will take place in 22 states. The hope is that primary voters will chose the candidate with the best understanding about and commitment to climate solutions, Van Hook explained.

In March, the campus will welcome John Turenne of Sustainable Food Systems LLC and creator of a sustainable food program at Yale University and consultant to several other colleges. He will present a lecture on ?Sustainable Food Practices? and meet with interested students, faculty, and staff, to share details about the topic.

The spring semester events follow a number of fall activities in which students became increasingly involved in global climate issues, according to Van Hook. She reported that about 25 students attended ?Power Shift,? a national conference at the University of Maryland, ?and they came back fired up to initiate change,? she said. Among their accomplishments were a recycling contest in the residence halls, a new web site for the EAC that promotes information about campus recycling and other environmental issues, and getting Skidmore's Congressional delegate, Rep. Kirstin Gillibrand, to sign the Climate Security Act now pending in Congress.

Other campus initiatives during the fall included the development of a carpool map that can be used by faculty and staff members to encourage ride-sharing to campus, a fall week devoted to increasing awareness about environmentally friendly ways to commute, and the College's partnership with Capital District Transportation Authority. The alliance allows members of the Skidmore community to ride free on CDTA buses. In addition, the Honors Forum hosted a ?Shades of Gray? all-campus discussion on global warming late in the fall semester.

Van Hook's goals for Focus Skidmore/FTN are few, but clear. ?I hope that people will gain an understanding of what climate change is about, and how small actions made by individuals can have a big effect. As an institution, Skidmore has taken some positive steps. Focus Skidmore/Focus the Nation will remind us all that we can do more.?