Week Two: September 1 - 7

Sunday and Monday were off, so nothing to add here.

Tuesday was the first day of proper classes, now that we're done with orientation week. We did a panel on conservation leadership with Marshall Jones, Dr. Nucharin Songsasin, and Will Hackman. They were all absolutely fascinating - I especially enjoyed hearing about their takes on the importance of communication in conservation. I'm hoping to pursue sci comm as my main focus (ideally with a Master's in something relevant), so it was really nice to get a variety of perspectives on the issue from both the research side and the policy-focused side. Mr. Hackman in particular reminded me of my class on public participation in environmental governance (it was a really unwieldy class title, but it sure was accurate!), since we had to do a lot of research into how policies would effect a variety of shareholders; not just the people living in the area, but also businesses, related industries, and all sorts of other concerns. It's a really complicated field, trying to balance all the needs of everyone in a community.

The rest of the day was pretty straightforward. We talked about some basic conservation concepts with Stephanie and then did some scientific sketching practice with Jim. I drew a lovely cerulean warbler and had an absolute blast. It was a very pleasant, meditative activity, though I'm glad I brought my own brush with me - I don't know if I could have pulled off some of the details I did without it. If I were more confident in my ability to get paid for my art, I think I would really like to try scientific illustration, if only for a little bit. It seems like it would be a really neat field.

Wednesday was another lecture on conservation, focused more on the social aspects and the values that we place on biodiversity. It reminded me a bit of my wildlife conservation class I took in Australia, since we went over a lot of the same concepts of how people use and interact with the environment. The more formalized categories for that are really useful, I think. After that, we talked about Wicked Problems (apparently they need proper noun status) with Jim, focusing on a case study with spotted lanternflies. I didn't know that they were first found in the Northern VA area in the Sheetz between 37 and 81 - that's not too far from my house!

Finally, we had the counterpart to our sketching seminar yesterday: conservation photography with Anneke. I've never been very good at taking nice photos of things, or at least not ones that really pay attention to composition, framing, all of that. I tend to use them more as a quick fix tool to help me remember the situation, rather than as an art form in and of themselves. But now that I have to figure out how to tell a conservation story through photos, I'm going to have to get better at it! I'm planning to do mine on how nature reclaims urban areas, I think. Once I have the photos done, I'll probably put the whole little project up on here to share with people.