Respectfully, this sort of program is simply an example of "experiential learning" for kids who can afford it and for their faculty-caretakers...the ecological community is losing the competition for biodiversity-preservation and, for numerous reasons, have little leverage against the corporate conservation organizations; economic, political, and social interests of habitat countries; repressive influence of defenders of "complex" & flagship taxa; the personality-driven and fashion-driven nature of conservation enterprises, etc., etc. Programs such as this one have proliferated remarkably over the past 15-20 y...*Cui bono*?...I call for an independent and quantitative evaluation of these "education abroad" and related programs, in particular, to determine their payoffs for the environment, for the mitigation of anthropogenic stressors, for science, for indigenous groups, for creative problem-solving, and the like. There is much more of concern...and very little time to act...Suggestion to Kolb: put these kids through Special Forces Survival Training, teach them to keep their mouths shut and their eyes open, and put them to work as forest security assistants under the direction of Brazilian nationals concerned with biodiversity-protection...
On Tue, Feb 28, 2012 at 10:48 AM, Suzanne Kolb <sk...@antioch.edu> wrote: > Antioch Education Abroad's Brazilian Ecosystems Program is a 16-credit fall > semester for undergraduate students. Now accepting applications! > > Please encourage your students to participate in this vital field > experience. It is an outstanding opportunity for direct field experience > with the ecology of Brazil's biodiversity, and with real world conservation > problem solving. > > The program travels to the Atlantic Forest, Cerrado Savanna, Amazon > Rainforest, and Pantanal Wetland, across four different states: Paraná, > Goiás, Amazonas, and Mato Grosso. > > Students return to campus inspired and energized about continuing their > education towards more realistically defined career goals. > > Program dates: 30 August - 29 November. > > Please invite your students to learn more about this program by directing > them to aea.antioch.edu/brazil > > Suzanne Kolb, Ph.D. Ecology > Associate Professor of Environmental Science > Director, Brazilian Ecosystems Program > sk...@antioch.edu > -- clara b. jones Blog: http://vertebratesocialbehavior.blogspot.com Twitter: http://twitter.com/cbjones1943
