October 12, 2015
A few personal notes:
After a very busy June and July, I took some time off in August. The garden was comming in, with a lot of picking and "putting up' to do, and my wife, niece and I had an Alaskan cruise planned. we returned from the cruise in early September, and I was in pain. I soon broke out in shingles -- and I had had the shot! About the time this cleared up, I ruptured a lumbar disc, which resulted in surgery on Oct 5. I am home recovering. I am under doctor's orders not to lift anything heavier than 5 pounds. I have an appointment to have the staples removed on Oct. 14. I hope he will give me the go-ahead to be about my business. Because of my illnesses, I had to cancel some work -- the Southern Environmental Education Alliance conference in Tennessee and, back home, a couple of teacher's conferences, where I was scheduled to erect exhibits and present PLT programs. I have quite a bit of work scheduled for the remainder of October, and I am eager to get to it.
PLT's Climate Change and the Southeastern Forest Secondary Education Module --
This module was developed as part of the PINEMAP project, an effort by the USDA in cooperation with the University of Florida to develop techniques for managing southern pine --a keystone crop in the southeastern US -- in the event of climate change. UF contracted out the educational component to PLT. Like all PLT material, the module is very well done -- interesting, attractive, with a lot of scientific background.
Dr. John Guyton and I were trained in facilitating PINEMAP workshops in Jacksonville, FL, and MSPLT facilitator Meachem Harlow was trained in Little Rock, AR last January. all of us have been involved in facilitating workshops, which have been well received. We realize that this is a controversial subject, with the number of "true believers," deniers and those with varying degrees of doubt being about equal, so teaching this workshop could be tricky, so this is the tack we take. We acknowledge, up front, the differences of opinion, but we get every one to agree that they want a clean and healthy environment and healthy forests, and practices that lead to these, including sound forest management, also are practices that scientist say can mitigate climate change. Workshop attendees from all sides of the issue are able to participate without feeling threatened.
Participants complete both a pre- and post-workshop survey -- not about their knowledge of or opinion about Global Climate Change, but rather about their willingness and ability to teach the subject. in almost every case, there is a big improvement in this regard. Frankly, I am pleasantly surprised.
Thanks to a PINBEMAP grant, I am able to present these workshops free of charge. all participants will receive a free module. A full-length, six hour workshop carries 0.6 CEUs. shorter, non-credit workshops can be arranged. if you are interested in hosting one of these workshops, give me a call.
