{"id":113675,"date":"2018-03-09T11:30:27","date_gmt":"2018-03-09T16:30:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/?p=113675"},"modified":"2018-07-27T14:27:42","modified_gmt":"2018-07-27T18:27:42","slug":"bates-in-the-news-environmental-studies-program-is-a-national-model-for-community-engaged-learning","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/2018\/03\/09\/bates-in-the-news-environmental-studies-program-is-a-national-model-for-community-engaged-learning\/","title":{"rendered":"Bates’ environmental studies program cited as national model for community engagement"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bates\u2019 environmental studies program is a national model for building civic engagement into academic programs, according to <\/span>Peer Review<\/span><\/i>, the journal of the American Association of Colleges and Universities. <\/span><\/p>\n

In its fall issue on civic learning. the journal featured Bates among nine case studies, and invited Jane Costlow, the Clark A. Griffith Professor of Environmental Studies and chair of that department, to <\/span>write an essay on the program’s record of civic engagement.<\/span><\/a>
\n<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Jane Costlow, Clark A. Griffith Professor of Environmental Studies<\/p><\/div>\n

Darby Ray, director of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, said the ES <\/span>program<\/span><\/a> exemplifies the high potential of community-engaged learning. <\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe way the Bates environmental studies program weaves public engagement into the fabric of the major produces fabulous outcomes not only for ES students, but also for the off-campus community partners with whom they collaborate,\u201d Ray said. \u201cTo be recognized in <\/span>Peer Review<\/span><\/i> as a national model is icing on the cake!\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

ES majors take courses in natural sciences, social sciences, and humanities, Costlow wrote. Each major completes an internship as well as a <\/span>capstone<\/span><\/a> course, in which groups of students pair with a community organization to bring scientific and other types of expertise to a specific project.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

As part of her 2015 environmental studies capstone project, Isobel Curtis ’17, center, speaks with Kim Finnerty, director of Whiting Farm in Auburn, and Tony Kieffer, managing director of Arch Solar. Curtis and her group evaluated Whiting Farm’s energy usage and the efficacy of renewable energy sources. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n

As a result, students learn that to solve problems, science must be situated in a place\u2019s economic, social, and political context.<\/span><\/p>\n

For example, one capstone group tested the feasibility of converting an abandoned mill into a \u201cshowcase of renewable energy and green agriculture.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\n

The project turned out not to be feasible, but figuring this out not only \u201cstretched the students\u2019 skills with calculus, botany, and physics, but it also confronted them with how to communicate what they found out to their community partners,\u201d Costlow wrote.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Professor of Environmental Studies Jane Costlow, far left, stands with students and faculty during a day of climate change action in 2015. (Phyllis Graber Jensen\/Bates College)<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe way the Bates environmental studies program weaves public engagement into the fabric of the major produces fabulous outcomes.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1005,"featured_media":113697,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_hide_ai_chatbot":false,"_ai_chatbot_style":"","associated_faculty":[],"_Page_Specific_Css":"","_bates_restrict_mod":false,"_table_of_contents_display":false,"_table_of_contents_location":"","_table_of_contents_disableSticky":false,"_is_featured":false,"footnotes":"","_bates_seo_meta_description":"","_bates_seo_block_robots":false,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_id":0,"_bates_seo_sharing_image_twitter_id":0,"_bates_seo_share_title":"","_bates_seo_canonical_overwrite":"","_bates_seo_twitter_template":""},"categories":[4,30,130,232,14],"tags":[10760,4583],"class_list":["post-113675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-academic-life","category-civic-engagement","category-collaboration","category-environment-sustainability","category-faculty-staff","tag-environmental-studies","tag-jane-costlow"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1005"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=113675"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113675\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":117350,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113675\/revisions\/117350"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/113697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=113675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=113675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bates.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=113675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}