Smithsonian Scientist to Share Research on Harmful Nutrient Flows into the Bay

CHESTERTOWN, MD—A Smithsonian scientist who studies harmful nutrient flows into the Chesapeake Bay will talk about his research when he visits Washington College Thursday, September 15. Thomas Jordan, Ph.D., senior scientist with the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC), will lecture at 7:30 p.m. in Litrenta Lecture Hall, John S. Toll Science Center, on the College campus, 300 Washington Avenue.

The title of Jordan’s talk is “Nutrient Overload to Chesapeake Bay: Where It Comes From, and Ways to Control It.” Presented by the Joseph H. McLain Program in Environmental Studies and the Washington College Chapter of Sigma Xi, the event is free and open to the public.

Jordan works in SERC’s Nutrient Lab, where he and colleagues study the flows of nitrogen and phosphorus in ecosystems, the effects of human-induced nutrient enrichment on marine life and water quality, and ways of removing excess nutrients. Since the early 1970s, the lab has monitored discharges from watersheds of the Rhode River, in Anne Arundel County. In the 1990s, it expanded its research to encompass the entire Chesapeake Bay basin, comparing discharges from hundreds of watersheds. SERC scientists explore the effects of geological differences and agricultural and urban land uses, as well as the restorative potential of riparian forests and wetlands.

Photo, bottom: Dr. Thomas Jordan inspects an automated monitor that records flow and samples water flowing in and out of a restored wetland. The wetland removes nutrients from the runoff it receives from nearby cornfields. Photo courtesy of SERC.

Oyster Float Workshop August 9

Chestertown, MD — The Center for Environment & Society at Washington College and the Friends of Eastern Neck, Inc, will host an Oyster Float Workshop on the lawn of the Custom House in Chestertown on Saturday, August 9, at 10:00 AM. Program coordinator Mark Wiest will go over all of the basics on how to start an "oyster garden" on local tributaries.

The creation, maintenance and monitoring of oyster floats—known as Taylor floats—are part of oyster restoration projects on the Chester River and at Eastern Neck Island. The floats provide an ideal habitat for oysters as they grow from a small "spat on shell" to a year-old oyster. At that point, hundreds of oysters from each float will be introduced to existing oyster bars on upper Chesapeake Bay.

If you do not have waterfront access from your own property, but still want to get your feet in the water, then come aboard as a volunteer monitor. Volunteers are needed to help with data collection on oyster growth and mortality at the College's test sites in Comegys Bight and at Eastern Neck Island. Opportunities are also available through the Adopt-A-Spat program, where people can feel great about supporting oyster awareness and stewardship on the Chester without dealing with the barnacles, algae and flatworms.

The event is free and open to the public, but pre-registration is required by August 8. To register, and for more information, call 410/778-7295 or contact mwiest2@washcoll.edu.

August 4, 2008

Science, Politics, And The Struggle To Save The Bay

Chestertown, MD, October 23, 2003 — Washington College's Joseph H. McLain Lecture Series and the Center for the Environment and Society present "CHESAPEAKE BAY BLUES: SCIENCE, POLITICS, AND THE STRUGGLE TO SAVE THE BAY, " a lecture by Dr. Howard Ernst, Assistant Professor, U.S. Naval Academy and Senior Scholar, Center for Politics, University of Virginia. A book signing will follow. The event will take place Thursday, Oct. 23, Hynson Lounge, 7:30 p.m.

College To Host Living Shorelines Forum September 13

Keeping Our "Edge" to Preserve the Health of the Chesapeake Bay

Chestertown, MD, August 28, 2002 — The Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, the Upper Eastern Shore Tributary Team and the Chester River Association will host a LIVING SHORELINES FORUM on Friday, September 13, 2002, from 3:00 to 5:30 p.m. in Room 100 Goldstein Hall on the College's campus. The public is invited to this forum to learn about and discuss various efforts to combat shoreline erosion while maintaining the critical habitat that is necessary for many Bay species.

The beauty of the Chesapeake Bay is tied directly to its bountiful tributaries whose edges and shorelines team with life. As more and more people seek out these distinctive areas to live and to work, there is a risk that the landscape that defines the unique environment of the Bay might be lost as homeowners and businesses opt for shoreline measures for recreation, business and farming that actually threaten and destroy habitat and, with it, the very quality of life that we seek by living on the Chesapeake Bay.

What happens to the environment when we lose "the edge" and what measures can be taken to prevent shoreline erosion? What is the State of Maryland doing to help counties deal with this issue? These questions are critical, both environmentally and economically, and will be addressed at this public forum. Guest speakers will include John Flood, a shoreline design consultant who has witnessed the loss of Anne Arundel County's shorelines to hardened approaches; Kevin Kelly, owner of Environmental Systems Analysis, Inc., in Annapolis, who uses alternative, bio-engineering methods to protect eroding shorelines; and Cornelia Pasche Wikar, a Coastal Hazards Planner with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, who is leading a statewide project to identify the shorelines most susceptible to erosion and the appropriate measures to protect them. Public questions and participation are greatly encouraged.

To learn more about educational events sponsored by the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, visit the center online at http://ces.washcoll.edu or call 410-810-7151.

Noted Oceanographer Dr. Jerry Schubel To Develop Alternative Futures Forum At Washington College

Forum To Foster Student Environmental Leadership, Support Community Outreach

The Alternative Futures Forum will use the techniques of scenario building to identify and to explore alternative futures, said Dr. Schubel. Participating students will learn to develop possible futures by identifying, researching and studying critical factors and conditions that influence trends and by studying how various choices determine different future outcomes. Dr. Schubel is an expert practitioner in scenario development who will guide Washington College students through the essential process and methods for conducting and utilizing such studies with an emphasis on addressing sustainability issues facing communities and their natural environments.Chestertown, MD, March 7, 2002 — Washington College announces that Jerry R. Schubel, Ph.D., distinguished oceanographer and former president of the New England Aquarium, has been appointed Director of the College's Alternative Futures Forum at the Center for the Environment and Society and Visiting Professor in Biology and Environmental Studies. An accomplished "scenario" builder in the field where community, business, government and the environment interact, Dr. Schubel will create a forum in which college students explore—with the help of scholars, policy makers, researchers, community leaders and other practitioners—alternative futures for environmental systems large and small, local to the Chesapeake Bay and across the world.

"All the sciences—including the social sciences—plus engineering, the humanities and the arts will be brought to bear on the environmental scenarios that students will explore," said Dr. Schubel. "Every effort will be made to secure a client for each study and to involve community decision makers, so that the students' work will make a real impact on communities interested in creating a better environmental future."

With a long record of research, academic honors and appointments, Dr. Schubel has specialized in coastal oceanography with a focus on estuaries and other environments. He is a graduate of Alma College in Alma, MI, and received his Ph.D. in oceanography from John Hopkins University in 1968. From 1968-1974, he served as a research scientist and associate director of the Johns Hopkins' Chesapeake Bay Institute. In 1974, he left the institute to teach and to direct the Marine Sciences Research Center at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, which he helped to transform from a small research unit into one of the world's most distinguished coastal oceanographic institutions specializing in the application of research to solving coastal problems and educating the next generation of researchers. In 1983, he became Dean of Marine Sciences at SUNY Stony Brook and later served as the university's Acting Vice Provost for Research and Graduate Studies, and its Provost.

After leaving SUNY Stony Brook in 1994, he became president and Chief Executive Officer of the New England Aquarium in Boston, MA.

Dr. Schubel has chaired numerous national and international committees and panels dealing with a wide range of environmental issues, and presently chairs the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration's committee assessing the effects of the proposed expansion of San Francisco International Airport on the San Francisco Bay. He is vice president of the Gulf of Maine Ocean Observing System and has lead the development of a public outreach program for Census of Marine Life—a decade-long exploration of the ocean that will be one of the most ambitious programs of ocean exploration ever undertaken. Earlier in his career he wrote extensively about the environment of the Chesapeake Bay in The Living Chesapeake and Life and Death of the Chesapeake Bay.

"The College is proud to welcome Jerry Schubel to our faculty," said Dr. John Toll, president of the College. "Environmental studies is one of our most popular majors. By developing the Alternative Futures Forum, we will greatly enrich our curriculum in order to prepare our students for environmental leadership roles and to tackle the environmental challenges that face the whole world."

Author Susan Stranahan To Speak On Sense Of Place On The Susquehanna River

Chestertown, MD, February 14, 2002 — The Washington College Center for the Environment and Society and the Journeys Home Eastern Shore Lecture Series present "A RIVER JOURNEY: THOUGHTS ALONG THE WAY," a lecture by Susan Q. Stranahan, Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter and author of "Susquehanna: River of Dreams" (Johns Hopkins University Press, 1993). The talk will be held Thursday, February 21, at 5 p.m. in the College's Hynson Lounge.

Stranahan will explore how the Chesapeake Bay region's sense of place migratedup the Susquehanna River and finally took root there. "The result," she writes, "has been an awakened fondness for and protectiveness toward the river and its watershed. It was my good fortune to watch it happen."

Until recently, Stranahan was a staff writer at The Philadelphia Inquirer, where she covered regional and national environmental and conservation issues for more than two decades. In 1979, she covered the Three Mile Island nuclear plant accident, and her articles were the major component in the entry that won The Inquirer the 1980 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting. She has received several state and national journalism awards, including the Pennsylvania Wildlife Federation's Conservation Communicator of the Year, and has written articles for The New York Times, The Washington Post, Audubon, Time, Fortune, and Mother Jones. She is working on a second book and freelances articles for several national publications.

Stranahan also will appear Wednesday, February 20, 2002, at 7:30 p.m. in the Historic Avalon Theatre in Easton, MD, as part of the Spring 2002 Journeys Home Eastern Shore Lecture Series co-sponsored by the Center for the Environment and Society, the Adkins Arboretum, the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, the North American Wildfowl Trust, and the Maryland Center for Agro-ecology. Her February 20th lecture, titled "Finding the Way Home," will address her early recognition of the tremendous sense of place that exists on the Chesapeake and the benefits of such deep-rooted identity with a region. She will be introduced by Frances Flanigan, former Executive Director of the Alliance for Chesapeake Bay. Ticket prices for Journeys Home are $10 per individual lecture. Student tickets are half-priced.

To learn more about this or other events sponsored by the Center for the Environment and Society, visit the center online at http://ces.washcoll.edu or call 410-810-7151.

See the Chesapeake through Ebony Eyes: Chantey Singers Share the Black Heritage of the Bay

Chestertown, MD, November 7, 2001 — Washington College's Center for the Environment and Society and Center for Black Studies present "Ebony Eyes and Voices on the Chesapeake," Thursday, November 15, 2001, at 8 p.m. in the College's Norman James Theatre, William Smith Hall. The event is free and the public is invited to enjoy an evening of song and history of the African Americans on the Chesapeake Bay.

Although a little known tradition today, much like gandy dancers on American railroads, singing was used by the black fishermen of the Chesapeake to coordinate their work on the Bay's menhaden boats. In the early 1990s, a group of retired menhaden fishermen from Virginia formed the Northern Neck Chantey Singers to preserve this musical tradition and to recreate for public audiences the traditional worksongs that the all-black menhaden crews sang. The Singers met with immediate acclaim from area residents of the Northern Neck of Virginia for whom chanteys were a distinctive regional tradition.

The Singers' performances generated public demand for a recording of these songs, so in 1993 they recorded "See You When the Sun Goes Down: Traditional Worksongs of Virginia Menhaden Fishermen." Revenues from sale of the cassette are divided equally by the Reedville (VA) Fishermen's Museum and the Northern Neck Chantey Singers. For more information on the Singers, visit www.virginia.edu/vfh/vfp/chanteys.html online.

The Singers will be joined by Vincent O. Leggett, president of the Blacks on the Chesapeake Foundation and author of two books, Blacks on the Chesapeake and The Chesapeake Bay Through Ebony Eyes. Since 1984, Mr. Leggett has worked to document and to preserve the history of African Americans living and working in the Chesapeake Bay's maritime and seafood industries, and has organized exhibits and delivered lectures throughout the region.

The Singers also will appear Wednesday, November 14, 2001, at 7:30 p.m. in the Historic Avalon Theatre in Easton, MD, as part of the 2001 Eastern Shore Lecture Series "Journeys Home: People, Nature and Sense of Place," a subscription series co-sponsored by the Center for the Environment and Society, the Adkins Arboretum, the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, the Horsehead Wetlands Center, and the Maryland Center for Agroecology. To learn more about this or other events sponsored by the Center for the Environment and Society, visit the center online at http://ces.washcoll.edu or call 410-810-7151.

Great Pumpkin Party to Launch Riverkeeper Initiative October 20

Chestertown, MD, October 9, 2001 — The Washington College Center for the Environment and Society and the Chester River Association invite all to join in A CELEBRATION OF THE CHESTER: THE GREAT PUMPKIN PARTY on Saturday, October 20, 2001, at the Washington College Custom House garden and High Street landing, Chestertown, beginning at 1:30 p.m. The public is invited to enjoy educational events, fun and games for all ages, plus food and refreshments and to learn about the Chester Riverkeeper Initiative.

The Great Pumpkin Party will bring the communities along the Chester River together in recognition of the many ways in which the Chester enriches our lives and to introduce the Chester River Association's Riverkeeper Initiative as way to preserve the quality, environmental health and unique character of the river.

In tandem with the Chestertown Wildlife Exhibition and Sale, the Great Pumpkin Party will begin with informal gatherings at many of the public landings along the Chester and its 43 tributaries. Up and down the Chester, pumpkins, fall produce and fall flowers donated by local farmers and gardeners will be delivered to the docks and loaded onto boats to be brought to Chestertown. Look for posters and signs telling where and when to gather to see the beginning of the pumpkin boat parade.

The boats are scheduled to converge at Chestertown's High Street landing at 1:30 p.m. to unload their harvest bounty. The Town Dock and the last riverfront block of High Street will be closed to traffic from 1:30 to 4:30 p.m. to accommodate the public for the Great Pumpkin Party.

As part of the Great Pumpkin Party, prizes will be awarded for the gourd with the largest girth and the heaviest homegrown pumpkin. Winners of the Kent and Queen Anne's County Arts Councils' "Bounty of the Chester" contest will be announced. Contest entries include poems, paintings, essays and photographs that illustrate how the Chester River enriches our lives. In addition, Great Pumpkin Party door-prize entry forms will be available throughout Kent and Queen Anne's counties and all who attend may enter their names for the prize of a 16-foot Old Town Loon Kayak.

Since its founding in 1986, the Chester River Association has served as an advocate for the Chester River and the resources it provides. Yet, despite the best efforts to address an array of complex river issues, the health of the Chester has continued to decline and the river is currently on the State of Maryland's list of impaired waterways.

As explained by Andrew McCown, president of the Chester River Association: "It was becoming clear that our volunteer board could not adequately respond to the Chester's growing needs. We had to commit to a more aggressive program in defense of the Chester and its water quality. That is the origin of our Riverkeeper Initiative."

As part of this new program, the Chester River Association petitioned for admittance and was unanimously accepted as a new member of the International Waterkeeper Alliance. The Waterkeeper Alliance directed by Robert Kennedy, Jr., will guide and support the Chester River Association in its Riverkeeper Initiative to hire a full-time professional riverkeeper by Fall 2002. To be employed by the Chester River Association, the Chester Riverkeeper will be based in Washington College's Custom House, headquartered with the College's Center for the Study of the Environment and Society, the C.V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience, and Center for the Study of Black Culture.

The Waterkeeper Alliance also promises an important partnership for the Chester by assigning the Hudson Riverkeeper, Alex Matthiessen, as mentor to the new Chester Riverkeeper. Matthiesen will be a guest at the Great Pumpkin Party to help explain the responsibilities of a riverkeeper and the importance of the Riverkeeper Initiative.

Later the same night, the Chester River Association will present "Chesapeake Scenes," words and music of the Bay in concert, at 8 p.m. in the Prince Theater, High Street, Chestertown. Join Washington College alumni Andrew McCown '77, Sue Matthews ' 75, Bill Matthews '71 and the gang in a celebration of the Chesapeake and Chester. Tickets are $25. For more information and reservations call the Kerns Collection at 410-778-4044.

For more information about the Great Pumpkin Party, call Andrew Stein at the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, 410-810-7151.

College Hosts Christopher Tilghman, Author of Mason's Retreat, October 18

Chestertown, MD, October 8, 2001 — The Washington College Center for the Environment and Society and "Journeys Home: An Eastern Shore Lecture Series" present a reading with commentary by Christopher Tilghman, author of In a Father's Place and Mason's Retreat, on Thursday, October 18, 2001, at 5 p.m. in the College's Hynson Lounge. The event is free and the public is invited to attend.

Tilghman is the author of two collections of short stories, "In a Father's Place" and "The Way People Run," and the novel Mason's Retreat, which tells the story of an expatriate Eastern Shore family that returns to its old Chesapeake Bay estate on the eve of World War II. Noted for his ability to set scene after scene with remarkable sensitivity to both sense of place and characterization, Tilghman has had stories anthologized in "Best American Short Stories" and other collections, and has been translated into ten foreign languages.

The recipient of numerous grants and awards, including the Guggenheim Fellowship and Whiting Writer's Award, Tilghman was previously Writer-in-Residence at Emerson College in Boston, MA, and now teaches creative writing at the University of Virginia. He and his wife, the writer Caroline Preston, live near Charlottesville, VA, with their three sons.

Tilghman also will lecture Wednesday, October 17, 2001, at the Historic Avalon Theatre in Easton, MD, speaking on "The Pull of the Land: Place and Imagination." Starting at 7:30 p.m., the lecture is part of the 2001 Eastern Shore Lecture Series "Journeys Home: People, Nature and Sense of Place," a subscription series co-sponsored by the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, the Adkins Arboretum, the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, the Horsehead Wetlands Center and the Maryland Center for Agroecology.

For subscription information on the Journey's Home Lecture Series or for information about other programs sponsored by the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, please visit ces.washcoll.edu or call 410-810-7151.

Grasses for the Masses Workshop Set for April 17

Learn How to Help Protect and Restore the Bay's Underwater Grasses

Chestertown, MD, March 29, 2001 — On Tuesday, April 17, 2001, the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society and the Chesapeake Bay Foundation (CBF) will host a "Grasses for the Masses" workshop at 6 p.m. at the Custom House, 100 Water Street, Chestertown, Maryland. The workshop will teach volunteers how to grow underwater grasses in a special system at home that will be used to help restore historic underwater grass beds in local rivers.

"Once, submerged aquatic vegetation was abundant in the shallower areas of the Chesapeake Bay," said Dr. Wayne H. Bell, director of the Center for the Environment and Society. "These grasses are essential in the ecosystem of the Bay, but today only a small percentage of the original beds remain. This workshop will teach citizens about the value and functions of the grass beds and give them a way to help restore the Bay's underwater grasses."

CBF staff will teach volunteers to grow redhead grass, a type of underwater grass native to the Bay. CBF will provide all necessary materials, plants and instruction at no cost. Later this spring, the grasses grown by volunteers will be planted at a designated local restoration site as part of a larger effort to restore underwater grasses in the Bay's watershed.

Underwater grasses are key indicators of the health of the Bay and its tributaries because underwater grass growth depends on good water quality. Underwater grasses filter polluted runoff and sediment, provide food for waterfowl, and provide habitat for crabs and many species of fish. According to CBF's 2000 State of the Bay Report, underwater grasses remain at only 12 percent of their historic levels. Many factors contribute to the decline of underwater grasses, including nutrient pollution, poor water clarity, and sediments from erosion.

To bring back the Bay's underwater grass beds, CBF is working to protect existing underwater grass beds, improve water quality, and restore grasses in areas where water quality is good enough to support survival. CBF's goal is to have 225,000 acres of underwater grasses cover the Bay and its tributaries by 2010.

Equipment is limited, so registration is required if you would like to participate, however, everyone is welcomed to attend the lecture. Contact Kim Donahue at 443-482-2155 or via email at kdonahue@cbf.org to register.

College To Host Dialogue on Bay Restoration

Chestertown, MD, March 15, 2001 — On Saturday, April 7, 2001, Washington College will host a prominent group of retired statesmen to participate in a dialogue on the origins of the Chesapeake Bay Program. The dialogue will start at 10 a.m. in the College's Norman James Theatre.

The featured guest for this dialogue is the Honorable Charles M. Mathias, former U. S. Senator from Maryland, whose efforts in 1975 led to the creation of the Chesapeake Bay Program. Senator Mathias will be joined by former Maryland Governor Harry Hughes, former Senator Joseph Gartlan of Virginia, former Delegate Tayloe Murphy of Virginia, former Senator Bernard Fowler of Maryland, and the Honorable George Wolff, former member of the Chesapeake Bay Commission from Pennsylvania. The participants will examine the origins of the Bay Program movement and the work that citizens, politicians and environmentalists still must accomplish to restore the health of the Chesapeake.

John Toll, president of Washington College, is the host for the dialogue, which will feature elected officials, public policy makers, students and citizens who will have the opportunity to pose questions to the invited guests. The dialogue is sponsored by the Alliance for the Chesapeake Bay, Washington College's Center for the Environment and Society, and the Environmental Protection Agency's Chesapeake Bay Program.

The dialogue is free and open to the public, but tickets are required, as space is limited. Please call 410-377-6270 to reserve a space.

College Co-Sponsors Environmental Speakers Series

Chestertown, MD, January 9, 2001 — The Historic Avalon Theater in Easton, Md., will host a 2001 Eastern Shore Lecture Series entitled "Journeys Home: People, Nature and Sense of Place." The presentations will explore the value we place on the natural world and give new insights into how those values translate into vibrant, safe and environmentally sound communities.

"Journeys Home" is a subscription lecture series co-sponsored by the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, the Adkins Arboretum, the Eastern Shore Land Conservancy, the Horsehead Wetlands Center and the Maryland Center for Agroecology.

The schedule of presenters for 2001 is:

Wednesday, February 14, 2001

Wes Jackson: "The 10,000-Year-Old Problem of Agriculture Can Now Be Solved"

Director and Founder, The Land Institute, Salina, KS. Author of Becoming Native to this Place, sketching his vision for the resettlement of America's rural communities. His most recent work, Rooted in the Land: Essays on Community and Place, co-edited with William Vitek, was released in 1996.

Tuesday, March 6, 2001

Janisse Ray: "The Country of Longing"

Author of Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, a remarkable first book that juxtaposes growing up as the daughter of a junkyard owner with the ecology of the Georgia longleaf pine ecosystem. Naming the Unseen, her chapbook of poetry about biology and place, won the 1996 Merriam-Frontier Award from the University of Montana.

Wednesday, April 18, 2001

Stephen Kellert: "Values of Nature, Sense of Place, and Human Well-Being"

Professor of Social Ecology, School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Yale University. Dr. Kellert was co-author of The Biophilia Hypothesis with E. O. Wilson, a work that explores human values in conservation biology and nature. An earlier work, Ecology, Economics, Ethics: The Broken Circle, highlights his interest in environmental ethics that has made him a major figure in conservation biology.

Wednesday, September 19, 2001

John Hanson Mitchell: "Inventing Place"

Author of Ceremonial Time, Fifteen Thousand Years on One Square Mile, and other books melding history, environment, and place around his home in Massachusetts. Mr. Mitchell freely admits that visits to his Eastern Shore roots were the origin of the values he has developed about people, places, and things environmental.

Wednesday, October 17, 2001

Christopher Tilghman: "The Pull of the Land: Place and Imagination"

Mr. Tilghman’s first book, In a Father’s Place, is a set of stories set against natural landscapes of North America, including Maryland’s Eastern Shore. The novel Mason’s Retreat is about an expatriate Eastern Shore family that, on the eve of World War II, returns to its old estate on Chesapeake Bay. He is noted for being able to set scene after scene with remarkable clarity and sensitivity.

Wednesday, November 7, 2001

Northern Neck Chantey Singers: "Songs of Our Life, Songs of Our Sea"

The series concludes with a live performance of narrative and songs by a troupe of retired menhaden fishermen from Reedville, VA. Their cassette recording, See You When the Sun Goes Down, contains a selection of the chanteys they sing, traditional work songs that all-Black crews sang to coordinate the raising of their fishing nets. Performance organized in cooperation with the Blacks of the Chesapeake Foundation, Annapolis.

Ticket prices are $50 for the complete six lectures, $30 for the spring or fall component of three lectures, or $10 per individual lecture. Student tickets are half-priced. All presentations will begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Historic Avalon Theatre, Easton. For further information, call Dr. Wayne H. Bell, Director of the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society, at 410-810-7171.

Regional EPA Administrator to Speak on Nutrient Control

Event Inaugurates College's New Center for the Study of the Environment and Society

Chestertown, MD, November 9, 2000 — Bradley Campbell, Regional Administrator of the EPA, will speak on "The Bay and the Politics of Regulation" on Wednesday, November 15 at 7:30 p.m. in Washington College's Casey Academic Center. Then event is free and the public is encouraged to attend. Campbell will discuss the issue of voluntary versus mandatory nutrient reduction and the impact of the dynamics of regional politics in preserving the Chesapeake Bay's ecosystem.

A graduate of Amherst College and the University of Chicago Law School, Campbell gained extensive experience in criminal and civil litigation focused on the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Appointed Regional Administrator for the EPA Mid-Atlantic Region by President Clinton, Campbell is responsible for environmental concerns in Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia and West Virginia. Previously, Campbell served on the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), which was the principle advisor to the President and Vice President on environmental issues. In his five-year tenure with CEQ, Campbell managed a wide range of efforts to protect the environment and helped to develop the Brownfield Initiative, Safe Drinking Water Act and Food Quality Act. Under the Clinton administration, he has worked on national initiatives for reinventing environmental regulations and enhancing the protection of wetlands.

This event inaugurates Washington College's new Center for the Environment and Society. The Center's mission is to broaden the understanding of environmental concerns by approaching them as complex social, political and scientific issues. Its multi-disciplinary approach addresses the need to integrate education, technology, policy and sense of place in finding real-world solutions to environmental problems. The Center is committed to providing a neutral academic forum in accomplishing these goals. Public outreach is a major component of its mission.

The Eastern Shore Land Conservancy and the Chester River Association are co-sponsoring the event. Celebrating its 10th anniversary, the Conservancy is a nonprofit organization committed to preserving farmland and other natural areas on Maryland's Eastern Shore by helping landowners to discover, evaluate and implement a variety of preservation options. The Chester River Association is an advocate for the health of the Chester River and the living resources it supports. As a watershed organization, it strives to promote stewardship of the Chester River — its forests, marshes, creeks and streams—as well as an understanding of the river's place in the economic and cultural life of our communities.

Talk to Address State of the Bay

Chestertown, MD, September 8, 2000 — Can the Chesapeake Bay be rescued from the ravages of pollution, over-harvesting and development? John Page Williams will discuss the state of the Bay's health and provisions for its future when he presents "Is the Bay Savable? What Needs to be Done" on Tuesday, September 19 at Washington College.

Senior naturalist for the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Williams will address the Chesapeake 2000 Bay Agreement—a contract designed to nurture and sustain the Bay, protect it as a habitat, restore and conserve watersheds, wetlands and forests, and improve water quality—and what it means for the Bay's future. He is author of two books, Exploring the Chesapeake in Small Boats and Chesapeake Almanac. In addition to a bi-weekly newspaper column, he has also written columns on fishing and natural history.

Williams's talk begins at 7:30 p.m. in Litrentra Lecture Hall, Dunning Hall. Sponsored by the McLain Program in Environmental Studies, it is free and open to the public.

New Director Takes Message of Chesapeake Bay to World

Chestertown, MD, August 11, 2000 —When Wayne H. Bell, Ph.D., was named director of the Center for the Environment and Society at Washington College in July, he called for the Center to become "a catalyst between the education programs at the College and the community, including the local Chesapeake Bay region, and the world beyond."

Making good on that pledge, Harvard-educated Bell will be a keynote speaker at the International Seminar on Chesapeake 2000, held in Kobe, Japan, August 21 to 24. Chesapeake 2000 is the name of the new Chesapeake Bay Agreement signed this past June by the Chesapeake Executive Council. The Council, which includes the governors of Maryland, Pennsylvania and Virginia and the mayor of Washington, D.C., has committed itself to continued restoration of the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Specific goals include improved water quality and restoration and maintenance of balanced ecosystems. If the water quality standards are met as outlined in the agreement, the Bay will be removed from the federal list of impaired waters by 2010.

The seminar is being hosted by the Scientific and Policy Committee of the International Environmental Management of Enclosed Coastal Seas (EMECS) Center. EMECS works internationally to bring together scholars, governments officials, industry representatives, and private organizations to resolve problems of bodies of water nearly surrounded by land. The Chesapeake Bay is one of nine major enclosed coastal seas recognized by EMECS. It is the largest and the most biologically diverse estuary in North America.

Dr. Bell will speak to approximately 120 government officials, researchers and private citizens about the Chesapeake 2000 agreement and his scientific point of view. Dr. Bell received both an A.M. in biology and a Ph.D. in marine microbiology from Harvard University. He comes to Washington College from the University of Maryland system where he most recently served as the vice president for external relations and the assistant to the director of special projects at the Center for Environmental Science. "Wayne Bell's public education experience and teacher outreach programs, combined with his extensive knowledge of the Chesapeake Bay, are perfectly suited to the mission of the new Center," said John S. Toll, president of Washington College.

Community outreach is a primary goal of both Chesapeake 2000 and the Washington College Center for the Environment and Society. The Center's mission is "to explore the critical relationship between society and environment...taking the Chesapeake Bay watershed region as [the] primary focus." It will be housed in the historic Chestertown Custom House, currently under restoration. The Custom House is located on the Chester River, a major tributary of the Chesapeake Bay.

Support for the Center has come from Ted and Jennifer Stanley, Tom and Barbara Gale, L. Clifford Schroeder and the Jessie Ball duPont Fund. The effort is part of the Campaign for Washington's College, now at $61 million. The Center for the Environment and Society is one of three new centers enhancing the Washington College academic program through rigorous, innovative courses and internships, issue analysis, collaborative work with leading scholars, and national community outreach. The other new centers are the C.V. Starr Center for the Study of the American Experience and the Center for Writing and the Creative Process.

Chesapeake Bay Watershed Lecture March 23

Chestertown, MD — The Chesapeake Bay Watershed's past, present and future will be considered in a lecture by Wayne H. Bell, vice president for external affairs at the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Science. The talk takes place at 7 p.m. on Thursday March 23 in the Litrenta Lecture Hall in Dunning Hall on the campus of Washington College. It is free and open to the public.

Bell combines a scientific background with the ability to translate into plain English important scientific information so that policy makers, educators and interested citizens can understand and use it. He is actively involved in developing and organizing international conferences on the management of coastal seas.

Bell's lecture is sponsored by the McLain Program in Environmental Studies.

Chivalry Dead in Migratory Birds, Smithsonian Bird Expert Says

Chestertown, MD — What happens after nesting is done and birds migrate to their winter quarters in the tropics? Peter Marra, Ph.D., terrestrial animal ecologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, relates that all is not sweetness and happy-times between breeding seasons in the north. His slide-lecture, "Chivalry is Dead in Migratory Birds," uncovers the story and its consequences for bird populations at 7:30 p.m., Weds., Nov. 17, in the Casey Academic Center Forum at Washington College in Chestertown, Md. The lecture is free and open to the public.

The Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, is dedicated to increasing the knowledge of the biological and physical processes that sustain life on earth. Marra, who has been working in the Caribbean and Central America, is beginning to study birds of the Chesapeake Bay area. His talk is sponsored by the McLain Program in Environmental Studies.