Greens Go Green: 'Golf and the Environment' Discussed at Washington College

Chestertown, MD — Washington College's Joseph H. McLain Program in Environmental Studies will present "Golf and the Environment: Creating Sustainable Relationships Through Common Values," a lecture by golf architect Troy Miller at Litrenta Lecture Hall on Thursday, March 19, at 7:30 p.m.

A golf course represents both potential environmental side-effects and potential environmental benefits. Ecologically minded golf course designers at the vanguard of their profession have become aware of both the pitfalls to avoid—the overuse of fertilizers, pesticides and other polluters—and the great opportunities to pursue—the creation of wildlife sanctuaries, the preservation of fields and trees that otherwise might have been paved over, the support of indigenous plants and animal species.

Troy Miller, Assistant Director of Land Design for Landmark Land Company, has been involved in environmentally aware golf course construction at sites around the country. Former Adjunct Professor in the University of Georgia's School of Environmental Design (Golf Course Architecture/Engineering), he has a Master's in Landscape Architecture, with an emphasis in golf course architecture, from the University of Georgia.

The Joseph H. McLain Program in Environmental Studies was established at Washington College in 1990 to focus attention on and augment study in the fields of aquatic and environmental studies. The Program supports lectures and symposia featuring visiting scientists and other professionals on matters of environmental interest, particularly relating to the Chesapeake Bay.

Litrenta Lecture Hall is located in the John S. Toll Science Center. Admission to "Golf and the Environment" is free and open to the public.

Underwater Artifacts: College Receives New Hi-Tech Seabed Scanner For Archaeology, Environmental Studies Programs

Chestertown, MD, April 30, 2004 — Ever wonder what secrets lie in Davy Jones's Locker, or just at the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay? Washington College students will soon find out. The College's archaeology and environmental studies programs have received a new tool for underwater archaeological and environmental surveys. Produced in Scotland by the firm SonaVision, the RoxSwath Seabed Classification System will add a new dimension to the College's undergraduate learning experience and allow students to study the marine environments at the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries.

According to John Seidel, associate professor of anthropology and environmental studies and an expert on underwater archaeology, RoxSwath can help to determine what objects of archaeological or environmental significance might be hidden under the surface of the Bay.

“We are very excited to have this new tool,” he said. “RoxSwath is a multibeam instrument that uses acoustics to map different seabed types. Simply put, the instrument uses multiple transducers to map a swath across the bottom of a river or creek and then makes fine discriminations between different types of mud, sand, shell, coral, grass, and so on. We have taken delivery of the first system in the U.S.”

On April 5-7, representatives of SonaVision trained a group of College personnel—including Seidel, Dr. Wayne Bell, Director of the College's Center for Environment and Society, Wendy Miller, Geographic Information Systems Program Coordinator at Washington College, and College senior anthropology major, Christian Mears—to use the system through a series of live demonstrations on the Chester River.

Following the field gathering and a post-processing of the data, the survey demonstration found several oyster beds—larger than anticipated—thriving in the river.

“This is an example of the type and the value of the data that this system can produce,” said Seidel. “Combined with our sidescan sonar, marine magnetometer and positioning and survey systems, this places Washington College well out in front of all our peers with regard to marine and estuarine survey capabilities, whether for archaeology or environmental science. We are taking archaeology and environmental studies to a much higher level for our students and letting them experience first-hand the most up-to-date methods in this field, with the Bay and its tributaries as our natural laboratory.”

For more information on Washington College's archaeology program, visithttp://archaeology.washcoll.edu.

College To Honor Author William Warner, April 18

Scholarship in His Name Recognizes Student Environmental Writing

Chestertown, MD, April 15, 2003 — Washington College will honor William W. Warner, acclaimed author of the Pulitzer Prize-winning book Beautiful Swimmers, on Friday, April 18 at 5 p.m. with the dedication in the College's Custom House of a plaque recognizing recipients of the William Warner Scholarship. The $1,000 scholarship was established by friends of the College to be presented to a Washington College junior in recognition of an aptitude for writing about nature and the environment.
“William Warner is one of the nation's most distinguished environmental writers, and he is a great inspiration to our students who aspire in their lives, through word and deed, to protect our world's natural resources,” said Dr. John S. Toll, president of the College. “The William Warner Prize will assist those worthy students who may one day follow in his footsteps.”
Warner has been a Senior Fellow of Washington College since 1985, when he was honored by the College for his classic work on the environment and people of the Chesapeake, Beautiful Swimmers: Watermen, Crabs and the Chesapeake Bay, originally published in 1976. Warner went on to write Distant Water: The Fate of the North Atlantic Fisherman, in which he studied the environmental impact of ocean-going factory fishing ships in the North Atlantic. In 1999, Warner published Into the Porcupine Cave and Other Odysseys, a book of 10 essays recounting life-shaping events in his growth as a naturalist, from wanderings in the wild with his step-grandfather to adventures in Patagonia and Hawaii. For this he received the Washington College Literary Prize in April of that year. Warner has also written many articles on nature for such journals as The Wilson Quarterly, Atlantic Monthly, New York Times, and Atlantic Naturalist.

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."

Allen Hammond, Author & Director of Strategic Analysis for World Resources Institute, to Speak on Environmental Issues

Chestertown, MD — Will the 21st century bring peace and prosperity or decay and destruction? Scientist and author Allen Hammond will probe these and other environmental issues when he speaks at 7:30 p.m. on Thurs., Oct. 28 in Litrenta Lecture Hall at Washington College, Chestertown, Md. His lecture is entitled "Environmental Issues for the 21st Century."

Senior scientist and director of Strategic Analysis for the World Resources Institute in Washington, D.C., Hammond is the author of Which World? Scenarios for the 21st Century. In Which World? Hammond examines the consequences of current social, economic, and environmental trends to construct three possible worlds that could await us in the future: Market World, in which free markets, private enterprise, and global market integration increase economic fortune; Fortress World, in which social and economic gaps widen and chaos emerges; and Transformed World, where social, political, and economic factors create a more harmonious and prosperous society.

Hammond holds degrees from both Stanford University and Harvard University. Prior to joining the World Resources Institute, he created the Research News section of the international journal Science and went on to found and edit such national publications as Science 80-86, Issues in Science and Technology, and Information Please Environmental Almanac. He also broadcast a daily, nationally syndicated radio program for five years and has written and edited 10 books. As WRI's senior scientist, he works to implement institute-wide advances in the use of analytical methods and information tools for policy research; studies environmental and sustainable development indicators; develops web-based communication tools; and writes on and researches long-term sustainability issues.

Hammond's talk is sponsored by the McLain Program in Environmental Studies. The lecture is free and open to the public.