Tag: workshops

Two papers out on Bay of Fundy by Elson

January 23, 2025 / k8sherren

Figure 4 in Galang et al (2025) in Sustainability Science, showing increases in empathy measures.

Kudos to McGill Bennett-lab NSERC ResNet PhD student Elson Galang whose first two PhD papers came out this past week, both based (at least in part) on the workshops that he led at SMU about the Bay of Fundy NSERC ResNet case study in November 2022. The first one came out in Sustainability Science on January 16th, Co-imagining future scenarios can enhance environmental actors’ empathy toward future generations and non-human life-forms, that found measurable impacts on participants’ empathy towards future people and other life forms, the latter even lasting 3 months after the event. This is tantalizing evidence of the value of participating in the development of environmental scenarios. The second paper came out in Environmental Science & Policy on Jan 21st, Participatory scenario planning: A social learning approach to build systems thinking and trust for sustainable environmental governance. This shares more good news about participation in such processes in relation to the cognitive, relational and normative dimensions of social learning. Both papers also describe innovative methodological tools for assessing these complex ideas. Congratulations, Elson!

ResNet is getting busy

November 10, 2020 / k8sherren

Jen Holzer of ResNet Theme 1 leads Landscape 1 through some facilitated discussions in the first ResNet workshop.

Yesterday we had the first workshop for ResNet Landscape 1 team, facilitated by ResNet Theme 1 (see above), in combination with our quarterly team call. We achieved an interesting set of break-out discussions on issues of ecosystem services in landscape 1 and as an integrative opportunity in research.

The quarterly call also featured a one-hour student symposium chaired by SMU MA student Brandon Champagne, where we heard from a dozen ResNet-affiliated students from Dalhousie, SMU, and Acadia about their research, including some early results from the field season now almost behind us. Two of those presenting students were Evan McNamara and Terrell Roulston, both SMU students in Jeremy Lundholm’s EPIC lab. Evan is pictured below doing some recent knowledge mobilization about their pollination ecosystem services work with participating farm owners and workers at Abundant Acres, where they did some of their fieldwork this past summer. Great work, everyone!

Evan McNamara showing pollinators to the team at Abundant Acres after the field season he and Terrell Roulston spent partly on that farm, Oct 3,2020 (Photo: Terrell Roulston).

Yan Chen in Singapore

January 29, 2019 / k8sherren

Yan Chen at NSF-funded workshop in Singapore, January 28-29, 2019.

Yan Chen presenting her IDPhD work at NSF-funded workshop in Singapore, January 28-29, 2019.

Yan Chen is wrapping up a few days in Singapore for the NSF-funded Research Coordination Network (RCN) in Science, Engineering and Education for Sustainability (SEES) on Putting Sustainability into Convergence: Connecting Data, People, and Systems. This international workshop has been diverse in attendees and disciplines. Yan reflected, “The most discussed question is how people from different disciplines can collaborate. There are many scholars like me, as social scientists who are using sophisticated data analysis models; while others are engineers working on social issues. We both, at a certain degree, struggle in ‘cultural shocks’ between different disciplines.” It’s been a great opportunity for her to workshop with similarly cross-cutting folks. She described her session as discussing, “data sources, sizes, validity, sharing, proxies, and so on. …. [agreeing] that data or method cannot develop only on the technologies, but has to answer certain questions. For social scientists, finding a good mechanism of data sharing or archiving may be very useful. Also, how to cope with the rapidly developing technologies will be another challenge for us.” Thanks to SSHRC for supporting Yan’s trip, via Mike Smit’s Insight Grant, on which I’m a CI, Assessing the social impacts of hydroelectricity-driven landscape changing using text, images and archives: a Big Data approach.

Fun week of workshops

May 7, 2016 / k8sherren

I seem to be giving bad news to Joyce and Simon from WWF on the HCV maps behind, as Beckley observes . Maybe I was, a little. (photo: Sarah Saunders, WWF Canada).

I seem to be giving bad news to Joyce and Simon from WWF on the HCV maps behind, as Beckley looks on. Maybe I was, a little. (photo: Sarah Saunders, WWF Canada).

Last week, with winter marks submitted, launched the workshop and conference season. Monday I spent all day in the marvelous new Halifax Central Library with a range of government, academic and NGO experts interested in agricultural risk management in the face of climate change. We workshopped AgriRisk research grant proposal ideas, well provisioned by Pavia. Then I hopped into the car with recent MREM alumna Sarah Saunders, now a tidal energy specialist at WWF Canada based in Halifax, to drive to New Brunswick for a meeting on the Saint John River. Organizer Simon Mitchell, WWF Canada’s Saint John River Advisor, always picks great meeting places, this time the Brundage Point River Centre in Grand Bay-Westfield, north of Saint John. That Tuesday meeting was to troubleshoot the first maps out of the Habitat Friendly Renewable Energy Mapping Project. WWF Canada uses the HCV system to identify constraints to development – high conservation value – which has 6 elements including social value and community needs. Those people-oriented maps were almost empty, prompting lots of suggestions from me and my Energy Transitions colleagues Tom Beckley and Louise Comeau, also in attendance. A thoroughly fun day for nerds like us, but I particularly enjoyed taking the long way home, across the Westfield ferry and up the Kingston Peninsula – entirely worth the extra half hour.

Two papers out on Bay of Fundy by Elson

ResNet is getting busy

Yan Chen in Singapore

Fun week of workshops

Copyright