Colloquium Fall 2019

Our trip to the Lee County Waste to Energy plant addressed a big problem that directly affects our everyday lives: trash and what to do with it. Recently in class, we have been reading about and discussing the impact our everyday lives have on the environment, such as the food we eat and the waste and garbage we produce. Understanding how big our footprints really are is important, so we can be more concious of the small changes we may be able to make. This trip in particular was very rewarding because it provided many sustainable solutions to several complex problems. Not only is the plant getting rid of waste, it is actually turning it in to energy that powers 30,000 homes without any extra emissions. What I was most suprised to learn at Waste to Energy was the amount of ways trash is sorted and dealt with, in the most sustainable ways possible. There are separate facilities for recycling, horticultural waste, and chemical disposal. In the horticultural waste plant, waste is proc...

Class discussions in Colloquium often include a problem or issue that is very complex. The issue tends to start as one element of an ecosystem that directly affects our lives, such as mosquitoes breeding the Zika virus, and quickly snowballs into a series of other problems like resulting pesticides killing bees, lack of pollination, and an eventual food desert as a result. Discussions like this can often be overwhelming, and it can seem very difficult to find an innovative solution to the issues we are talking about. Our field trip to ECHO showed us some of the solutions currently in place to solve another major issue: world hunger and the need for sustainable agriculture. Through the use of appropriate technologies and farming practices, the ECHO team is helping to feed many different parts of the world and communicate new ways of cultivating crops and livestock. The alternative technologies portion of the tour was definitely the part about our trip that I found the most fascinating...

The Corkscrew Regional Ecosystem Watershed is 60,000 acres of protected natural land. On our class visit to CREW, we were fortunate enough to see many of the different plants and animals that live among the marshland with the help of educational guides and naturalists. We were taken along trails that introduced us to snakes, grasshoppers, and turtles while the guides told us about how CREW was developed and why it was important. Started by a local councilman many years ago, the preserved land is now a crucial part of Lee County's aquifer system, which accounts for all of our clean drinking water. At the end of the trail, there was an overlook tower situated in front of a large body of water, surrounded by plants and buzzing with the sound of life. It was here where we gathered to take in the view and discuss in depth the different parts of the ecosystem we were experiencing, and the importance of conservation. Standing atop the overlook tower and seeing the vast amount of wa...

Visiting the FGCU campus, and walking around the academic buildings and the nature trails on Tuesday gave me a new perspective on the school itself and the way it was built with sustainability as a major priority. The tour introduced me to many small details I had never observed before, and how nearly every feature of the buildings' architecture or surrounding landscape had a purpose that supports healthy environmental conditions or a reduction of waste. Learning about the way FGCU was built 20 years ago helped me understand the main point made by J.B. MacKinnon in his passage on Knowledge Extinction. Our conversation with the naturalists, and the institution of the Colloquium course, is a good way of combating knowledge extinction. By teaching students the importance of sustainability, we are able to expand our worldview and in turn pass on the same perspective to other people and the generations that follow us.  Prior to our walk through the nature trails, we stopped at the...

Growing up in South Florida, much of my connection to nature was through days at the beach and fishing trips on my father's boat. I learned how to swim at an early age and found a love for snorkeling. I have an interest in learning how to scuba dive, but I am not yet certified. Throughout my childhood, I have many fond memories with my family and friends on the East Coast where I grew up. In the rest of this blog post, I will discuss the impact nature has had on me, and what mattered to me most about the time I've spent outdoors. Though fishing is often harmful to the environment, both commercially and recreationally, it is one of the most significant parts of my childhood and is still a key part of my relationship with my father. I was taught from a young age to abide by all the guidelines for fishing, like legal size limits and catching fish only when they are in season. My favorite part was always lobster season. I loved diving and searching under rocks to find them and ca...