{"id":57117,"date":"2012-03-23T08:10:22","date_gmt":"2012-03-23T12:10:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/?p=57117"},"modified":"2012-03-27T12:27:55","modified_gmt":"2012-03-27T16:27:55","slug":"focusing-on-a-healthy-environment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/2012\/03\/focusing-on-a-healthy-environment\/","title":{"rendered":"Focusing on a Healthy Environment"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"CIMA<\/a>UConn\u2019s commitment to a healthy environment is being showcased in a series of on-campus events called Climate Impact, Mitigation, and Adaptation (CIMA): A Reflection on Our Future.<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n

Beginning with an opening ceremony on Monday, March 26, at which President Susan Herbst will deliver greetings and sign an updated commitment that expands upon the University\u2019s current Climate Action Plan (CAP<\/span><\/a>), through to the Teale Lecture<\/span><\/a> on Thursday, March 29, where noted climate activist Michael Mann<\/span> <\/a>will speak, CIMA events include activities for faculty, staff, students, and members of the greater-Mansfield community.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe original Climate Action Plan was developed through the American College & University Presidents Climate Commitment and it gave us a great start,\u201d says Richard Miller, director of the Office of Environmental Policy<\/span><\/a>, \u201cbut its focus is on mitigating the effects of climate change. We\u2019ve made significant strides in that respect here at UConn, but on a broader level it\u2019s possible we are not going to see the progress we\u2019d like in terms of greenhouse gas mitigation and carbon footprint reduction.<\/p>\n

Miller says the University has added a section on adaptation to the Climate Action Plan that speaks to UConn\u2019s ongoing efforts at being a resource \u2013 through academic departments, the Department of Extension\u2019s outreach efforts, and various centers and institutes \u2013 to help provide a better response to environmental challenges and make the University’s resources available to local and state governmental agencies, citizen groups, and others who can benefit.<\/p>\n

The events that will take place during the week have been developed by an ad hoc committee that, in the words of Greg Anderson, professor emeritus of ecology and evolutionary biology, \u201cgrew out of a gathering of like-minded friends who share an interest in protecting the environment.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says the effort started over coffee at the Up & Atom caf\u00e9 last summer, when George Rawitscher, emeritus professor of physics, said he wanted to do something that would engage our new president \u2013 as well as the whole university \u2013 in an awareness of the effects of climate change.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur efforts just grew,\u201d Anderson says, \u201cand before we knew it, a committee was formed that included people from all areas of the University who are interested in the environment. We have the full support of the administration, and we\u2019ve had a great response from both within and outside the University.\u201d<\/p>\n

Among those participating in Monday\u2019s event will be visiting distinguished research professor and newly appointed environmental advisor to President Herbst, <\/a>Gene Likens<\/a>,<\/span> who will speak about UConn\u2019s sustainability footprint.<\/p>\n

Likens, a veteran of the climate debate, says, \u201cIn today\u2019s political climate, it\u2019s easy to get frustrated and pessimistic. We\u2019ve become a fractious society where people aren\u2019t willing to listen to anyone else\u2019s ideas. But I\u2019m very excited about CIMA, because it is a grassroots effort and it\u2019s a chance for UConn to lead the way in examining an important subject by fostering intelligent dialogue.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although a recently released study<\/a> in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology<\/em> indicates that today\u2019s young people \u2013 the \u2018millennials\u2019 in popular parlance \u2013 are less interested in environmental sustainability than their predecessors, Likens does not think that\u2019s true, at least not as far as UConn is concerned.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m pretty familiar with these issues,\u201d he says. \u201cThey seem to wax and wane from generation to generation. It\u2019s been my experience when I\u2019ve been on campus teaching that, for the most part, UConn students are engaged and dedicated to making the world a better place. I wonder what a poll taken at Storrs would look like. I suspect the results might be very different than the numbers shown [in the journal article].\u201d<\/p>\n

The CIMA website <\/span><\/a>contains a complete list of activities. All events are free and open to the public.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

UConn is putting the focus on a healthy environment with CIMA, a week-long celebration of environmental responsibility that begins March 26.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":56850,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[56],"class_list":["post-57117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-15 15:11:08","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57117"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57433,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57117\/revisions\/57433"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/56850"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57117"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=57117"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=57117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}