Tamborine Rainforest Skywalk, Australia
Where in the world will you be on July 29? Wherever you’ll be, you can still attend our free — and fascinating — Research Update webinar presented by TREE Foundation’s virtual summer interns. Sign up for this free one-hour event, which starts at 5:30 p.m., EST and is hosted by Williams College, here: https://tinyurl.com/yyh5nwq8.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, our summer internships were virtual, with three students from Williams College: Lilia Robinowitz, Eva Castagna, and Evan Wright; and a fourth from the University of Southern California, Merry Moore, working on topics ranging from worldwide canopy walkways, sloths, rainforest preservation, forest conservation, and environmental justice. But being virtual was no impediment to their amazing research efforts.
TREE interns learning from and collaborating with Dr. Margaret Lowman
Join them — and TREE Executive Director Dr. Margaret Lowman — for this one-hour Zoom webinar, on July 29, 5:30 – 6:30 p.m., Eastern Standard Time, requires advance registration at https://tinyurl.com/yyh5nwq8.
“Our planet needs scientists and earth detectives more than ever right now — perhaps even more so because of the rising occurrence of global pandemics,” says Dr. Margaret Lowman, Director of TREE. “Unfortunately, due to the pandemic, many undergraduates found themselves without meaningful employment this summer. Thanks to generous funding from Williams College and local donors, the TREE Foundation was thrilled to hire college interns to work with us virtually.”
“It was a fantastic opportunity for these budding environmental scientists to connect with people from places such as Australia, the Amazon, Africa, and Asia, to collaborate on issues that affect the health of our planet and all of humanity.”
The students’ efforts have helped leverage TREE’s new program: Mission Green, to sponsor ten canopy walkways in the highest biodiversity forests of the world, providing stewardship from a unique combination of education, economy, and ecology. Mission Green not only creates education and research sites for future students, but provides employment to indigenous people from ecotourism instead of logging.
Hopkins Memorial Forest canopy walkway, Williamstown, Massachusetts
“The Mission Green program had its genesis with the construction of the Williams College canopy walkway in 1991 (the first one in North America), which was followed in 1999 by the first public canopy walkway in Myakka State Park in Sarasota, Florida,” says Dr. Lowman. “These two skywalk models are now deployed around the world for application to conservation and environmental justice.”
Don’t miss this bound-to-be-fascinating, free presentation. Click here to register: https://tinyurl.com/yyh5nwq8.