The Institute on the Environment’s Annual Meeting brings together our community for a day of inspiration and lively discussion about how we can work together even more effectively toward a just and environmentally sound world. The meeting is for everyone – staff, students, affiliates, partners, and friends. Together, we’re building a future in which people and planet prosper together.

Friday, September 27, 2019
9:00 AM – 4:00 PM
Registration opens at 8:45 a.m.
Humphrey School of Public Affairs

Any questions, please contact:
Kimberly Long, Events Manager, longx296@umn.edu

Agenda

Morning Program

9:30 a.m. Director’s Address
10:15 a.m. Panel Discussion and open Q&A (further information below)

Community-Engaged Scholarship: Best Practices and Ethical Considerations

Panelists will share what they have learned from their own community-based research, reflecting on the key components of mutually beneficial and ethical community-university partnerships.

• Virajita Singh, Assistant Vice Provost, Office of Equity and Diversity & Senior Research Fellow, Center for Sustainable Building Research
• Dr. Cathy Jordan, IonE Fellow and Associate Director for Leadership and Education, Institute on the Environment
• Dr. Crystal Ng, IonE Associate and Assistant Professor, Earth and Environmental Sciences
• Dr. Nicholas Phelps, Assistant Professor & Minnesota Aquatic Invasive Species Research Center (MAISRC) Director

Moderated by Carissa Slotterback, IonE Fellow and Associate Dean and Associate Professor, Humphrey School of Public Affairs

Afternoon Breakout Sessions

The overall goal of the breakouts is to provide a platform for the IonE community to gather and have directed conversations amongst a diversity of backgrounds about topics of interest. All breakouts will be self-selected on the day of the Annual Meeting.

Accelerating climate action while advancing social justice: tension or opportunity?
Location: Blegen Hall 317

Is there a tension between acting as quickly as possible to mitigate climate change and the potential for harnessing climate mitigation to advance equity and justice? Can the urgency for climate action accelerate a broader, equitable systems change or does it simply imply doubling down on existing institutions and market actors thereby exacerbating current inequities? Come to engage in a conversation that shapes our collective understanding of these questions and potential insights and learnings that could shed light on pathways forward.

Room Leads:

• Christine Baeumler, IonE Fellow, Professor, Art, College of Liberal Arts
• Lissa Pawlisch, IonE Fellow, Clean Energy Resource Team Statewide Director

Invited Practitioners: 

• Ansha Zaman, Policy Coordinator, Center for Earth, Energy and Democracy
• Nazir Khan, Organizer, Minnesota Black, Indigenous, and People of Color Climate & Environmental Justice Table
• Richa Nagar, Professor, Gender, Women, and Sexuality Studies, College of Liberal Arts
• Timothy Den-Herder Thomas, General Manager, Cooperative Energy Futures

Place-Based Carbon Neutral Goals
Location: Humphrey Forum

Pat Hamilton, Director of Global Initiatives at the Science Museum of Minnesota and Shane Stennes, UMN-TC Sustainability Director will each lead a subgroup discussing opportunities around their respective organizations as they create ambitious goals towards achieving carbon neutrality. These include not just buildings but operational, outreach and educational opportunities.

Room Leads:

• Patrick Hamilton, IonE Fellow, Director, Global Change Initiatives, Science Museum of Minnesota
• Shane Stennes, IonE Fellow, Director of Sustainability, University Services

Planetary Health: Theory, Education, and Practice and Call for Leadership
Location: Humphrey Room 215

Planetary Health is an emerging concept that started in 2015. It takes One Health a step further to fully integrate environmental health into the health of humans and animals. Planetary health is deeply committed to transdisciplinary systems thinking. The University of Minnesota has a growing relationship with the Planetary Health Alliance at Harvard and is positioned to be an early leader in the field. This session will provide an overview of cutting-edge planetary health theory, a planetary health competency framework to guide education, and planetary health practice exemplars. Participants will begin to envision the role that the IonE community and the University can play in this global movement.

Room Lead: Teddie Potter, IonE Fellow, Professor, School of Nursing

Source Water Protection and Rural Development
Location: Humphrey Room 180

Throughout the greater Minnesota, there is growing concern about the changing quality of source water. It’s a complex problem as demographics, climate, and economics are all changing at the same time. A brief knowledge assessment will be presented and discussion groups will brainstorm forward-looking ideas about protecting source water given these current and looming changes and where new opportunities for UMN might exist.

Room Lead: Kate Brauman, IonE Fellow, Lead Scientist, GWI

Invited Practitioner: Anna Claussen, Founder, Voices for Rural Resilience

Sustainability Forecasting: Building a Navigation System for Climate Action Planning & Sustainable Land Use
Location: Blegen Hall 330

Climate Action Planning is critical for our future. However, on our state’s journey to carbon neutrality we will continue to need food, provide clean water, protect biodiversity and more, i.e. we still need to be sustainable. To aid in evaluating potential plans and policies, we must be able to forecast impacts of plans on our natural resources and climate goals. The University can contribute its broad expertise towards sustainability forecasting to better characterize emissions, potential mitigation options and the synergies and tradeoffs with other sustainability targets, looking sector by sector (e.g., agriculture, forestry, urban, etc.). The discussion in this breakout session will focus on opportunities for the University of Minnesota community and other stakeholders to develop an integrated assessment and monitoring of the potential mitigation options that each sector in Minnesota can provide as contributions to the state’s current emission reduction goals.

Room Lead: Eric Lonsdorf, Lead Scientist, NatCap and IonE Impact Goal Lead

Who’s Coming?

122 Ioneers so far! Plus 16 guests. Last update: 8:30 a.m. on September 24