EarthWorks | Spring 2012 Screenings and Lectures
Presented by the Campus Sustainability Network | A student, staff, and faculty coalition
Welcome to EarthWorks – the new film and lecture series focused on environmental and sustainability issues – organized by the Campus Sustainability Network. Topics for Spring 2012 include climate change, food security, invasive species, pollinators, oceans and riverways.
Join us for our inaugural season of films, discussion panels, lectures, multi-media presentations, and plant pulls!
The events are free and open to all - students, staff, faculty and the community.
The following courses are participating in the 2012 EarthWorks Passport: BIO 105, BIO 111, GEOG 102, GEOG 210, GEOG 316, GLBS 110, PSYC 340, REC 152 and REC 245. For more information on the EarthWorks Passport program and ways to participate, please contact Jeanne Mikita.
Questions regarding the 2012 series? Suggestions for the 2012/13 series? Please email us at sustainability@capilanou.ca
Tuesday, Apr. 3 | FORCE OF NATURE - The David Suzuki Story
7pm | BOSA Centre Theatre
"For the first time since life appeared on earth, one species- us- is single-handedly altering the physical, chemical and biological nature of earth. We have become a force of nature" - David Suzuki
Award-winning director Sturla Gunnarsson presents a biography of ideas featuring iconic Canadian scientist, educator, broadcaster and activist David Suzuki. At 73 years of age Suzuki delivered what he describes as “a last lecture - a distillation of my life and thoughts, my legacy, what I want to say before I die.”
In Gunnarsson's documentary, Suzuki articulates a core, urgent message: We have exhausted the limits of the biosphere and it is imperative that we rethink our relationship with the natural world. He looks unflinchingly at the strains on the interconnected web of life and offers up a blueprint for sustainability and survival.
Director of Photography Tony Westman will be in attendance.
Past Events | Spring 2012
Tuesday, Jan. 24 | PEACE OUT, A film by Charles Wilkinson
7pm | Bosa Centre
A year-long labour of love by Cap U Motion Picture Arts program instructor and movie director, Charles Wilkinson, Peace Out made its world premiere at the Vancouver International Film Festival in October. The Capilano Sustainability Network is proud to present the film's Capilano premiere. Peace Out is the story of British Columbia’s magnificent Peace River, a valley and the energy it produces, which many of us consume without fully realizing the impacts our conduct is having on people and places far away. As Canada’s energy consumption grows, scientists, industry and government are making hard choices about how to feed it. Charles Wilkinson’s latest eye-opener is a concentrated look the harrowing costs of our technological affluence.
PEACE OUT trailer.
Tuesday, Jan. 31 Douglas Coutts, Global Food Concerns and the UN World Food Program
7pm | Library 322
Douglas Coutts, on assignment from the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), has more than 24 years of experience with WFP, most recently as Country Director for Bangladesh, where he oversaw the organization's single-largest development operation in the world – embracing integrated food security, school feeding and refugee operations, nutritional support and HIV/AIDS awareness/community health programs.
Learn more about the UN World Food Program.
Thursday, Feb. 2 | Charles Moore, Plastic Oceans
11:30am-1:00pm and 4:30-6:00pm | NSCU Centre for the Performing Arts
Presented by the Neil Brown Distinguished Speaker Series
Capt. Charles Moore of the Algalita Marine Research Foundation first discovered the Great Pacific Garbage Patch -- an endless floating waste of plastic trash. Now he's drawing attention to the growing, choking problem of plastic debris in our seas.
Charles Moore's 2009 TED Talk Learn more about the Algalita Marine Research Foundation.
Tuesday, Feb. 7 | The Waterscapes Project
7pm | Cedar 148 | Co-sponsored by The Capilano Review and Capilano's Liberal Studies BA
Gu Xiong, Chris Lee, and Jennifer Chun will present field notes and photographs from their Waterscapes project, featured in Issue 3.16. of The Capilano Review. Waterscapes: Mapping Migrations Along the Yangtze and Fraser Rivers is an interdisciplinary collaboration that tracks the relationship between the environment and migrant experiences in China and Canada by comparing two major riverways.
Thursday, Feb. 16 | Campus Invasive Plant Pull - A hands-on experience
9:15-9:30am - Orientation, instructions, and safety talk – Cedar Lawn
9:30am-2:30pm - Plant Pulling
Whether you pull for the morning, the afternoon or all day, all are welcome. There will be a hot lunch for volunteers at noon compliments of the CSU Environmental Issues Committee
Dress warmly. Bring gloves. Wear appropriate footwear. RSVP for lunch: sustainability@capilanou.ca
Wednesday, Feb. 29 | Marian Adair, The Status of Biodiversity in British Columbia
7pm | Cedar 148
Our well being depends on healthy ecosystems. Biodiversity in BC is still in relatively good shape, but it is vulnerable to deterioration unless we make changes in the way we use and relate to the natural world. Learn more about what biodiversity means from a BC context and why we should care. Marian Adair will be presenting on the major findings from Taking Nature's Pulse: The Status of Biodiversity in BC.
Marian Adair, RPBio
Marian joined The Nature Trust in 2002 as their Habitat Ecologist and finds constant stimulation working with the staff and Board members toward The Nature Trust’s role in conserving this province’s areas of highest biodiversity value. One of the most inspirational challenges for Marian has been her work as co-chair and more recently as chair of Biodiversity BC; a role she has held since its inception in 2005. The Biodiversity BC Steering Committee whose founding members are representatives from five conservation organizations and three government levels was mandated to develop a science-based biodiversity strategy for British Columbia.
Marian holds a Bachelor of Science in Botany from the University of Calgary and is a Registered Professional Biologist and member of the College of Applied Biology.
Tuesday, Mar 13th | Alternative Thinking: A symposium on oil pipelines, the impacts, and the alternatives
6-9pm | Cedar 148. Note room change.
The future of the British Columbia Coast may soon be put at much higher risk for an oil spill, which would devastate natural food sources, clean drinking water and the abundance of life we are so lucky to have. Don’t miss this great chance to hear some of the facts, delivered by speakers with a great passion for protecting our coast. Speakers will include: Ben West, Wilderness Committee; Josh Patterson, West Coast Environmental Law; and James Griffiths, Sea Breeze Power Corp.
Thursday, Mar. 15 | Alicia Gladman, Biofuel and Land Rights: The cost of sustainability in an ever-expanding market
11:30am-12:30pm | Cedar 138 | Sponsored by the Liberal Studies BA
The Liberal Studies BA is pleased to host a talk by Alicia Gladman, a former Capilano student now affiliated with the Guatemala Solidarity Project and the Comity de Unidad Campesino. Guatemala has a long history of colonialism and a long-standing struggle for indigenous land rights. Throughout the 30 year long civil war, campesinos and guerilla forces fought for title over their land and their lives, but today there remains an elite group of landowners who continue to abuse their power. The global market for biofuels has powered a new wave of land theft and evictions, once again undermining indigenous rights in favour of the profitable crop of African Palm, which produces biodiesel. Though it has been tagged as a "green" fuel, it warrants much examination before it can be accepted as a sustainable solution.
Sunday, Mar. 18th | Alexandra Morton, Salmon Farming in British Columbia
9:00-10:30am | CE 233 (Note: Location may change. Room booking will be finalized by Friday, Mar. 16th.)
In recent years, Alexandra Morton - recipient of the Murray Newman Award for Aquatic Conversation - has been working to educate the public, lobby government and promote industry change around the farming of salmon on our BC coast. Alexandra will be joining TOUR 342 as guest speaker on the morning of Sunday, March 18th. The class is open to all EarthWork passport holders and interested students, staff, faculty, and members of the local community.
Kickass Canadians: Dr. Alexandra Morton | A Profile
Thursday, Mar. 22 | Elizabeth Elle, Humanity and habitat destruction: what it means for pollinators and food security
7pm | Cedar 148
We are in the midst of a global extinction event that may rival the greatest extinction events in the history of the world-including when the dinosaurs disappeared. The number one cause is habitat loss and conversion of habitat for human use, and the main reason habitat is converted is for agriculture. Ironically, much of our food supply relies on pollination services provided not only by managed bees (like the European honeybee) but by wild bees currently at risk of extinction because of habitat loss. This presentation will introduce you to the diversity of wild bees in BC and beyond, what is known about the possibility of pollinator extinctions, and how wild bees contribute to crop production. It will also ask an important question: who is responsible for stewardship of nature, and do species need to have economic worth to be worthy of conservation?
Dr. Elizabeth Elle is an Associate Professor in the Department of Biological Sciences at Simon Fraser University. A pollination ecologist, Elizabeth researches both plant mating strategies and pollinator biodiversity and conservation. As a member of the Canadian Pollination Initiative she studies the contribution of native bees (we have perhaps 500 species in BC!) to pollination services in both wild and agricultural ecosystems, how our land-use practices impact pollinator biodiversity, and how we can preserve pollination services to wildflowers and crops in the face of pollinator losses.
