| The CUNY IVE/CollegeNow Nature of New York Initiative
is a series of workshops and credit-bearing courses that offer younger CUNY
students a hands-on learning experience in urban ecology and environmental
leadership. In addition to the traditional classroom exposure to the natural
sciences, students are given the unique opportunity to explore the city's
wildlife and engage in direct ecological action through experiential learning
projects. Students are introduced to a network of NY-based environmental
and scientific organizations and exposed to as many summer internship and
career opportunities. They are encouraged to see and help solve the many
environmental and public health issues that face their communities (air
and water quality, waste vs. energy conservation, traffic congestion vs.
public transportation, plant, animal and habitat preservation, ecological
footprinting).
The classroom experience: focuses on ecological literacy; i.e.: learning
the processes and patterns that define all living systems (cells, organisms,
communities, ecosystems) and their role in sustaining the natural history
of the NY region.
Field trips: focus on the forests of Inwood Park (Manhattan) and wetlands
of Jamaica Bay and the Hudson River Estuary (Queens, Brooklyn). Students
explore and help inventory the rocks, plants and animals of the New York
region and learn how they combine to benefit the health and well-being
of the city’s inhabitants. In the process students become creators,
not just consumers of knowledge.
Environmental leadership and career opportunities: students identify
and pursue their own projects. Instruction assists them with networking
resources and an early exposure to potential professional and/or academic
careers in the natural sciences and environmental health. Students are
invited to join the IVE ‘Green teams Initiative”
as an additional provided resource.
Most importantly, the IVE/CN Nature of New York series aims to help students
develop their own personal relationship to the natural environment, by
providing them with the vision needed to identify the ecological realities
of their everyday existence.
Links:
Pictures
from IVE/CN Winter Workshop 2005
Pictures
from IVE/CN Now Spring Workshop 2005
Video from IVE/CN Now Spring Workshop 2005 |
