The Conflicting Reasons for my Australian Vacation

Posted on July 25, 2023 by climatechangefork

Figure 1 – Map of Australia (Source: Geology.com)

Figure 2 – The three national parks around Darwin

My wife and I are back from a three-week vacation in Australia. In this blog, I will try to explain why we went there in the first place and why my next series of blogs will be dedicated to this trip. The trip was structured so we spent half of the time with family in Melbourne and the other half of the time in Darwin and the surrounding national parks. As strange as it sounds, both halves connected to the rapid changes that now afflict our planet, and to which this blog is dedicated. However, the connection to climate change of such a trip is unquestionably problematic: the flying distance from New York City, where we live, to Melbourne is 16,763 km (10,418 miles). In addition, the distance between Melbourne and Darwin is 3,740 km. There is no question that flying such distances is not good for the planet. To add to that, both my wife and I are of an advanced age (I am of a considerably more advanced age than my wife) and our health is fragile. Flying such distances in economy class is brutal for our bodies. Fortunately, we could afford to fly business class. By doing so, however, we doubled the environmental impact of our flights.

The main driving force that led us to take the trip was the family trip to Melbourne. My family there started with my cousin (his father and mine were brothers), who is eight years older than me, also born in Warsaw, Poland. Unlike me, he encountered the Nazi invasion at the age of 8 (I was 3 months old when the Nazis invaded Poland). He survived the Holocaust and after a few years in Israel, he ended up in Melbourne with his stepfather and his mother. A few months ago, he was interviewed in Australia about his early experiences. Recently, he lost his wife, and we felt a strong urge to spend some time with him and his family. I will dedicate a future blog to making a case for constructing massive societal family trees until we demonstrate that all of us are members of the same family and thus share responsibility for each other’s well-being.

Summer break usually gives faculty time to “rearm” themselves with developments in their fields. The trip to Darwin—and to the surrounding national parks shown in Figure 2—was designed to accomplish that while also catering to our interest in exploring unfamiliar parts of the world.

July is mid-winter in Melbourne. During our stay, we had one rainy day. It was very pleasant to walk around, but less pleasant to swim. We went to Darwin to experience something different. As can be seen in the opening map, Darwin is at the northern tip of the continent. There is no winter or summer there per se, but there is a dry and a wet season. We were there at the height of the dry season, with temperatures that we might associate with a mild summer (around 25oC or 77oF). Darwin is the capital of the Northern Territory of Australia, with relatively few residents (but a lot of tourists).

The last two blogs, one by me and the other by Sonya Landau, focused on the water stress in Arizona and its conflicts with population growth. Water stress is one of the most important impacts of climate change on Arizona and many other parts of the world. Adaptation to the dry season is one of the most important tools to adapt to climate change. The visit to Darwin taught me how nature can create wonders in the wet season and how the landscape can adapt to water stress during the dry season. The next blog will try to explore these trends further.

We had some surprises in Australia that have nothing to do with environmental impact and thus will not be expanded to separate blogs. The biggest surprise (at least to me) was the news that I really didn’t need to bother exchanging my American dollars for Australian ones. We were told that—at least in the places that we planned to visit—nobody uses cash. We didn’t believe our sources and got some Australian dollars anyway. It turned out our sources were right. In Melbourne, the only place that required cash was a small Chinese restaurant where we had lunch. In Darwin, at the entrance to the Hilton hotel where we stayed, there was a sign, shown in Figure 3.

Photo of blue and white sign that says "This hotel is cashless, no money on site"Figure 3 – The “warning” on Darwin’s Hilton door

We didn’t bother to inquire what was behind the story that made management post the sign. When we went out, the soft drink machines (shown in Figure 4) made the overall shift to a “cashless” economy clear.

Photo of two soft drink vending machines. Both say "100% cashless" at the top.Figure 4 – Soft drink machines in Darwin.

Before leaving Australia, we had to change almost all our Australian money back to American dollars. I didn’t use the trip to start the conversation about the impact of such a shift on people who cannot open bank accounts and get credit cards, however, I have no doubt that such a conversation will start if the trend expands beyond the Australian borders.

Posted in Climate Change | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment

Vacation Notice

Posted on July 18, 2023 by climatechangefork

This week I am taking a break from the blog, so there will be no post. Please do come back next Tuesday, when I promise to continue our discussions.

Posted in Climate Change | Leave a comment

Sonya Landau Guest Blog: Arizona: Water Shortage vs. Population Growth

Posted on July 11, 2023 by climatechangefork

Hi, I’m Sonya Landau. I’ve been Micha’s editor for this blog since the beginning, and have contributed a couple of guest blogs over the years regarding Tucson, water, and heat (see the October 9, 2018 and June 22, 2021 posts). Given that his latest topic is Arizona and the conflict between population growth and water scarcity, I agreed to weigh in again here.

Population Growth

Last week, Micha mentioned the population of the Phoenix metro area, which is growing astronomically. According to the Arizona Commerce Authority, as of 2022, the area boasted a population of 5,040,400 and is projected to reach 8,035,300 by 2052. It is one of the fastest-growing cities in the nation. I’m a native Arizonan and I love the Sonoran Desert. I also understand the lure of relatively low real estate costs. Still, the idea of so many people moving to a place where it regularly reaches over 110oF for extended stretches during the summer and which has a history of chronic drought seems especially absurd in the face of climate change, which promises to worsen both the heat and the availability of water. In contrast, the Tucson area is (fortunately) growing slower. In 2022 it had 1,072,300 people and is expected to reach 1,436,500 by 2052. As Micha has mentioned, there is a very real chance in the not-so-distant future that many Arizona residents will become climate refugees seeking shelter in more temperate areas.

Of course, one of the key considerations in the sustainability of this growth is water. Arizona has had laws since 1980 that require developers in cities to prove a 100-year water supply for each new project that does not rely exclusively on groundwater. The goal is to avoid overtaxing and depleting the finite groundwater reserves. Last month, the state halted approval of some of the construction projects near Phoenix because of doubts about water availability. Already approved projects will continue, as will new ones that exclusively use surface or recycled water rather than groundwater.

The Colorado River and Water Rights

Arizona’s other main water source, the Colorado River, has also been in the news lately for its record low levels and the ongoing battle for usage rights between the lower Colorado Basin states: Arizona, California, and Nevada. The original allotments overestimated supply, based on projections made during a period of extremely high flow, and resulted in problems when the water level dropped. Earlier this summer, the states reached an agreement about how the water will be distributed going forward in light of the historic megadrought and expected effects of climate change. Aside from these states, however, there is also the matter of Native American tribal water rights—in this case, those of the Navajo Nation, which spans parts of Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. There has been a long legal battle to secure water for the struggling area, based on the 1868 treaty, which created the reservation with the promise of a “permanent home.” Unfortunately, last month the Supreme Court ruled against the tribe, denying that the US has obligations to provide reliable water sources on reservations.

Agriculture and Virtual Water

The 1980 law that governs water usage in Arizona’s cities is unhelpful when it comes to the resource’s use in other situations. Arizona has an enormous agricultural industry, and there are very few regulations on water use for farming. According to CNN, “In around 80% of the state, Arizona has no laws overseeing how much water corporate megafarms are using, nor is there any way for the state to track it.” In other words, there are virtually no protocols or procedures in place for the state to establish oversight, much less control.

Oddly, many of the crops grown in Arizona are especially thirsty and ill-fitting for a drought-ridden area. Micha has mentioned the concept of virtual water—the amount of water needed to grow a specific thing. That thing could be a single strawberry or almond, whose water intake is easy to track, or it could be something more complicated, like beef. In this instance, you must first calculate not only how much the cow drinks but also aspects such as how much water goes into growing its food (which is often grown elsewhere). The argument is that exporting produce that was grown with a lot of water in a water-insecure area amounts to the theft of critical natural resources. One of the most prominent crops grown in Arizona (and other places like California) is alfalfa, a type of hay that is used precisely for feeding cows and other livestock. It is a lucrative crop but it also requires an immense amount of water.  This is an especially sensitive subject because much of the crop is grown by foreign companies who export it to feed livestock in other countries. Ironically, one of the biggest farm corporations is from Saudi Arabia; it moved to the US because its own country outlawed the growth of such crops in its arid lands. This summer, Arizona officials have started to crack down on these foreign companies by restricting well permits. Additionally, towns and regions across Arizona are debating new regulations on agricultural water practices, including among people who have traditionally balked at governmental oversight.

Arizona’s governor, Katie Hobbs, also introduced a 100-year study of Phoenix’s groundwater. Additionally:

Governor Hobbs announced a $40 million investment of American Rescue Plan Act funds to spur increased water conservation, fund critical water infrastructure, and promote sustainable groundwater management throughout the State. The Arizona Water Resiliency Fund will be administered by the Arizona Department of Water Resources to facilitate sustainable groundwater management through grants and financial support for pressing water resiliency efforts.

This is a continuing conversation that involves both government officials and community leaders/activists. On the latter side, there is a podcast called Thirst Gap, which addresses how people in the Southwest are coping with a decreasing water supply.

Resilience

Clearly, the high-paced growth of Arizona cities—while alarming—does not show the full picture of Arizona’s water woes. Nor does the number of people moving here (especially to Phoenix) seem to be slowing. There are, however, a few steps that can be taken to make growth more sustainable in the desert. Part of that comes back to neighborhood planning and communication of services. Last week, Micha pointed out the precariousness of heat safety here, and what would happen in the event of a power outage. Several organizations—both governmental and nonprofit—have produced guides with strategies for creating resilient cities and neighborhoods. One such guide describes the issue at hand:

Resiliency is a critical characteristic that allows healthy communities to respond to unknown future changes. Social, economic, political, and environmental changes occur frequently in communities and an ability to adapt to these changes is essential to maintain community health.

The guides pay special attention to the dangers of the deadly Arizona heat and how to mitigate and adapt to potential disasters. These measures include public cooling centers, resilience hubs, identification of especially vulnerable groups, community outreach, and the creation of urban forests/green spaces.

I do not know to what extent these measures will have an immediate or lasting effect on water usage/conservation in the state. I’m not convinced that those who are part of the massive population influx are aware of or willing to help confront the problems but there are plenty of groups of local Arizonans that are making a demonstrable difference. I will list several of these below in case you want to know more.

Resources

Awareness Ranch

Dunbar/Spring Neighborhood Foresters

The Guardian: Dunbar/Spring urban food forest

Live Well Arizona: Resiliency

Oatman Flats Ranch

Phoenix regenerative agriculture

Physicians for Social Responsibility Arizona: Building Resilient Neighborhoods (BRN) Citizens’ Guide

Planning.org: Urban Heat Resilience

Rainwater Harvesting for Drylands and Beyond by Brad Lancaster

The Urban Farm in Phoenix

US Department of Agriculture: Southwest Watershed Research Center in Tucson

Watershed Management Group

Posted in Climate Change | Leave a comment

Arizona: Remedies for Water Shortage

Posted on July 4, 2023 by climatechangefork

By the time that you read this blog (and the next two), I will be in Australia. I will return toward the end of the month, and I will write about some of my experiences. In this blog and with the one that will follow, I will abandon my dark glasses from the last blog and focus on places that are trying to make our life brighter. I am starting with Arizona.

Arizona has been in the news often recently, and not always for the better. Its place in the news is often dominated by two issues: politics and the impact of climate change. The latter focuses especially on rising temperatures and water stress. I am following the daily temperature in the two biggest cities: Phoenix and Tucson. Starting in mid-May, when almost everywhere else in the US was still experiencing spring, the temperature there already hovered around 100oF. It is predicted to go considerably higher this summer, in part due to El Niño’s impact. Toward the end of May, a research article came out in the Journal of Environmental Science and Technology titled, “How Blackouts during Heat Waves Amplify Mortality and Morbidity Risk,” written by 14 coauthors, with Brian Stone Jr. as the corresponding author. The abstract is cited below:

The recent concurrence of electrical grid failure events in time with extreme temperatures is compounding the population health risks of extreme weather episodes. Here, we combine simulated heat exposure data during historical heat wave events in three large U.S. cities to assess the degree to which heat-related mortality and morbidity change in response to a concurrent electrical grid failure event. We develop a novel approach to estimating individually experienced temperature to approximate how personal-level heat exposure changes on an hourly basis, accounting for both outdoor and building-interior exposures. We find the concurrence of a multiday blackout event with heat wave conditions to more than double the estimated rate of heat-related mortality across all three cities, and to require medical attention for between 3% (Atlanta) and more than 50% (Phoenix) of the total urban population in present and future time periods. Our results highlight the need for enhanced electrical grid resilience and support a more spatially expansive use of tree canopy and high albedo roofing materials to lessen heat exposures during compound climate and infrastructure failure events.

Phoenix’s population is now estimated to be 1.6 million and it is the fastest-growing city in the US. Counting the entire Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale metropolitan area, that number is almost 5 million. One of the conclusions of this article is that in case of a heat wave with power failure, 50% of the population would require medical care – that’s 800,000 people (or 2.5 million in the Phoenix metro area)! This is serious. As we can see below, the water availability cannot keep up with the growth:

Underground storage may be a key for Western states navigating water shortages and extreme weather.  Aquifers under the ground have served as a reliable source of water for years. During rainy years, the aquifers would fill up naturally, helping areas get by in the dry years. But growing demand for water coupled with climate change has resulted in shortages as states pump out water from aquifers faster than they can be replenished. The fallout can also lead to damaged vegetation and wildlife as streams run dry and damage to aqueducts and flood control structures from sinking land. Municipalities and researchers across the country are working on ways to more efficiently replenish emptied-out aquifers.  By over pumping aquifers “you’ve created space. There’s space under the ground that used to be filled with water,” explained Michael Kiparsky, water program director at the Center for Law, Energy & the Environment at the University of California, Berkeley School of Law.   “And what we can do with these groundwater recharge projects is take advantage of that space, which is vastly greater than the sum of all of the surface storage reservoirs that exist now or could be built,” he said. Several communities across California, Arizona and other states have been using managed aquifer recharge for years to better regulate local water supplies.  If implemented on a wide enough scale, recharge projects hold the potential to bolster water security in drought-stricken regions while improving the health of the environment.  Kiparsky said if it can be pulled off, “it holds the promise of being able to generate a whole new water supply we really didn’t even know that we had.”

Water stress is a serious issue. I wrote about it in previous blogs (See “Human Reaction to Climate Shift” from November 1, 2022, and “Adaptation and Affordability” from December 6, 2022). As I said then:

In rich countries, such as the United States …in many cases, people are counterintuitively flocking to the most vulnerable places. Most of the fastest-growing states in the United States are in the West and South. In terms of the climate change impacts, the South is known for its floods and the West for its fires and droughts…

Now, Arizona seems to  have done a U-turn and is trying to limit construction in certain areas to try to match growth with available water supply:

As the mayor of an old farming town bursting with new homes, factories and warehouses, Eric Orsborn spends his days thinking about water. The lifeblood for this growth is billions of gallons of water pumped from the ground, and his city, Buckeye, Ariz., is thirsty for more as builders push deeper into the desert fringes of Phoenix.

But last week, Arizona announced it would limit some future home construction in Buckeye and other places because of a shortfall in groundwater. The worried calls started pouring in to Mr. Orsborn.

“I have neighbors who come up to me and say, ‘What are you doing? Are we running out of water?’” Mr. Orsborn said. “It put our community on edge, thinking, ‘What is going on here and do I need to move?’”

No, he tells them. Breathe.

The upheaval was caused by a new state study that found groundwater supplies in the Phoenix area were about 4 percent short of what is needed for planned growth over the next 100 years. That may feel like a far-off horizon, but it is enough of a change to force the state to rethink its future in the near and long terms.

Arizona has some of the strictest groundwater laws in the country in more regulated areas like Phoenix. For decades, the state has required new developments to show they have a 100-year supply of water before they can sell lots or break ground.

Arizona is also trying to increase its water supply by using desalination. However, a quick look at the map below shows that Arizona doesn’t have access to the ocean. What it has is a border with California, which has a long ocean shore. However, California, for a variety of reasons, also has massive water stress. For a long time, the state has been considering constructing water desalination systems. I wrote about it 10 years ago (See the November 12, November 19, and December 3, 2013 blogs). The feedback on my writing by a Californian expert on the water issue (Peter Gleick) can be found in the November 19, 2013 blog.

(Source: Wikimedia SVG map of the United States, Created by Wapcaplet)

I tried to get more recent information on desalination efforts in California and ended up with one company:

Environmentalists say desalination decimates ocean life, costs too much money and energy, and soon will be made obsolete by water recycling. But as Western states face an epic drought, regulators appear ready to approve a desalination plant in Huntington Beach, California.

After spending 22 years and $100 million navigating a thicket of state regulations and environmentalists’ challenges, Poseidon Water is down to one major regulatory hurdle – the California Coastal Commission. The company feels confident enough to talk of breaking ground by the end of next year on the $1.4 billion plant that would produce some 50 million gallons of drinking water daily.

Arizona was apparently familiar with desalination efforts in California and decided to try to build its own facility in Mexico:

Fifty miles south of the U.S. border, at the edge of a city on the Gulf of California, a few acres of dusty shrubs could determine the future of Arizona.

As the state’s two major sources of water, groundwater and the Colorado River, dwindle from drought, climate change and overuse, officials are considering a hydrological Hail Mary: the construction of a plant in Mexico to suck salt out of seawater, then pipe that water hundreds of miles, much of it uphill, to Phoenix.

The idea of building a desalination plant in Mexico has been discussed in Arizona for years. But now, a $5 billion project proposed by an Israeli company is under serious consideration, an indication of how worries about water shortages are rattling policymakers in Arizona and across the American West.

The pipeline is proposed to move desalinated water from Mexico to Phoenix. There is a strong likelihood of it passing close to Tucson. Tucson is the second largest city in Arizona; its present rate of growth is considerably slower than that of Phoenix. However, most of the water-related policies are decided at the state level. We are fortunate to have a friend in Tucson: Sonya Landau, the editor of this blog (see her guest blogs from June 22, 2021 and October 9, 2018). It will be fascinating to see her take on Arizona’s fight between water and growth in next week’s guest blog.

Posted in Climate Change, US, Water | 1 Comment

Phase Transition in People’s Movements

Posted on June 27, 2023 by climatechangefork

(Source: Mitratech)

As I mentioned in earlier blogs, my spring semester is over, and the summer break has started. My wife and I have been dealing with some health issues and we were thinking seriously about staying home, recuperating, and doing some home-bound research (AI??) to get us ready for the Fall semester that starts at the end of August. Then, the sky turned orange on us, Manhattan became invisible, and there were predictions that the situation will worsen when El Niño comes to visit later in the summer. The issue isn’t confined to where I live, either. Local scenes all over are predicted to expand and worsen:

As climate change drives an increase in wildfires, we’re seeing more smoke lofted into the upper atmosphere each fire season. Depending on wind and weather, this smoke can spread hundreds or thousands of miles from its source—as we saw in early June on the U.S. East Coast.

And we’re likely to continue seeing it increase in severity, frequency, and longevity as the planet warms.

In addition to these prospects, the head of our family in Australia (my cousin – older than me!!) is not in great shape. We decided it’s time to forget all our problems here and visit him in Australia (it’s the start of winter there). We leave soon.

Meanwhile, the climate crisis is also starting to take shape as a financial crisis:

This month, the largest homeowner insurance company in California, State Farm, announced that it would stop selling coverage to homeowners. That’s not just in wildfire zones, but everywhere in the state. Insurance companies, tired of losing money, are raising rates, restricting coverage or pulling out of some areas altogether — making it more expensive for people to live in their homes. “Risk has a price,” said Roy Wright, the former official in charge of insurance at the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and now head of the Insurance Institute for Business and Home Safety, a research group. “We’re just now seeing it.”

It’s not just the insurance companies that are calculating the livability of different places. According to ProPublica:

Climate change is remapping where humans can exist on the planet. As optimum conditions shift away from the equator and toward the poles, more than 600 million people have already been stranded outside of a crucial environmental niche that scientists say best supports life. By late this century, according to a study published last month in the journal Nature Sustainability, 3 to 6 billion people, or between a third and a half of humanity, could be trapped outside of that zone, facing extreme heat, food scarcity and higher death rates, unless emissions are sharply curtailed or mass migration is accommodated.

In an earlier blog (September 17, 2019), I tried to explain how a mama polar bear teaches her cubs the nature of phase transition by noting the sizes of icebergs floating in the surrounding water and pointing out how they constantly change. That blog was focused on energy transition. This blog is focused on people’s attempts to move when they face changes that they don’t like. I started it with my simple vacation announcement (getting out of NYC). There’s been another major movement: as a result of COVID-19, it was a necessity, for a time, to do much of our work from home. Technology developed that enabled many of us to do so much more conveniently. This technology stays with us, even as the pandemic is abating, triggering major societal changes.

Dictionary.com distinguishes between the movements of people, starting with the following introduction:

There are a lot of words to refer to people who move from one place to another. Some are used in overlapping ways, but there are key differences between many of them, including whether the person is coming or going, and for what reasons.

The dictionary chooses to concentrate on differentiating between the following classes of movement:

⚡ Quick summary

  • emigrant vs. immigrant: An emigrant is someone who emigrates—moves away from a country. An immigrant is someone who immigrates—moves to a different country. Both words can apply to the same person—a person must first emigrate to immigrate. However, these terms are often used to distinguish different groups, such as when tracking how many people are moving to a country and how many are moving away.
  • immigrant vs. migrant: Migrant can generally refer to a person who moves from one place to another (or back and forth). It’s often used more specifically to refer to a migrant worker (who moves from place to place for work) or as another way of referring to an immigrant (which implies permanent relocation), especially one who may be subject to removal from the country they are trying to relocate to.
  • migrant vs. refugee: Refugee specifically implies that a person is fleeing their country for their safety, often due to war or political persecution. This may be the case for many migrants, but the word itself does not imply this, and the term is used more broadly.
  • refugee vs. asylum seeker: Asylum seeker specifically refers to a person who applies for refuge or asylum in a foreign country or its embassy, especially for political reasons. Some refugees may be asylum seekers, but not all asylum seekers necessarily consider themselves refugees.

The smaller movements, such as travel and workplace choices, are not mentioned; these include the “movements” that I am currently engaged in. These small movements are mostly voluntary and taken by people that can afford them, as opposed to the mostly forced movements described by the dictionary. In a sense, I started my life among those labels listed above—the Holocaust forced me to migrate—and I am closing my life as a voluntary traveler.

The constant movement of people throughout the world is not new; nor is such movement unique to humans. Everything that can move does so to better their survival prospects. Our current situation is introducing natural limits to both human population and livable places. Now climate change, driven by anthropogenic changes in livable places, is accelerating those limits and converting the situation to a phase transition. There are two main phases as I see them: either the availability of living places decreases to a degree that might drive the human race to extinction, or we adapt and mitigate the changes, allowing humanity to flourish in the future. The latter option would depend on transitioning our energy use to fusion and thus converting Earth to a “star” that will circle the sun as a binary system with robotic, artificial intelligence to guide humanity’s long-term existence. Based on our current global governing system, if I were a betting man, I would bet on the dark side (extinction), and do what I could to shift the prospects.

Let us examine a bit more closely the prospective limits to living space:

Globally the exponential population increase over the last century has driven various movements based on the final sizes of the habitable land. One of my favorite science blogs gives an overview:

Landcover is one key way that we can measure how much of the terrestrial environment has been covered by humans. Earth’s surface is about 500 million km2, but most of that (70.8%) is water, which we’re not really very good at. So ignoring oil rigs and the occasional cruise liner, we’re only talking about a total possible land surface to cover of roughly 149 million km2.

The thing is, landcover is something that is changing (and our technology to estimate it is improving) constantly, so even fairly recent estimates may already be out of date. A meta-analysis in 2011, which included 326 studies of urban landcover using remote sensing technology such as satellite images, found that urban landcover increased by nearly 60,000 km2 between 1970 and 2000.

In the year 2000, estimates suggest that globally, urban land covered somewhere between 700,000 and 3.5 million km2 – but that’s a pretty big margin of error. The meta-analysis found that the largest rates of increase in urban landcover were seen in India, China and Africa, while North America experienced the largest total change since 1970. In all regions, urban land expanded either faster or equivalent to population growth rates, suggesting our societies are also becoming more expansive.

Using data from 1970 to 2000, the researchers then tried to project future urban land cover change – their results predict that global urban landcover will increase by a further 1.5 million km2 by 2030. Over half-way to this prediction, where are we now?

Trying to explain the consequences of humanity’s movements to her cubs is a big job for a mama polar bear, and I am afraid that it will not get easier—either for her or the rest of us.

Posted in Climate Change, immigration | Leave a comment

Prerequisites Part 2: Continuing Education

Posted on June 20, 2023 by climatechangefork

(Source: Education Corner)

Last week’s blog ended with the following two short paragraphs:

Mid-career or career-shift education seems to be the right remedy for acquiring job-relevant knowledge of the fast-changing reality. Adult education is being offered now in many colleges. I will expand on this issue in my next blog.

I’m not sure that everyone needs to go back to school but we do need to take care of dangerous gaps in our knowledge as they affect our decisions, especially when those decisions can have such an enormous impact. I will discuss this more in next week’s blog.

This blog will try to put some content behind these statements.

A broader introduction to continuing education is cited below:

Continuing Education is a form of education that most professionals need to pursue after their formal education to have the most updated knowledge in their field of expertise. There are many mediums and methods for such programs; they would vary from one-time classes, conferences, online courses, and post-degree programs.

Although not all professions require this continuous learning, most specialized careers do. For example, in the medical field, doctors need to continually study and learn new and advanced methods for treating their patients. Health care specialists need to stay current in improving the welfare of everyone. The same thing applies to lawyers, politicians, scientists, professors, and many more experts.

This will prepare you to handle new responsibilities and create better opportunities too. With the continually changing of the globalized society, continuing education will be more commonplace shortly. Even notable people and people in business around the world are advocates of it.

Learning is a lifetime process, so make the most of it by taking advantage of the different sources and platforms for continuing education.

The key relevant sentence in that quote is the last one, particularly in an environment in which reality changes are accelerating at the rate that we are observing.

An earlier blog that was focused on the forecasted population decline (March 7, 2023) showed a global map comparing changes in the 65+ age group, between 2015 and 2050. It indicated a major increase in elderly people. I focused specifically on the developed world, where this shift is accompanied by major increases in social spending on this segment of the population. A more recent accounting goes even further, predicting a decline toward 6 billion by the end of the century (from about 10 billion at the peak around the mid-20th century) with a commensurate accelerated increase in the proportion of the elderly. These newer data indicate that the largest 15 countries by GDP all have fertility rates below replacement (this includes India and China) and that globally we are quickly approaching replacement.

I am 84 years old. My wife is younger but not by much. We both have tenure at the same school, and have decided not to retire as long as we can be effective, both in our teaching and service to our institution. Throughout our long academic careers, we have also had the opportunity to take sabbatical breaks, during which we were able to observe the accelerated changes in the reality that surrounds both our professional and private lives. This practice is not unique to our institution; it runs across much of the academic world.

I have mentioned earlier that I have family in France, with whom we are trying to maintain as much contact as we possibly can (see the December 18, 2018 blog, in the context of the Yellow Vests demonstrations). One of the family members, a physician by profession, visited us a few months ago, with her immediate family. She stayed for a week and enjoyed the experience. I asked why she couldn’t stay longer, and she answered that she had to return to work to take over a temporary managerial position. I asked her to consider taking a sabbatical in NYC so we could spend more time together. She didn’t know what I was talking about, and I realized immediately how unique academic situations are. I tried to Google to find out which companies offer a paid sabbatical to their employees and I got a list that looked more like opportunities for extended vacations. They are nice but they are not academic sabbaticals.

I am fully aware that most people go through life without the benefits of higher education. This is particularly true in developing countries, but it is also true in rich countries. The numbers are shown in Figure 1. The bigger issue is primary education and not higher or continuing education (for many, it comes down to gender equity more than the availability of educational institutions).

However, the issues of equity in educational availability and the availability of continuing education are different. In today’s environment, attaining higher education in some form is not a prerequisite for understanding changing environments. It is, however, a tool required to successfully adapt to the changing environment and be able to make a living. There is a difference.

Figure 1 (Source: UNESCO Institute of Statistics via World Resources Simulation Center)

At least in developed countries, and many developing countries, the infrastructure for higher education exists. The infrastructure for continuing education also exists but is a bit chaotic. Higher education is focused on degree programs: you register for a degree, the school states the requirements for the degree, and you follow them. Usually, the degree programs are divided into departments, each of which administers the degree in its particular areas. In principle, most of the courses that are available for degree programs are also available for general education. However, many of the courses (especially in the sciences) are vertical, meaning there are prerequisites for taking them. For a degree program, the responsible departments will set out a degree map, which ensures that you will meet the prerequisites. If you just enroll in a course, paying no attention to the prerequisites, chances are that you will be completely unprepared and will drop out of the course, wasting your time and money.

Back to the first of the two sentences I quoted at the beginning, from last week’s blog:

One of the best ways that is presently being employed to ascertain that job holders follow the changing realities and the progress in their specific areas is to require a license for practitioners. We are used to licenses that give us permission to do stuff, such as drivers’ licenses, passports, and identity cards. Many of the licenses come with expiration dates that require passing some tests before renewals. In the US, most of the licenses are issued by states. From personal experience, growing up and being educated in Israel, many of my friends who attended medical schools took the American exams to practice medicine in some US states as a matter of routine. The rationale was that the demanding tests should not be a problem immediately after finishing medical school but might present a bigger challenge after a year or two out of school.

Business News Daily has a list of professions that require a license:

You already know you need a license to become a truck driver, but did you know that nearly 1 in 4 occupations in the U.S. now require a license? According to data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, about 23% of full-time workers have a license or certification.

Requirements for renewals can be demonstrated by the following regulation in Texas:

Continuing professional education (CPE) is required to renew a standard certificate. Your certificate will be set to inactive status if you do not renew by the expiration date. CPE hours are required, even if your certificate has already been set to inactive status. Certificates cannot be renewed by completing examinations. 

  • Classroom teachers must complete 150 CPE hours.
    • No more than 150 CPE hours are required, even if you hold multiple classroom certificate areas.
  • If you hold an administrative and/or student services certificate you must complete 200 CPE hours.sw
  • No more than 200 CPE hours are required, even if you hold multiple certificates, such as: classroom, administrative and student services certificates.

General CPE information is located on the Continuing Professional Education Information page, along with renewal FAQs.

I added the emphasis on the non-exam requirements to show that there are other ways to measure continued learning within a field.

License requirements are not based on the “noble” wish that we stay up-to-date in our professions. In many cases, the practice is also strongly motivated by the not-so-noble desire to limit competition in the profession. I reserve this issue for a separate discussion.

Should we require a license before approving a US supreme court judge or mandate renewal requirements? I don’t think so! There are effective alternatives. In the case of the US Supreme Court, the chief justice could try to periodically (once every five years?) sort the cases in front of the court into a semi-disciplinary data collection and (politely) ask  every judge to be the point man/woman in that area. It would be at the judge’s discretion to determine if he/she needed additional education in his/her area. That judge would not have different voting powers in his/her areas of specialty, but he/she would be asked to update fellow judges on the latest developments in that particular field.

For higher education institutions, it would be both convenient and doable to expand existing educational structures to include certification demands. In today’s environment, this is already done in schools of education in universities.

Posted in Education | Leave a comment

Prerequisites for Supreme Court Judges

Posted on June 13, 2023 by climatechangefork


(Source: MarcusObal on Wikimedia)

“Playing with fire” is an idiom that has become popular on more than one level. Cambridge Dictionary describes it as “to act in a way that is very dangerous and to take risks.” I am writing this blog in NYC, which is currently (hopefully for only a short time), the most polluted big city in the world, due to a weather system driving the smog from major wildfires in Eastern Canada in our direction. One can combine this idiom with reality in many major environmental indicators. To demonstrate the issue and offer a possible solution, I will start with the US Supreme Court. About two weeks ago, the Supreme Court announced an important, unanimous environmental decision, the essence of which is summarized in the New York Times article below:

After half a century of painstaking restoration under the Clean Water Act, streams and wetlands nationwide are once again at risk of contamination by pollution and outright destruction as a result of a ruling on Thursday by the Supreme Court.

The Environmental Protection Agency has long interpreted the Clean Water Act as protecting most of the nation’s wetlands from pollution. But now the court has significantly limited the reach of the law, concluding that it precludes the agency from regulating discharges of pollution into wetlands unless they have “a continuous surface connection” to bodies of water that, using “ordinary parlance,” the court described as streams, oceans, rivers and lakes.

At least half of the nation’s wetlands could lose protection under this ruling, which provides an even narrower definition of “protected waters” than the Trump administration had sought.

The full ruling is posted on the court’s webpage.

I want to emphasize that although the ruling was unanimous, it came with four separate justifications, each of which will probably have a strong impact in terms of the future authority of the EPA or, more broadly will put such authority to the test again in a not-so-distant future. Below is the essence of Justice Kavanaugh’s separate reasoning (to which the three liberal justices joined). He agreed with the ruling but was troubled about the potential ramifications:

I write separately because I respectfully disagree with the Court’s new test for assessing when wetlands are covered by the Clean Water Act. The Court concludes that wetlands are covered by the Act only when the wetlands have a “continuous surface connection” to waters of the United States—that is, when the wetlands are “adjoining” covered waters. Ante, at 20, 22 (internal quotation marks omitted). In my view, the Court’s “continuous surface connection” test departs from the statutory text, from 45 years of consistent agency practice, and from this Court’s precedents. The Court’s test narrows the Clean Water Act’s coverage of “adjacent” wetlands to mean only “adjoining” wetlands. But “adjacent” and “adjoining” have distinct meanings: Adjoining wetlands are contiguous to or bordering a covered water, whereas adjacent wetlands include both (i) those wetlands contiguous to or bordering a covered water, and (ii) wetlands separated from a covered water only by a man-made dike or barrier, natural river berm, beach dune, or the like. By narrowing the Act’s coverage of wetlands to only adjoining wetlands, the Court’s new test will leave some long-regulated adjacent wetlands no longer covered by the Clean Water Act, with significant repercussions for water quality and flood control throughout the United States. Therefore, I respectfully concur only in the Court’s judgment.

In different words, Justice Kavanaugh is accusing some of his colleagues of being ignorant about basic environmental workings, like the interconnections of the global water cycle. To put it more broadly, he accuses other justices of playing with fire when it comes to our environmental well-being.

The last few blogs (starting on April 25th, with the Earth Day blog) focused on colleges’ attempts to include the accelerating global realities that will affect students throughout their lifetimes into the official strategic plans. I indicated that faculty can be prepared for such instruction only through conducting and/or following timely research. Most of these reality changes are anthropogenic. They break the traditional separations of physical and social sciences. It is not surprising that the impact of these changing realities doesn’t stop at the gates of universities but has spread to affect all of us and everything we do, including the role of supreme court judges.

This is starting to come to life in another decision, still pending before the Supreme Court, regarding the admission criteria that colleges and universities are allowed to use. David Brooks makes an interesting point in his op-ed, suggesting that race-based affirmative action be replaced by a class-based equivalent:

We now have whole industries that take attendance at an elite school as a marker of whether they should hire you or not. So the hierarchies built by the admissions committees get replicated across society. America has become a nation in which the elite educated few marry each other, send their kids to the same exclusive schools, move to the same wealthy neighborhoods and pass down disproportionate economic and cultural power from generation to generation — the meritocratic Brahmin class.

And, as Michael Sandel of Harvard has argued, the meritocratic culture gives the “winners” the illusion that this sorting mechanism is righteous and inevitable and that they’ve earned everything they’ve got.

And then we sit around wondering why Trumpian populists revolt.

Worse, this system is built on a definition of “merit” that is utterly bonkers. In what sane world do we sort people — often for life — based on their ability to be teacher-pleasers from age 15 to 18?

The last sentence in the citation can be rewritten: In what sane world do we ask people to perform any job — often for life — based on their ability to be teacher-pleasers from age 15 to 18?

There should be prerequisites for judging environmental issues. We need to redirect, to fill skill deficiencies regardless of age. This is obviously not limited to environmental issues, nor to issues that require a solid science education (STEM). Recently, such a need emerged in another majority decision accusing Andy Warhol of stepping on copyright requirements. Again, it looks like only one minority opinion (Justice Elena Kagan) knew what she was talking about.

Mid-career or career-shift education seems to be the right remedy for acquiring job-relevant knowledge of the fast-changing reality. Adult education is being offered now in many colleges. I will expand on this issue in my next blog.

One good example of how this works is the accelerating emergence of Artificial Intelligence (see ChatGPT) in our everyday life and the emerging realization of the need for government regulations to limit misuse and prevent disasters. A few months ago, one member of Congress recognized the need for more information and took the appropriate step to increase his knowledge of the issue:

For Northern Virginia Congressman Don Beyer, it’s never too late to go back to school. At 72 years old, Beyer — who represents Arlington, Alexandria City, Falls Church and parts of Fairfax County — is a part-time student at George Mason University.

“I’m pursuing a graduate degree in computer science with emphasis on machine learning, and according to George Mason University, that’s the closest to quote unquote artificial intelligence,” said Beyer, a 1972 graduate of Williams College in Massachusetts.

I’m not sure that everyone needs to go back to school but we do need to take care of dangerous gaps in our knowledge as they affect our decisions, especially when those decisions can have such an enormous impact. I will discuss this more in next week’s blog.

Posted in Climate Change | Leave a comment

Incorporating Changing Reality into College Strategic Plans: Part 6: The Many Ways

Posted on June 6, 2023 by climatechangefork

Senator Schumer coordinated what was probably the most consequential senate resolution in his tenure as majority leader, close to midnight on Thursday (June 1st). Even so, he was able to show up Friday morning at Brooklyn’s Barclays Center, to celebrate Brooklyn College’s 2023 graduate commencement. I was impressed.

I have been teaching at Brooklyn College since 1979 (44 Years). In that stretch of time, I have attended many commencements. As far back as I can remember, Senator Schumer has attended. His agreement to honor Brooklyn College graduates probably anchors on the special relationship that his wife, Iris Weinshall, has with the college. She graduated from the College and also served as Vice-Chancellor of CUNY.

Senator Schumer’s attendance at this year’s commencement was probably the most impressive. True, each time, he has told the same story about the choice that he made between taking a trip around the world after his graduation or staying with his new girlfriend. Among older faculty that has heard this story many times, this has become a sort of joke. This year’s graduates, however, heard it for the first time. For them, it was new: a message that now they will have to live with the choices that they make—some of which will be consequential—so they better think hard before they make them.

This commencement also distinguished itself with an address by a former faculty member Tania León (Brooklyn College, Wikipedia). In addition to numerous accolades (coupled with an honorary doctorate), she received an additional distinction, presented by another notable Brooklyn College graduate, Leonard Tow. He announced the establishment of a new distinguished teaching position at the Brooklyn College Conservatory of Music, which will be named in her honor. Another prominent Brooklyn College graduate, Jumaane Williams, is now the Public Advocate for NYC. He advised graduates that failures are good and that they should learn how to handle them. A lack of failures indicates that we aren’t experimenting and thus will also miss successes.

Since my Earth Day blog (April 25th), I have focused on ways to incorporate accelerated changes in global reality into college curricula, emphasizing my own school and university. Major components in all the changing realities are of our own making (anthropogenic). Adaptation and mitigation to these changes will be necessary over the lifetimes of our students and their immediate families. I have emphasized that most of the curricular and research changes that we need to introduce to accomplish these important issues are new both for the students and for faculty, meaning that serious research is needed to find our way through it.

One way to address it is to directly involve students in the changes that the college already has to go through. This practice has been labeled “Campus as a Lab” and I described it repeatedly in an earlier series of blogs (July 19 – October 4, 2022). As classes ended this semester and exams started, the faculty at Brooklyn College organized a Faculty Day to discuss our work and issues in various fields. One symposium that day was a demonstration of various applications of the concept. I presented some of the material I have described in the blogs, focusing on the energy transition. Two other faculty members presented different possible applications:

Prof. Jolanta Kruszelnicka from the Health and Nutrition Sciences Department talked about green building and health, with a real example of how to involve students with the sustainability requirements of new building construction on campus. Meanwhile, Prof. Brett F. Branco from the Earth and Environmental Sciences Departments discussed the role that centers can play in addressing parts of the reality we all live in. Prof. Branco is also the director of the Science and Resilience Institute at Jamaica Bay:

The Institute is a partnership among the National Park Service, the City of New York, and the City University of New York (CUNY) acting on behalf of a Consortium of seven other research institutions: Columbia University, Cornell University, Rutgers University, Stony Brook University, New York Sea Grant, Stevens Institute of Technology, and the Wildlife Conservation Society.

Our mission is to produce integrated knowledge that increases biodiversity, well-being, and adaptive capacity in coastal communities and waters surrounding Jamaica Bay and New York City.

Almost all universities with an active research program create research centers in various relevant topics for which funding is available. As I discussed in an earlier blog, one center that is directly mentioned in the current Brooklyn College Strategic Plan is the Cancer Institute. These research centers actively involve students on various levels and collaborating faculty from various disciplines.

Another productive way to directly involve students in current reality is to try to get them involved with the surrounding community. At Brooklyn College, one productive example is the creation of the Brooklyn College Community Partnership:

The Brooklyn College Community Partnership (BCCP) is a youth development program bridging Brooklyn College to the broader Brooklyn community through initiatives in public middle and high schools and at our Brooklyn College Arts Lab (BCAL). As a youth-centered organization with a long history of community engagement and empowerment, we invite our students to bring their histories, knowledge, and expertise to the learning process. Through our unique relationship with Brooklyn College, we further connect youth to the College campus by leveraging our resources at BCAL, which includes a STEM lab, 2 music studios, a performance stage, and a fashion design lab.

In addition to serving the purpose of directly involving students and faculty in current affairs, this partnership offers a productive opportunity to recruit students to attend the college, a pressing issue these days for many schools.

An alternative to achieve similar objectives with a different audience is to create an Energy Park on the college campus (see the March 24, 2021 blog). Exhibits for the park can be solicited from relevant startups in the neighborhood and research products from college faculty and students.

This concept can be extended beyond energy to a “future park.”

With commencement behind us for this year, this will be the last blog in which I focus on how to incorporate changing realities into the strategic plans of High Education institutions, highlighting my school. However, the issue is important enough to try to open new doors to explore new opportunities to address new needs. The next blog will address the issue of prerequisites in today’s job market, starting with the Supreme Court of the United States.

Posted in Climate Change, Education | Leave a comment

Incorporating Changing Reality into College Strategic Plans: Part 5: Extending Boundaries

Posted on May 30, 2023 by climatechangefork

Non Sequitur by Wiley Miller

My last blog finished with a promise that this blog would propose ways to incorporate attempts to understand accelerated global changes into the strategic plans of local schools. Again, I will focus on my school. These changes include:

Mandated decarbonization

Mandated decrease in the use of single-use plastics

Testing of sewage for early detection of viral threats

Running schools with decreased enrollments

Preparing society for adaptation to extreme conditions.

Various aspects of these changes have served as the main topics for the more than 600 blogs I have posted over the last 11 years. Our students will spend their lives under such reality changes and our main job is to prepare them to function under such conditions. Every school’s strategic plan should be clear about the way that the school is trying to accomplish such a task.

It should be fully understood that global changes such as these require research to understand, adapt to, and mitigate the most damaging effects. School faculty usually cannot draw from their own experiences, whether direct or learned in school, to confront such changes but they are hired to teach their students how to function under such changing environments. All of this means that the accumulated knowledge has to come from research. Global changes such as these never take place simultaneously everywhere. The best way to learn how to function under such changes is to study places where these changing conditions hit hardest and early so feedback to action can also be generated early and analyzed.

As I mentioned earlier, CUNY is a federated university (see the May 17, 2023 blog, part 3 in this series) that covers 25 institutions (11 four-year colleges, 7 community colleges, and 7 graduate/professional schools) and a central administration. Adaptations that reflect the accelerating global changes are compatible with President Abraham Lincoln’s original creation of large-scale, state-based higher education in the form of land-grant universities:

A land-grant university (also called land-grant college or land-grant institution) is an institution of higher education in the United States designated by a state to receive the benefits of the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890.[1]

Signed by Abraham Lincoln in 1862, the first Morrill Act began to fund educational institutions by granting federally controlled land to the states for them to sell, to raise funds, to establish and endow “land-grant” colleges. The mission of these institutions as set forth in the 1862 act is to focus on the teaching of practical agriculture, science, military science, and engineering—although “without excluding other scientific and classical studies”—as a response to the industrial revolution and changing social class.[2][3] This mission was in contrast to the historic practice of higher education concentrating on a liberal arts curriculum. A 1994 expansion gave land-grant status to several tribal colleges and universities.[4]

Ultimately, most land-grant colleges became large public universities that today offer a full spectrum of educational opportunities. However, some land-grant colleges are private, including Cornell University, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and Tuskegee University.[5]

The key sentence of this introductory paragraph is that which clarifies that the institutions were meant to teach multiple topics—both “practical” and those relating to science and classical studies. At that time, the US reality was dominated by land and agriculture. Now it is changing quickly, as a result of anthropogenic (human-triggered) dominance. The need to adapt to the changing reality is the same. New universities need not be created but their curricula need to be changed to accommodate.

Map of Land-Grant Universities in the US

Figure 1 –The Land-Grant Universities in the US (Source: EveryCRSReport.com)

Back to the BC Strategic Plan. Aside from the creation of the Cancer Institute, the present strategic plan does not mention research content. However, this strategic plan is about to expire, to be replaced by a new one. I have no idea what shape the new plan will take, but I can hope and make suggestions.

CUNY has the advantage of being a multi-institutional organization with strong centralized governance. A few of the largest changes that need to be accommodated, such as timely decarbonization of energy use and decrease of single-use plastic, are mandated by the State and City governments. The university is now working on them and I am involved in this work.

These efforts are coordinated by the CUNY Central Sustainability Office (Sustainable CUNY, see June 4, 2019). To implement changes, the office invites representatives from each of the institutes to analyze issues and make recommendations. Usually, the results are not mandated by the central office. Rather, we see them as announcements from individual colleges that they are creating pilot projects. The colleges work with the central office to draft timelines and deliverables for the projects. The results are analyzed on a timely basis to decide if, how, and when, to extend these pilots to the entire university. Once this takes place, the changes become mandated.

These dynamics can be explicitly stated in the strategic plan.

Incorporating decarbonization of energy use and reducing the use of single-use plastic are both relatively simple, mandated changes. The pilot steps taken require feasibility and economic analyses but not scientific breakthroughs. Water stress and other calamities that result from climate change feedback can bring a major need for adaptations, in which new technology might be required. Here, we might take advantage of the federated structure of the country that we live in.

As I mentioned earlier, accelerated global changes do not hit either this country or the world uniformly. A good example is the impact of climate change on the water cycle.

Up to now, NYC, the place where I live and work, has hardly been impacted. The Southwest, where Sonya Landau, my friend, and the editor of this blog (June 22, 2021) lives, is already suffering temperatures in the upper 90s(oF) temperature and a multi-year drought. The region is now in a race against accelerated climate change, seeking ways to be less dependent on fresh water. There is no question in almost anyone’s mind that the water stress will expand to hit every corner of the world. The two recent references below will provide some background:

NYT Op-Ed: When One Almond Gulps 3.2 Gallons of Water

NPR: Arizona farmers rely on drought-stricken Colorado River to water crops

We all should be prepared—especially our students. We can strive to expand our boundaries and collaborate with schools in other areas to allow our students to do relevant research on these issues.

Next week’s blog will continue exploring the same line of thinking and will include experiences of College as a Lab and collaboration with local industry on college campuses.

Posted in Climate Change | Leave a comment

Incorporating Changing Reality into College Strategic Plans: Part 4: Incorporated Research

Posted on May 23, 2023 by climatechangefork

Physics laboratory at Brooklyn College

This blog tries to deliver on last week’s blog’s promise to look at the broader impacts of research in the Brooklyn College (BC) Strategic Plan. As I’ve mentioned in earlier blogs in this series, universities are endowed with the strongly interconnected dual functions of education and research. Much of the learning happens through research; at the same time, the structure of most universities is departmental, rooted in the education task. Furthermore, since most students come to universities in their late teens or early twenties with the expectation that the university will prepare them for a productive future of their choosing, the university’s vision should be focused on the future. Neither faculty nor students are prophets endowed with the ability to predict the future. Instead, the role of universities is to engage in research that contributes to understanding the past and present and draws sound consequences about the likely future and what needs to be done to prepare for a variety of scenarios that might develop.

All universities understand this mission. Again, as in previous blogs in this series, I will focus on my university (CUNY) and my College (Brooklyn College).

The key documents of the strategic plans, including the list of goals, were first mentioned in an earlier blog (May 2, 2023), however, I am repeating them below:

  • Goal 1: enhance our academic excellence.
  • Goal 2: increase undergraduate, master’s, and doctoral students’ success.
  • Goal 3: educate students about opportunities for fulfilling work and leadership in their communities.
  • Goal 4: develop a nimble, responsive, and efficient structure to serve our students and carry out our mission.
  • Goal 5: leverage Brooklyn College’s reputation for academic excellence and upward mobility.

The two key documents include a 43-page detailed version  of the plan and a much shorter, tabular, version of 5 pages that focuses on the main performance indicators. Earlier blogs in this series focused on the shorter document. Taking only the Key Performance Indicators and Targets from the shorter tabular plan gives us the following entries, with the first number indicating the goal number:

1.2b Increase the average number of faculty pieces of scholarship/creative activity from 0.9 to 1.3 (2017-2018 PMP).

1.2c increased number of funded research grants from 45 to 53 (2017-2018 PMP).

4.4b Increase the total number of alumni donors by 30% from 5849 to 7644 (FY 2018, OIA). 4.4c Increase external funding (donor, grant and foundation support) by 50% from $8.9 million in FY 2018-2019 to $13.35 million in FY 2023 (OIA).

For more details, and to emphasize research, we need to examine the longer plan. Its typical structure consists of a list of objectives, along with a particular goal, the college office that will be held responsible, and a list of benchmarks to be followed. A brief reminder here, that shortly after this plan was instituted, we were all hit with the COVID-19 pandemic, which made most of the commitments difficult to follow. This week, I’m looking at three research-related examples from the latest strategic plan. Two of the examples are given below. I discuss the third one later in the blog.

  • Improve the office of grants and research:
    • Goal 1D:  Support and promote excellent research and increase sponsored research to advance intellectual inquiry.

 a. The Office of the Provost will enhance staffing and resources at the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs to meet the needs of faculty across the college.

YEAR 1 BENCHMARK: Assess the staffing needs of the Office of Research and Sponsored Programs (ORSP) and evaluate its effectiveness for faculty.

YEAR 2 BENCHMARK: Hire full-time grants manager for the School of Natural and Behavioral Sciences (NBS). The dean will develop a school-wide plan for NBS to enhance research.

YEAR 3 BENCHMARK: Make necessary staff and operations adjustments based on the assessment in Year 1. Deans across the campus will develop plans to enhance research.

YEARS 4 AND 5 BENCHMARKS: New staff will work with faculty to carry out the plans to apply for additional grants.

5-YEAR OUTCOMES: Enhance staffing of ORSP to enable enhanced support for the pursuit of grants across the five schools

d. The dean of the School of Natural and Behavioral Sciences and the Brooklyn College Foundation will work with departments to generate funds and coordinate researchers on campus to create an interdisciplinary Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research.

YEAR 1 BENCHMARK: Establish the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research through Brooklyn College and CUNY governance bodies. Develop a fundraising case for support for the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research.

YEAR 2 BENCHMARK: Develop a methodology of using Research Foundation indirect cost recovery funds to create a stream of revenue for operating costs for the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research.

YEAR 3 BENCHMARK: The dean of the School of Natural and Behavioral Sciences and the Brooklyn College Foundation will develop a list of potential individual and institutional donors to support the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research. Solicit lead support for facilities, endowed positions, and research projects. Develop a public communications plan that supports the effort.

YEAR 4 BENCHMARK: Refine the case and expand fundraising solicitations for the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research to individual and institutional donors prospects.

YEAR 5 BENCHMARK: Steward lead gift donors and expand engagement of individual and institutional donor prospects for priority funding opportunities for the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research.

5-YEAR OUTCOMES: Enhance external funding for facilities and operations of the Brooklyn College Center for Cancer Research.

Similarly to the task of the Dean of Behavioral and Natural Sciences, all five college deans are tasked to “work with departments and programs to generate funds to advance research and creative work,” in areas relevant to their schools.

Not surprisingly, the content of the research is hardly mentioned (faculty don’t like to be told what research they should do). The only content-related entry is the recent establishment of a Cancer Center at Brooklyn College, which I’ve mentioned previously. However, all research needs financial support and successful, productive, research enhances the standing of the institution. The “broader impact” of addressing the needs of society beyond the university walls is accounted for in both versions of the plan. Table 1 addresses the relevant sections in the tabular plan, however, the key performance indicators have yet to be assigned for these particular segments:

Table 1 – Selected “broader impact” segments of BC Strategic Plan 2

Objective Strategic Action Priorities Key Performance Indicators and Targets
3.4 Prepare students to become engaged, global citizens and decision makers in a complex, diverse, and sustainable society. The Brooklyn College Foundation and the Office of International Education and Global Engagement will expand funding to support students to study, work, and intern abroad
5.3 Position and develop Brooklyn College as a vital resource to advance the public good in our borough. Brooklyn College, working closely with the Center for the Study of Brooklyn, will strengthen partnerships, with organizations and projects that share our commitment to advancing the public good, such as the Brooklyn Museum, the Brooklyn Historical Society, the Brooklyn Botanic Garden, the New York City Department of Education, The New York City Department of Environmental Protection, the Mayor’s Office, community boards, city parks, the National Park Service, the Rockefeller Foundation, and the Department of Sanitation’s Compost Project, and increase students’ opportunities to engage with them.

The needs for interdisciplinary training of society and students are addressed separately in Goal 1A-b of the detailed plan:

The provost and deans will support and encourage the cross-school development and success of curricula, programs, and major/minor pairs that promote interdisciplinary work.

YEAR 1 BENCHMARK: The deans will collaborate to prepare an inventory of existing major/minor pairs within schools and major/minor pairs across schools that promote interdisciplinary work. The deans will catalogue, communicate, and promote these pairs.

YEAR 2 BENCHMARK: Building upon existing programs and supporting new ideas, the deans will collaborate with faculty to assess potential new major/minor pairs that promote interdisciplinary work.

YEAR 3 BENCHMARK: The deans will support faculty and departments in the development of new curricula to promote the major/minor pairs identified in Year 2. Curriculum changes will be submitted to Faculty Council.

YEAR 4 BENCHMARK: Faculty and departments will teach courses in the new major/minor pairs. These will be documented and promoted to students. Additional pairs will be developed.

YEAR 5 BENCHMARK: The provost, deans, and departments will collaborate to assess the effectiveness of the new major/minor pairs for promoting interdisciplinary work.

5-YEAR OUTCOMES: A well-thought-out set of cross-school course offerings that meets the needs of students and faculty in participating departments, interdisciplinary programs, and schools will be documented and promoted.

We are now living in an era of accelerated changing global realities (See September 27, 2022 blog) in areas such as:

  • Mandated decarbonization
  • Mandated decrease in the use of single-use plastics
  • Testing of sewage for early detection of viral threats
  • Running schools with decreased enrollments
  • Preparing society for adaptation to extreme conditions.

The present BC strategic plans do not mention such changes. However, this strategic plan is about to expire, to be replaced by a new one. The next blog will focus on my thoughts about preparation for such changes in future strategic plans.

Posted in Climate Change, Education | Tagged , , , , | Leave a comment