I went to Banff National Park this past weekend. Mostly I avoided popular places because Covid is raging in the province. But both times I ended up where people were, I saw people getting too close to wildlife and someone feeding or intending to feed the animals. To me, this behaviour is evident of the … Continue reading
Okay, so 2+2=4. If that’s the question, I can probably grade it. But most of what I teach is sustainability and “right” answers are a lot less clear. I’ve been doing research into self-reflection and sustainable assessment recently for a project and I think it applies here. Sustainable assessment, described by Boud and Falchikov (2007), … Continue reading
It’s week 3 of the Great Cycle Challenge Canada, raising funds and awareness for childhood cancer research. One of the most inspiring parts of participating in this event is the number of kids who are current or past cancer patients who ride their own distances in the challenge. Thinking of them makes it pretty insignificant … Continue reading
In Edmonton, Alberta, Canada we have an organization, Fresh Routes, that runs a mobile grocery store. One of the main goals is to increase access to fresh, healthy foods in low income neighbourhoods. This is necessary because these neighbourhoods often have reduced access to major grocery stores. The residents rely on public transit and active … Continue reading
Support for making a societal shift from fossil fuels to renewable energy is growing but one of the issues is where to locate things like solar and wind farms. These generation points don’t have the same ongoing emissions as fossil fuel run plants so there is potential to locate them closer to communities without the … Continue reading
As someone who takes personal action and supports policies to take wider action to combat climate change and as someone living in a province where the current government makes regular decisions that go in the face of the science and bet against the need for climate change action, I’m curious what would make a policymaker … Continue reading
I was speaking with a student who was a member of a First Nations group once about her language when she made a comment that has stuck with me for several years. She said that when she moved to the city to pursue school she had to give up part of her language. This wasn’t, … Continue reading
Yep, you read that correct, tree farts. I’ve been walking in Edmonton’s river valley a lot this year and I’ve noticed a lot of standing dead trees, often called snags. I don’t know if there’s actually more than normal around here but in coastal areas there has been an increase thanks to climate change. Climate … Continue reading
The other day, I went down a rabbit hole trying to find out if there were any differences between brown and white eggs. They are laid by different types of chickens and traditionally the hens that laid brown eggs were bigger and therefore cost more to feed, hence the price difference that got passed to … Continue reading
I’ve been thinking a lot recently about individual versus collective actions. When I worked in energy efficiency we often focused on individual actions as being a starting point towards sustainability. Part of the hope was that if an individual engaged in individual actions like installing a high energy furnace or not idling while they waited … Continue reading