FYSOP Environment

Believe it or not, the week of FYSOP is right around the corner. This summer has been incredible, and helping to plan this program has been a great experience. So I asked myself…what am I most excited for? I think I’m most excited to visit a site. As coordinators, we are responsible for all of the behind the scenes action, like planning education day, finding the sites, creating the information packet– and making sure everything goes according to plan during FYSOP. But for one day, we get to go to a site and volunteer with you guys. I can’t wait to experience FYSOP, and get my hands dirty. Here’s a quick video I made to keep everyone as excited as I am:

With FYSOP right around the corner, there are MANY things for me to look forward to. But, out of all of these things, most of all I am excited for Education Day! Education Day is an entire day devoted to learning about your issue area. The coordinators will be having speakers, showing movies, and doing other fun activities to expose their volunteers to problems within their issue area. Miles and I have a lot of fun and informative things planned for you, so I hope that you’re excited, too!

Franklin Park Zoo- The Franklin Park Zoo, which is located in Dorchester, is part of a group of zoos, called Zoo New England. The mission of Zoo New England is “to inspire people to protect and sustain the natural world for future generations by creating fun and engaging experiences that integrate wildlife and conservation programs, research, and education.” Right now, Zoo New England is involved in a number of animal conservation programs and are therefore working closely with amphibians, turtles, butterflies, wolves, snow leopards, and cranes. The Franklin Park Zoo has many exhibits featuring animals ranging from gorillas to hypos to snakes. When groups are volunteering at the Franklin Park Zoo, they will be helping to clean up animal habitats and engaging in other maintenance tasks around the zoo.

Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary- The Wellfleet Bay Wildlife Sanctuary is located in Cape Cod. It is made up of 1,100 acres of salt marsh, beach, woodland, and freshwater ponds. There are also five miles of trails and butterfly and hummingbird gardens. Here, you can see lots of wildlife including birds and seals. Volunteers will be taking part in trail maintenance and beach clean up.

Sharing the Harvest Community Farm - Sharing the Harvest Community Farm, which is located in Dartmouth, MA, is run entirely by volunteers. This farm is relatively young, having only been established in 2006. The mission of this farm is to “alleviate hunger on the south coast of Massachusetts.” The volunteers who run Sharing the Harvest are focused on hunger relief and agricultural education. Volunteers will be helping harvest the crops that are in season.

Hey guys!

For Education Day, which is when you will learn a lot of information about the environment and current issues involving the environment, we are having an activity in which many different speakers will set up around the room creating multiple stations.  Everyone will have about ten minutes at each station.  One of the stations will be run by us!  We wanted to know what YOU want to hear about, so that we can plan our station accordingly.  Do you want to learn more about rising sea levels?  Pollution?  Sustainable farming?  Feel free to comment on this post to let us know!

My smartphone says Habitat Education Center and Wildlife Sanctuary is just a 17 minute drive away from Boston University. Apparently, my phone is smarter than I am, because it took Courtney and me about 2 hours to find the green shores of its secluded forest. I got us lost and drove us around in one big circle, in fact, after about an hour of driving we were somehow back at BU (it’s tempting to make a “circle of life” metaphor here). Also I drove us into an oncoming traffic lane on a major highway. So maybe escaping the busy roads and the angry people shouting at me made Habitat Sanctuary that much more beautiful. As the WRONG WAY signs faded into welcome signs, we were greeted by the site’s property manager, Sandra Vorce.

Habitat’s forests and trails are breathtaking. Sandra walked us around and showed us how they had just installed a few gigantic solar panels to help power the visitor’s center. There are public gardens where locals can plant vegetables, and a stunning garden behind the estate. The open green space feels special, and that’s probably why it’s a popular location for weddings. The building is an adapted mansion, now used as a welcoming center and a small art gallery. Habitiat is expansive, and it felt like the meadows had no end. While walking a trail, onto the path sprang a group of baby turkeys. And yes, even baby turkeys are cute. It was a magical moment as a hush came over the woodland and Sandra said simply, “Aren’t they so free?” Ok, she actually just snapped a few pictures, but I wish someone said that. Either way, I wrote a Haiku about it:

Hi Baby Turkey,

Let’s hide here from Thanksgiving.

Here’s to a long life

            Turtle Pond is another hidden oasis within Habitat, although we somehow didn’t manage to see any turtles.  As we toured the landscape, Sandra expressed how excited she was to be hosting our volunteers at the end of August. She explained some of the service would help maintain the balance and beauty of Habitat, such as putting down woodchips, weeding, removing invasive species, and maybe a naturerific surprise if she can get the resources. That’s right-Moose taming.  Just kidding, probably more along the lines of planting flowers. We want to thank Sandra and Habitat for letting us visit, it was love at first site. In fact, our van loved the nature so much it decided to run out of batteries and stay awhile. A helpful employee named Stu drove over and jumped the van (Courtney might marry him in the garden some day, I just hope I get invited). We can’t wait to send our volunteers and know they’re going to love Habitat as much as we did.

Check out BU Today’s article here, or click Habitat to go their main page.  Thanks for reading!

In an article by Fiona Harvey of The Guardian, she discusses the growing problem of reduced aid to clean water and sanitation projects in developing nations.  One of the 2015 Millenium Development Goals created by the UN is to cut the number of people who live without access to clean water and proper sanitation in half by 2012.  Unfortunately, as of late, donors have been cutting back on funding in favor of, in Harvey’s terms, “sexier” causes, like building schools and hospitals.  Because of this massive reduction in money, it is estimated that about one billion less people than expected will have improved access to these basic needs by 2015.

In countries that cannot provide their citizens with clean water and sanitary conditions, not only is healthcare in jeopardy, but less obvious aspects of human life such as education, politics, and the economy are, too.  According to the article, “the World Bank has recently shown that more than 6% a year is being wiped off the GDP of countries failing to provide their citizens with adequate sanitation, because of health effects and the resulting lack of education and work opportunites.” When the difference between economic growth and economic recession is only 2%, losing 6% of GDP is significant.

Furthermore, women are more greatly affected by these conditions than men.  This is because females are usually responsible for fetching water, which can be an all-day affair.  Lots of girls are therefore forced to drop out of school in order to complete this task.  Also, once girls hit puberty, many will not attend school during their period if proper sanitation is not available to them.

Clean water and sanitation are one of the topics that we will be focusing on during FYSOP.  While we are lucky enough to go to school in a developed nation where access to clean water and sanitation are not major problems, this is a severe problem in many parts of the world.  Water and cleanliness are critical to sustaining life and are therefore very important for us to know about.

For more information, check the article out at http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/jun/27/donor-aversion-water-projects/print

One of the sites that our volunteers will be going to during the week of FYSOP is the Habitat Education Center and Wildlife Sanctuary in Belmont, MA.

Hello viewers!  Our names are Miles Greene and Courtney Federico, and we would like to welcome you to our brand new blog.  Here, we will be posting fun articles, images, and videos pertaining to the environment, as well as updates on the First Year Student Outreach Project (FYSOP), which we have been working on planning all summer.  For more information about us, please click the “About” tab at the top right corner.  Feel free to post questions or comments, or email us at fysopenvironment22@gmail.com.  Happy viewing!