Environmental Studies Commons^™

The Political Economy Of Wasted Food Policies In The United States And European Union: A Multi-Scale Analysis, Rebecca Miller

Sustainability and Social Justice

Between 33 and 40 percent of food produced is wasted while one quarter of the population of the United States and the European Union is food insecure (Gunders, 2012, p. 4). How is this problem addressed through policy in the United States and the European Union? Although there are non-governmental organizations working to redistribute food and educate consumers, a more comprehensive policy-based approach is needed to fully address this problem. Several cities and states in both the U.S. and E.U. have adopted policies before they were nationally or internationally implemented. These early adopter cases were examined here to determine best …

(Between The Streets) In Worcester : Redefining Professional Education In Community Development To Cultivate Empathy Through A Community Theatrical Framework, Chiu Yi Hannah Yukon

Sustainability and Social Justice

This research paper presents an alternative form of conducing Community Development Research. It highlights the gaps that currently exist in professional education with the community development and planning program at Clark University. The research paper employs a theatrical framework to encourage practitioners to ask more illuminating questions that informs the ‘human work’ that sometimes gets overlooked. In order to be authentic in the field of Community Development, practitioners need to be in touch with a less scientifically rational side of themselves, to truly embrace the complexities of the human condition. Drawing from my personal experiences, I wrote a play based …

Nuclear Power Plant Policy Comparison Between The U.S. And Republic Of Korea, Vara Ha

Sustainability and Social Justice

Five years after the Fukushima accident, people and countries still argue about the opportunity costs of denuclearization. While nuclear power generation has safety and waste issues, it is carbon free. Climate change has created more pressure for greenhouse gas reduction, so a few countries have decided to maintain or even increase nuclear power generation. The United States ranks first for using nuclear power produced by electricity generation, while the Republic of Korea, the closest country in proximity to Japan, ranks fourth in countries that use nuclear power. In fact, Korea even rapidly increased nuclear business after the Fukushima accident. Despite …

Infrastructure And Exclusion: Roadbuilding, Extractive Industries And Environmental Degradation In The Case Of Iirsa Sur Through Southern Peru, Kimberly S. Farias

Sustainability and Social Justice

This paper considers the case of the Southern Interoceanic Highway, a major transportation corridor linking the Atlantic and pacific coasts through Southern Peru under the auspices of the Initiative for Regional Infrastructure in South America (IIRSA). The highway has raised significant social and environmental issues, including concern around the lack of mitigation planning on the part of the Peruvian government as well as the exclusion of civil society from participating in a review of the project. Based on GIS mapping of this highway and secondary research this paper finds that unprecedented migration into the region has contributed to an increase …

Land Change Modeler Application: Summer Internship With Clark Labs, Nan Ding, Siqi Cheng

Sustainability and Social Justice

This paper is a description of our internship with Clark Labs in the summer of 2015. We worked as research assistants in the Land Change Modeler Application (App) project. This project aimed to display the land cover changes in the United States from 2001 to 2010, show the vulnerability in 48 states and predict changes from the yaer 2050. Our responsibility was to extract eight variables (slope, elevation, surface water, roads, high intensity land, protected areas, county subdivisions, and cultivated crops) in TerrSet, and use them in several models to test the accuracy of prediction.

The internship is a great …

An Integrated Strategy For Strengthening Worcester's Regional Food System: Key Roles For Education And Information, Joel Simonson

Sustainability and Social Justice

Food security and access to healthy food are public health issues that continue to persist in the United States and are ones that are strongly influenced by social and environmental factors. In Worcester, Massachusetts there are many organizations that contribute to alleviating the resulting effects, but do not always have the capacity to reach full potential and expand upon current initiatives. Students can provide existing human resources and knowledge that would benefit all parties. This would allow for organizational capacity development, ultimately impacting local residents, and for students to gain deeper connections to the greater Worcester community while learning vital …

Childhood Trauma, A Cycle Of Violence: Worcester, Ma, Samantha Arsenault

Sustainability and Social Justice

This research examines the relationship between childhood trauma, indicated by early police contact, and the probability of later negative life experiences, including involvement in and perpetration of violence, criminal activity and gang involvement for men age 0-27 in Worcester, MA. This research was conducted using probit and tobit regression analysis using the Worcester Police Dataset. This study shows a positive and highly statistically significant correlation between childhood trauma and gang involvement as well as involvement in violence, perpetration of violence, and the number of incidents of violence. This suggests that a crisis intervention for childhood trauma, including witness-based childhood trauma, …

Adopting New Banana Varieties In Uganda: The Role Of Gender And Head Of Household Status, Emily Albertson

Sustainability and Social Justice

Recognizing the gender gap that exists in the adoption rates of improved agricultural technology is crucial in increasing agricultural productivity in Sub-Saharan Africa. A gender-disaggregated framework is used to examine key variables that guide the adoption decision of improved agricultural technologies by gender and household headship. Drawing on household data collected in two districts in Uganda and constructing a probability model, key variables will be analyzed as to their significance in the adoption decision for improved banana cultivars. The analysis shows that gender alone is insufficient in fully understanding adoption decisions, as other significant factors exist. Using the literature and …

Textron Systems, Geospatial Solutions Technical Writing Internship, Casia L. Terenzoni Ms.

Sustainability and Social Justice

ABSTRACT TEXTRON SYSTEMS, GEOSPATIAL SOLUTIONS TECHNICAL WRITING INTERNSHIP CASIA TERENZONI

My internship at Textron Systems, Geospatial Solutions took place from June 1 to July 31, 2015 where I worked under the supervision of Denise Harrington. My time at Textron Systems in the Geospatial Solutions department was divided into one large project and several smaller projects. I was required to spend time getting to know the GIS software in order to complete these projects. The large project consisted of writing and developing a Quick Reference Guide for a solution called GeoCatalog Discover. The smaller projects I completed consisted of writing several …

The Hartford Food System: A Review Of Assets, Challenges, And Opportunities, Zachary A. Fromson

Sustainability and Social Justice

Abstract

Healthy food systems hold potential to improve a city’s social, health, and economic well-being. Currently, there is a worldwide trend in refocusing food systems to invest in the local community rather than relying on hyper-industrial food value chains that erect barriers for local residents in a city’s food sector. It is the purpose of this report to assess how Hartford’s food sector currently is working so that the city may move in a more innovative direction with its food sector, improving the social, health, and economic conditions for the city and its residents. Thus, this report examines Hartford’s food …

When Reality Crashes The Imagination: Experiences Of Young Qurbojoog (Foreign Raised) Somalis In Somaliland, Amina Musa

Sustainability and Social Justice

As the Somalis territories are re-building there is heightened migration of people returning. They are heavily involved –formally or informally in development in the region. In the case of Somaliland, it is a semi-autonomous state championed by the diaspora. This assignment centers the experiences of young diaspora Somalis raised abroad in Somaliland. This demographic has grown up in the shadows of the civil war is the first generation to not grow up in the Somali territories. To capture their experiences, I carried out ethnographic fieldwork in Hargeisa, Somaliland over the summer of 2015. For this study I argue that young …

Somewhere “I Can Live”: Youths’ Conceptualizations Of Nature And The Outdoors In Worcester, Ma, Sarah Bertrand

Sustainability and Social Justice

This paper describes the methodology, findings, and implications of research project attempting to understand youths’ conceptualizations of nature and the outdoors. Drawing on and responding to literature that calls for the prioritization of youths’ voices and describes nature as a constructed concept, I interviewed five youth residents of Worcester, Massachusetts, a mid-size city in New England. Using discourse analysis, I also attempt to understand what influences these youths’ conceptualizations of nature and the outdoors. The youth expressed nuanced and complex ideas about nature and the outdoors, situating these ideas within broader conceptualizations of the environment. They also suggested that these …

Social Entrepreneurship As A Response To The Energy Crisis, Climate Change And Women’S Inequality In Developing Countries: Women Managed Solar Cooker Production Business In Rural Haiti, Lelani S. Williams

Sustainability and Social Justice

In developing countries such as Haiti, households heavily rely on charcoal and wood to satisfy their energy needs. The unsustainable use of these fuels accompanies adverse health and women's inequality impacts. As well as have severely altered Haiti’s environmental landscape. Solar cooking is one clean energy alternative to these issues. Despite its multiple benefits; solar cookers have had little traction in developing countries. Most research is focused only on technical improvements of solar cookers. This paper looks at how the utilization of solar cookers can positively impact the problems facing Haiti due to traditional cooking methods (1) environmental, (2) energy …

Gis And Spatial Analysis: Summer Internship With The Center For Health And Global Environment At The Harvard T.H. Chan School Of Public Health, Wensi Hu

Sustainability and Social Justice

The objective of the report is to introduce and discuss my internship at the Center for Health and Global Environment at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, in Boston, MA. The internship lasted four months from the middle of May to the middle of September, with 15 hours each week. My tasks included geocoding, developing GIS-calculated variables, data visualization/mapping and documentation. Creation of variables was vital as it included air quality data, land use map, greenness (NDVI), roads data as well as parks data.

I am happy that I have a chance to work under a professional environmental …

Healthcare Facility Location: A Breast Cancer Alliance Case Study, Alexandra Knopf

Sustainability and Social Justice

Community health is impacted by the location of a health advocacy agency. This commissioned report for the Breast Cancer Alliance of Greenwich, CT, consists of a location analysis to review potential cities in which they might locate expansion efforts. Such cities include Boston, MA, Chicago, IL, Greenwich, CT, Los Angeles, CA, San Francisco, CA, and Washington, D.C. This report will look at five ways (4 mathematical and one spatial) of conducting a location analysis that require specialized knowledge for interpretation. For this study, a Spatial Geographic Information System methodology is preferred because of the visualization component, which can ensure that …

Redefining The Impact Of Public-Access Media In Worcester, Ma, Anthony Ortiz

Sustainability and Social Justice

This research presents findings from a study of how Worcester’s current public-access media center can serve as an anchor institution for two-way communication between the producers and the audience. More generally, it addresses two questions: 1) How to ensure maximum participation and 2) How can active communication be preserved (or maintained) between the producers and the audience. Drawing on case studies done around the U.S. this paper offers a model of community based media that can be essential for empowering people to serve as active receivers of information. The concept for community based media should allow as a grassroots oriented …

Barriers To Energy Efficiency In Hospitals: Building A Better Business Case For Sub-Metering, Chris Davies

Sustainability and Social Justice

The natural world finds itself placed in an ever more precarious position as climate change is continually exacerbated by the burning of fossil fuels. Achieving greater energy efficiency in resource intensive industries has emerged as part of the immediate solution to this problem, a solution which can be financially, environmentally, and socially beneficial. Healthcare is one such industry where energy efficiency has high relevance. With hospitals operating 24/7 and energy intensive equipment running all day long, the healthcare industry offers high potential for successful building energy efficient retrofits. Yet it also faces many unique barriers. This paper identifies some of …

Land Change Modeler Application:Summer Internship With Clark Labs, Siqi Cheng, Nan Ding

Sustainability and Social Justice

This paper is a description of our internship with Clark Labs in the summer of 2015. We worked as research assistants in the Land Change Modeler Application (App) project. This project aimed to display the land cover changes in the United States from 2001 to 2010, show the vulnerability in 48 states and predict changes from the yaer 2050. Our responsibility was to extract eight variables (slope, elevation, surface water, roads, high intensity land, protected areas, county subdivisions, and cultivated crops) in TerrSet, and use them in several models to test the accuracy of prediction.

The internship is a great …

The Effect Of Athletic Stadiums On Communities, With A Focus On Housing, Dominique Wilkins

Sustainability and Social Justice

ABSTRACT: The purpose of this research is to examine the role of athletic stadiums in the gentrification of minority neighborhoods. New athletic stadiums have increasingly been constructed in low- and moderate- income areas with high minority populations, and results in the displacement of that community’s longstanding residents. This paper uses Census and American Community Survey (ACS) data as part of a case study of the Washington Nationals Stadium in Washington DC; the data shows that within a few years of construction, the community that previously boasted an affordable housing stock and a high low-income minority population is replaced with high-income, …

Innovations In City-Level Climate Policy: Building Energy Efficiency And Retrofitting Programs In C40 Cities, Benjamin Tweed

Sustainability and Social Justice

Abstract

Innovations in City Level Climate Policy: Building Energy Efficiency and Retrofitting Programs in C40 cities

Benjamin Tweed

Worldwide buildings account for approximately a third of global energy use and a quarter of GHG emissions. In large cities these proportions can double or even triple. Combined with a slow rate of building turnover, this creates a need for policy instruments designed to address the energy efficiency of existing buildings. With a lack of national attention, cities are stepping forward to offer a solution. This paper examines policy approaches taken by six cities, all members of the C40 Climate Leadership Group. …

Exchange Patterns And Relations In Collaborative Governance., Charles Wharton Kaye-Essien

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Collaborative governance has received considerable attention in recent years. From environmental resource management to public safety, collaborative governance continues to play a vital role in regional problem solving. In spite of this increasing popularity previous attempts to model the political, economic, and demographic determinants of collaboration have in most cases produced inconsistent results, thereby undermining the ability to generalize from such findings. Additionally, our understanding of the relational patterns that emanate from collaborative agreements remains fairly rudimentary. The main objective of this research is to address some of the gaps in the literature and improve our understanding of collaborative governance …

Climate Change Instability And Gender Vulnerability In Nepal: A Case Study On The Himalayan Region, Akriti Sharma

Sustainability and Social Justice

For the past decade, low-income developing countries have and will continue to remain on the frontline for the consequences of human induced climate change. While climate change is expected to have universal negative impacts on the health, well-being and the livelihoods of people, it is expected to specifically affect women from low-income developing countries where poverty and gender inequality are both still very prevalent. A closer look at previous research reveals that women, specifically in the Himalayan region of Nepal are more vulnerable due to the already challenging terrain in which they live in. This paper analyzes the vulnerability of …

Remote Sensing Of Land Cover Change On Indonesia’S Bird’S Head Peninsula After The Creation Of Marine Protected Areas, Daniel Auerbach

Sustainability and Social Justice

This report is an account of my time spent on a summer internship at the World Wildlife Fund’s Washington, DC office. I interned there for 9 weeks from June to August 2015. I worked for the science team under Dr. Louise Glew. The official title of the internship was “Land-Use Change Remote Sensing Intern.” My task was to remotely sense land cover change on a remote peninsula of Indonesia, and to see if any significant changes occurred following the creation of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) in the traditional fishing grounds surrounding the peninsula. The internship was an opportunity for me …

Summer Internship At African Community Education, Stephen A. Chiavaroli Iii

Sustainability and Social Justice

My internship at African Community Education (ACE) took place from May to December 2015, where I worked with GISDE alum, Joshua Plisinski. My summer was split as a volunteer at ACE and GIS Analyst in partnership with a Worcester nonprofit Cultural Exchange Through Soccer (CETS). My duties at ACE included tutoring, mentoring, and leading the students in homework assignments and various recreational activities. I also completed several GIS tasks and instructed a GIS tutorial for the high school students of ACE. The other time during my summer was spent conducting a spatial network analysis of Worcester soccer fields for CETS …

Creating A Learning Laboratory For Urban Sustainability: Consulting Project For The Blackstone River Corridor Living Systems Laboratory, Jacquelyn Dayle Burmeister

Sustainability and Social Justice

The Blackstone River Corridor Living Systems Laboratory (“LSL”) is a newly formed nonprofit organization with a broad and compelling mission to engage people with local history and water so as to improve public heath though bioremediation. It has evolved from a non-centrally administrated coalition of research institutions and municipalities interested in water quality to a multidisciplinary partnership, requiring consistent coordination. The broad organizational mission with such varied stakeholders requires a stable administrative platform, as well as funds to continue development of novel model process for wastewater treatment. The purpose of this project was to provide long term administrative and project …

Foraging Time And Food Resource Use Of Geoffroy’S Tamarin (Saguinus Geoffroyi) In An Urban Forest Landscape, Parque Natural Metropolitano, Ciudad De Panamá, Panamá, Rachael Pruitt

Independent Study Project (ISP) Collection

Saguinus geoffroyi, a small neotropical primate that ranges from the Chocó region of Colombia along the Pacific coast of Panamá to the eastern side of the Azuero peninsula. They are known to be a disturbance tolerant species and are mostly found in secondary growth and forest edges where understory growth is moderately dense. They have 3 main food sources: insects, small fruits and exudates (plant saps), which are located in different layers of the forest, although the composition of these may change depending on the season. This study attempted to determine the common food resources, foraging time and location of …

Sites Prioritization Of Commercial Solar Photovoltaic Systems Using Gis Resources In Massachusetts, Zifeng Li

Sustainability and Social Justice

ABSTRACT SITES PRIORITIZATION OF COMMERCIAL SOLAR PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEMS USING GIS RESOURCES IN MASSACHUSETTS ZIFENG LI

My summer internship at SolarFlair Energy Inc. was conducted from May 20 to August 21 in 2015, where I cooperated with two supervisors for my work; Dodge A. Travis and Daniel T. Greenwood. I was working as a Geographic Information Science analyst to help generate business and sell commercial solar panel systems. By using available GIS databases to assess viable sites for solar installations, analyzing sites using and prioritizing potential sites through multi-criteria analysis, I successfully generate business lists for a variety of towns in …

Worcester, Ma Bike Share Feasibility Study, Corinne Jachelski

Sustainability and Social Justice

The Worcester, MA Bike Share Feasibility Study was conducted to determine whether the City of Worcester is suitable for a city wide bike share. This study includes a general history of bike shares; their benefits based on major categories of social, environmental, economic, and transit; and overview of demographic composition of Worcester. Several cities of similar population size to Worcester that have implemented bike share systems are reviewed as context for system size. Other completed bike share feasibility studies informed the methods employed in this study, as well as provided more information broadly and specifically about all of the elements …

Park Management Gis Intern In New York City Department Of Park & Recreation, Dongjun Zhou 3125032

Sustainability and Social Justice

My park management GIS internship with New York City Department of Parks & Recreation took place during June and August 2015, where I primarily worked under the guidance of Terese Flores, the park manager for the borough of Manhattan. My internship responsibility was assisting the Park Manager with park improvement project that primarily involved asset mapping for park properties, field data collecting and entry, budget devising as well as park staff coordinating. According to the requirement of GISDE program at Clark University, the content of this report mainly covers three aspects of this internship: the introduction for the mission and …

The Influence Of Urban Development Dynamics On Community Resilience Practice In New York City After Superstorm Sandy: Experiences From The Lower East Side And The Rockaways, Leigh Graham, Wim Debucquoy, Isabelle Anguelovski

Publications and Research

While (urban) resilience has become an increasingly popular concept, especially in the areas of disaster risk reduction (DRR) and climate change adaptation (CCA), it is often still used as an abstract metaphor, with much debate centered on definitions, differences in approaches, and epistemological consider- ations. Empirical studies examining how community-based organizations (CBOs) “practice” resilience on the ground and what enables these CBOs to organize and mobilize around resilience are lacking. Moreover, in the growing context of competitive and entrepreneurial urbanism and conflicting priorities about urban (re)development, it is unclear how urban development dynamics influence community- based resilience actions. Through empirical …