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Currently viewing the tag: "CIERP"
When I was walking from my bus to Fletcher this morning, I was struck by how lovely the campus looks. We’ve had a hot and dry summer, but this morning was cool and clear — a taste of what September and the fall will bring.
Though the weather and Orientation have us looking toward the fall semester, today I’m going to look back at some of the summer’s news that you may or may not have seen in other Fletcher sources.
I’ll start with something you won’t have read, but it’s pretty cool. Tufts will have an observer team at the United Nations climate negotiations (COP 22) in Marrakech, Morocco in November, and students were invited to apply to participate. The team at the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy will submit the nominations for official observer status.
And speaking of CIERP, the crew there is always busy in the summer. Mieke van der Wansem, F90, associate director for educational programs at CIERP, spent part of her summer with an international group of sustainability professionals at an executive education course organized by the Sustainability Challenge Foundation in the Netherlands. She co-led the faculty of the International Programme on the Management of Sustainability, which focused on negotiation and consensus building.
Not new CIERP news, but a new wrap up — check out this Tufts Now story on the Paris Climate Conference.
Continuing with the staff/faculty theme, Professor Cheyanne Scharbatke-Church told us about a new blog on corruption in fragile states that, she wrote, touches on many areas of interest to the Fletcher community, including “power analysis, systems thinking, aid ineffectiveness, good governance, fragile states etc.” She also explained that many of the posts are derived from work that Professor Diana Chigas and she are doing, “looking at the intersection of corruption, justice and legitimacy.”
In news from the Institute for Business in the Global Context, Dean Bhaskar Chakravorti, PhD student Ravi Shankar Chaturvedi, and MALD/PhD graduate Ben Mazzotta, have posed the question, “What countries would benefit most from a cashless world?” Their answer, which builds on the work of their Digital Evolution Index and the Cost of Cash research, can be found in their Harvard Business Review article that evaluates “the absolute costs of using cash around the globe to find what countries could unlock the most value by moving to a cashless society.”
And now some summer news about alumni.
Christina Sass, F09, is one of four co-founders of the two-year-old startup company, Andela, which is now backed by both Google and the Chan-Zuckerberg Foundation. So many of our students and alumni work with small organizations, and it’s exciting to see one receive so much love!
Since graduating, Patrick Kabanda, F13, has been busy writing on cultural development for the World Bank, including “Creative Natives in the Digital Age”, “Music for Development in the Digital Age”, “The Arts, Africa and Economic Development: The problem of Intellectual Property Rights,” “Mozart seduces the World Bank and the IMF” (a blog post), and just recently, for the Inter-American Development Bank, “‘The World Sends Us Garbage, We Send Back Music’: Lessons from the Recycled Orchestra in Paraguay.”
And finally, Fletcher has developed a series of video answers to the question, “Why Fletcher?” This summer, Elise Crane, F11, offered her perspective.
Even as I noted yesterday how quiet it is at Fletcher this month, there are a few things going on around here. First, there’s a group of diplomats on campus for a short-term executive program. And second, there’s a panel in ASEAN Auditorium this evening on women in the environment field. The panel will be moderated by Professor Barbara Kates-Garnick. Here are all the details.
“The Business of Getting to Clean Energy & Environment”
July 12, 2016 from 5:00-8:30 p.m.
New England Woman in Energy and the Environment (NEWIEE) is hosting the second-annual Women Shaping the Agenda Panel to share ideas and experience related to the practical and business aspects of our clean energy and environment future.
“NEWIEE’s panel series strives to provide a forum for the constructive and informative discussion of topics of interest today to environmental and energy professionals,” said Beth Barton, NEWIEE Board of Directors President and Partner at Day Pitney LLP. “NEWIEE’s goal is to bring together experienced and young professionals from across New England for an open conversation about clean energy and environmental issues for our region and beyond.”
Further information and tickets, if still available, can be found on the event page.
A couple of weeks ago, I highlighted the United Nations speech of Fletcher professor and alumna, Rachel Kyte. Shortly thereafter, another graduate, Cornelia Schneider, F06, wrote to make me aware of the signing ceremony speech of Dr. Cristiana Pasca, a 2014 graduate of the PhD program and 2006 MALD graduate, and currently the Environment Minister of Romania. Click on the photo below to watch the speech.
It’s always satisfying to see our graduates in action, and I also particularly appreciate how alumni watch out for each other, such as in this case when Connie took the time to make me and the alumni office aware of the great work her MALD classmate is doing.
I love hearing from alumni, and not only when they send me news for the blog. But if they happen to send something newsworthy, well, I’m certainly going to seize the opportunity to share.
On Monday, I was pleasantly surprised by an email from Atanas, a 2015 grad. He recently started in a new position at the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, working on climate resilience. I’ll let him continue the story:
Last week I was lucky to be working at the Executive Office of the UN Secretary General on the organization of the Paris agreement signature ceremony, and on Friday, I witnessed first-hand this historic moment. I met a few presidents, including Colombia’s President and Fletcher grad Juan Manuel Santos, and had a brief chat with Leo DiCaprio who is UN Messenger of Peace and delivered a speech during the ceremony. It was certainly a day to remember.
But one of the most powerful experiences I had was listening to a Fletcher alumna who spoke on a panel in the afternoon of the same day — Rachel Kyte, who is the CEO of Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL) and Special Representative of the Secretary General. She talked only for five minutes but completely captivated the audience and, according to everyone working in this area, hers was one of the best speeches given in a long time.
I’ll plug in a few details about Rachel Kyte. She’s a 2002 graduate of the GMAP program and, also, currently a Fletcher professor of practice of sustainable development, associated with the Center for International Environment and Research Policy.
The forum at which Atanas heard her speak was “Taking Climate Action to the Next Level: Realizing the Vision of the Paris Agreement.” Click the photo below to hear her comments following a question at about 1:47:00.
There’s always something happening in Fletcher’s Center for International Environment and Resource Policy. The center hires student researchers each year and regularly sponsors lectures, and the professors teaching courses on the environment are frequently cited in the media.
Recently, the Tufts Now newsletter highlighted some CIERP accomplishments:
Mieke van der Wansem, F90, the associate director for educational programs at the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy at the Fletcher School, is the new co-head of faculty for the International Programme on the Management of Sustainability, a one-week executive education course organized by the Sustainability Challenge Foundation in the Netherlands. She also organized a new one-week executive education program in December for senior officials of the Chinese National Development and Reform Commission titled “Industrial Implications of the Circular Economy,” led by Kelly Sims Gallagher, F00, F03, associate professor of energy and environmental policy at Fletcher. Several Fletcher professors taught in the program, including Gallagher, on “U.S. Climate Policy”; Avery Cohn, on “Metrics and Lifecycle Analysis in a Circular Economy”; Shinsuke Tanaka, on “Economic Policies for Pollution Control and Innovation”; Joel Trachtman, on “The Trans-Pacific Partnership: Environmental Provisions and Implications”; and Bhaskar Chakravorti, on “Innovation and Corporate Entrepreneurship.” Two professors from the Department of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning in the School of Arts and Sciences taught sessions: Ann Rappaport, on “Corporate Environmental Management,” and Weiping Wu, on “Sustainability and Industrial Parks.” Jonathan Harris, from GDAE, spoke on “Principles of Ecological Economics.”
While these programs don’t directly affect current Fletcher students, they do add to the general knowledge residing in the School.
Here’s something a little different. Emeritus Professor William Moomaw participated last month in a Reddit AMA (ask me anything) session about the COP21 climate talks. As Professor Moomaw explains in his AMA intro, in addition to his usual responsibilities during his long Fletcher career, he was a member of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
Within the general framework of climate-related topics, the AMA discussion ranged widely, from water issues to nuclear energy to the “clathrate gun” hypothesis. There’s even at least one question from a Fletcher alum. Check it out!
Is it too late to write about the Paris Climate Talks? I thought not. In fact, I’m not going to write much of my own, but Fletcher is well represented at the talks and in the study of environment issues, and I collected some links for you.
First, for general info on COP21, you could do worse than to check out the Tufts Sustainability Office’s page. Note that members of the Fletcher community are tweeting about the event — Professor Kelly Sims Gallagher and PhD Candidate Rishikesh Bhandary, and there’s a Twitter feed for the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy.
And some other stories:
Daniel Reifsnyder, a 2014 graduate of the Fletcher PhD program, is co-leading the climate negotiations that culminated in Paris.
Professor Rachel Kyte, F02, was named one of Vogue Magazine’s 13 “climate warriors.” She is the special envoy to the talks from the World Bank, and she also shared her comments recently on NPR.
Cristiana Pasca Palmer a 2014 graduate of the PhD program, has been named Romania’s Environment Minister. You can find her here among all the other Ministers of the Romanian Government.
And there’s recent commentary from Professor Gallagher and also from Professor Michael Glennon.
Finally, you can read about fall semester events organized by the Center for International Environment and Resource Policy.
One of the more commonly selected Fields of Study at Fletcher is International Environment and Resource Policy, which also has an associated research center. If you plan to pursue environment study at Fletcher, you’ll want to check out the CIERP website, which includes several profiles of alumni working in the field.
If you’re especially interested in the CIERP community, you’ll also want to read about the faculty and staff. It’s worth noting, too, that CIERP hires students for several research positions each fall.
With the People’s Climate March having taken place in New York this past weekend, I wanted to share this interview on the subject with Fletcher PhD candidate, Kartikeya Singh. Kartikeya’s comments particularly focus on what’s at stake for countries like India and the Maldives, as well as his past involvement in negotiations. For those not familiar, the March took place directly before the UN Summit on Climate Change, at which 120+ heads of state will discuss how their nations will tackle the issue.
Listen to the interview here:
