We’ve had the privilege of working with a professional photographer, Josh Dick, over the last few months.  (See http://www.joshdickphoto.net/ for more of his work.)

His photo essay is on the home page of ISDSI, and we’ve worked with him to produce a series of 10 posters.  Great photos that give a good sense of way the program is like.  Good for printing or for desktop wallpapers!

The posters are high resolution, and the larger ones are suitable for either high resolution printing or large banners (e.g. vinyl for a study abroad fair, etc.)

Click on the “Large” to download the large version (about 53 MB .tif file), and “Small” to download the smaller version (about 8-18 MB .jpg file).

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/MekongPaddle.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/MekongPaddle.jpeg

Large: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/Karst.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/Karst.jpeg

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/ReefCheck.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/ReefCheck.jpeg

Large: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohLipe_Kayak.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohLipe_Kayak.jpeg

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/Snorkel_Boat.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/Snorkel_Boat.jpeg

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/LaosRice.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/LaosRice.jpeg

Large: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohAdang_Kayak.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohAdang_Kayak.jpeg

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/SeaGrass.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/SeaGrass.jpeg

Large:  http://www.isdsi.org/docs/MekongPaddle_Group.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/MekongPaddle_Group.jpeg

Large: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohRawi_Boat.tif

Small: http://www.isdsi.org/docs/KohRawi_Boat.jpeg

Here are a few photos from the Oceans course, Culture and Ecology of the Andaman, wrapping up the first course section focused on mangrove and seagrass ecology, and the coastal village and its efforts to conserve and sustainably use the coastal resources.

Drawing on experience with participatory rural appraisal (PRA) and other innovative approaches to learning, rather than sitting together and talking and using the whiteboard, we took an experiential and hands-on approach to review and synthesis of the material.  PRA has been used for years in village appraisals, and can produce very deep and sophisticated representations of local knowledge and systems.  So we took the approach of PRA and applied it to the course material to synthesize and analyze what the students had learned in the first module on coastal resource management.

Students broke into two groups, and were given the task of building a representation of the coastal ecology and related systems out of objects they could find on the beach.  The models had to be comprehensive, sophisticated, and be able to explain the ecosystem and stakeholder relationships that they had been reading about and experiencing first hand.  Each of the groups then had to explain their model to the other one.

We also played stakeholder and resource base charades (a good break and hilarious to see someone acting out mangrove clearing shrimp farm!), and then moved to a discussion of ranked issues and concerns in the coastal zone, using pieces of driftwood to “vote” and create histograms of each issue.

Here are some photos to give you an idea of what a creative seminar can be like when you’re not confined to a classroom, as well as a few photos from today packing the boat and heading out to the islands for the second course module.

Here are a few pictures from our most recent field course, Rivers.

We were able to paddle the Mekong River, travel into Laos and see some of the dams being built there, meet with activists, local communities, villagers, government officials, engineers building dams, and others.

We were fortunate to have a professional photographer traveling with us, so a big thanks to Josh Dick for his photography (you can see more on his website www.joshdickphoto.com).

This week we’re running a Wilderness First Responder (WFR) recert course and a Wilderness First Aid course with the great folks at WMI/NOLS.

When 9-1-1 is not an option, the rules change … plain and simple! For almost two decades the Wilderness Medicine Institute has defined the standards in wilderness medicine training. We offer a wide range of course and certification opportunities tailored to meet your needs.

Because of our commitment to excellent risk management and the highest standards of care for our students, we run our course with instructors who are WFR or WFA certified by WMI/NOLS.  The rules certainly change in the backcountry, and even more so in the backcountry of a developing country like Thailand.

As educators it is always great to be taught by the great teachers from WMI/NOLS, and over the years we’ve been impressed with their depth of knowledge, ease of communicating difficult material, and fun and engaging ways of teaching sometimes difficult material.  So thanks to Shaun Quinn for his marathon solo teaching effort over three long days!

Here are a few photos from the course.  Jump to our WFR course page for description of and a video of our last full (10 day) WFR course.

This week Ajaan Laura is at the 13th Biennial Conference of the International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC) in Hyderabad, India from January 10th to 14th, 2011. The Conference is being held in South Asia for the first time; and in a departure from the past, will be hosted by a practitioner organization – Foundation for Ecological Security (FES).

Laura is presenting a poster and paper that she and Ajaan Abram prepared discussing how using an institutional arrangements framework can be used to help students make sense of how local communities manage their resources.

Click through for a PDF of the poster!

The students just got back last week from our Forests course (Political Ecology of Forests: Upland People and Natural Resources).

This is an amazing course, with students living with and learning from remote highland communities in Mae Hong Son province.  Students travel out to MHS by bus, and then spend the next three weeks backpacking to each village (using the traditional trails the communities are trying to preserve — some of which have been in use for over 100 years), living with Karen tribal families, working in their fields, studying how the manage and care for the forest, and immersing themselves in the lives of the villages.

The ecology is amazing (remote and dense forests and jungle, wild orchids in the trees), steep mountain trails, lots of river crossings, and sitting around the fires in the village at night drying out and drinking tea, listening to the sounds of village life, and talking with host moms and dads, brothers and sisters, about their lives in the village, their hopes for the future, and their struggles to live a sustainable live in the mountains.

Here are just a few photos to give you an idea of what the course is like:

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This week they are switching focus to the Oceans course, and the islands, reefs and mangroves of Southern Thailand.

No, it isn’t just laying around the Institute drinking herbal tea and reading poetry…

This last month as been PACKED at ISDSI.

The students finished up their course on sustainable food systems and agroecology, and are now mid-course on the political ecology of forests course.  Currently both groups are up in the mountains of Mae Hong Son Province, living with and learning from the Karen villagers.

For the instructors, they’ve been all over the world.

Last month Ajaan Laura and Ajaan Abram went to India to present and participate in a conference / workshop on sustainable agriculture and sustainable development with ECHO Asia, including local and international grassroots NGO partners.

Then, Mark and Ben went to the US to present workshops at two conferences, one at the AASHE (Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education) in Denver, and the Wilderness Risk Management Conference in Colorado Springs.  At the AASHE Conference they taught a workshop on Experiential Learning and Sustainability (read more about it here) and at the WRMC they taught a workshop on International Risk Management (learn more here).  Great conferences, good visits with alumni, faculty, and prospective students.  Even with meetings every single day (including the days we flew in and out!) we managed to sneak in a couple of brief hikes up into the mountains, so it was a great trip.

Snow on the mountains in October? We must not be in Chiang Mai...

Ben barely arrived back in Chiang Mai before going down south with Pi Am and Pi Pui to check the logistics for our Oceans course that starts in a month.  We’re combining the best of the former Islands and Coastal courses (hence “Oceans”), and we need to check in with the village homestays, and confirm the logistics for the islands section of the course. Moving 30+ students, instructors, sea kayaks, and all the associated gear (snorkels, fins, tents, etc.) around Southern Thailand by train, truck and boat can be complex!

Ben, Pui and Am flew back the Chiang Mai, paused for about a day, and picked up Aaron and Ajaan Abram and left for Laos!  They are there now, and are setting up an incredible addition to the Spring Semester course on Rivers.  Rivers and trans-boundary issues are critical to resource management and sustainability in Southeast Asia, and we are now, after several years of planning, able to make the Mekong River a bigger component of the course.

They get back, and next week Ben and Mark fly to Sydney Australia for 4 days of training (see cfcnx.com to learn what we’re up to)… and get back in time to greet the students for the set up and start of Oceans!

Fun!

The start of a study-abroad semester at ISDSI is full of intensive Thai language, academic seminars (sustainability, history, ecology, etc.), and lots of experiential learning opportunities to get out in the field and use the language, start to learn about ecology and sustainability, etc.

Here are a few photo sets of three fun — and important — parts of the first few weeks during our Foundations course:

Rock climbing — This is a great day climbing, learning about working together as a team, and starting to develop the leadership and teamwork skills that will be critical to success on the Expedition Field Courses.

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Retreat at Mok Fa waterfall — Each semester we do a retreat, which includes an open water swim assessment, getting to know each other (students and staff), learning about risk and responsibility, how to manage emergencies in the field, and lots of free time and games.

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Host family farewell — The Foundations course ends with a farewell “kantoke” dinner with our host families and students.  While there is some traditional dancing, in recent years there has been a lot of host families teaching the American students to do Thai dances — which is a lot of fun for all!

Earlier this summer we heard through a former student Genevieve Leet (Gigi) and from Urak Lawoi that due to the prolonged heat and warmer waters, the corals were bleaching in the Adang Archipelago where we do the Oceans course.  Gigi brought back a report, after diving several of the sites that we use for the course, and reported that about 1/3 of the corals in some areas had bleached.   She also found some anenomes had bleached as well, and took some photos to document the changes.

More from the New York Times:

Extreme Heat Bleaches Coral, and Threat Is Seen

This year’s extreme heat is putting the world’s coral reefs under such severe stress that scientists fear widespread die-offs, endangering not only the richest ecosystems in the ocean but also fisheries that feed millions of people…

What is unfolding this year is only the second known global bleaching of coral reefs. Scientists are holding out hope that this year will not be as bad, over all, as 1998, the hottest year in the historical record, when an estimated 16 percent of the world’s shallow-water reefs died. But in some places, including Thailand, the situation is looking worse than in 1998…

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the first eight months of 2010 matched 1998 as the hottest January to August period on record. High ocean temperatures are taxing the organisms most sensitive to them, the shallow-water corals that create some of the world’s most vibrant and colorful seascapes…

“It is a lot easier for oceans to heat up above the corals’ thresholds for bleaching when climate change is warming the baseline temperatures,” said C. Mark Eakin, who runs a program called Coral Reef Watch for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. “If you get an event like El Niño or you just get a hot summer, it’s going to be on top of the warmest temperatures we’ve ever seen.”

In Thailand, “there some signs of recovery in places,” said James True, a biologist at Prince of Songkla University. But in other spots, he said, corals were hit so hard that it was not clear young polyps would be available from nearby areas to repopulate dead reefs.

We expected that eventually the reefs at our study sites would be hit with the impact of global warming.  We just didn’t expect it this soon.

From what we have heard, we think that the archipelago is one of the places where we will see recovery.  Studying this change will be an important part of the course this semester.

Two weeks ago to start our Foundations Course, we watched a great film — 180º South — about a climber retracing the journey of two of his heroes to the tip of South American and Patagonia.

Here’s a description:

Chris Malloy’s film strikes so deeply into the heart of Patagonia’s wilderness we come to feel at home there. 180° South: Conquerors of the Useless follows Jeff Johnson as he retraces the epic 1968 journey of his heroes Yvon Chouinard and Doug Tompkins to Patagonia. Along the way he gets shipwrecked off Easter Island, surfs the longest wave of his life – and prepares himself for a rare ascent of Cerro Corcovado. Jeff’s life turns when he meets up in a rainy hut with Chouinard and Tompkins who, once driven purely by a love of climbing and surfing, now value above all the experience of raw nature – and have come to Patagonia to spend their fortunes to protect it.

What we found useful in the film is the deeper story about sustainability.  Going to Rapa Nui (Easter Island) can’t help but bring up questions about sustainability. Like our own students on study abroad at ISDSI, Jeff Johnson is on a journey — getting to know interesting people, and experiencing first-hand a different way of life .

We used the film as a jumping off point to discuss sustainability and its challenges, and think that this film can be a great way to start thinking about culture and ecology — the core of what we care about at ISDSI.

Here’s the trailer:

Here are some of the questions we used for the film:

• Who are the actors / people / groups in the movie?
• What resources are they interested in / do they have a stake in?
• What is the connection to the natural world do different people / groups have?
• What key issues / questions / problems of sustainability does the film address?
• What expedition / leadership skill are demonstrated during the film?

We then followed up the rest of the week with reading papers and articles related to the sustainability themes in the film. Some of the topics we focused on were:

• Consumerism
• Resource use / management
• Views of nature / people in nature
• Corporate responsibility / sustainable business
• Individual responsibility
• Local costs / distant benefits (externalities)
• Ecological footprints
• Marginalization and sustainability

So yes, it is a fun journey movie, and entertaining.  But there is a deeper message there if you think about it.

Go see it if you can.

For more information go to 18oSouth.com and for information on showings see Patagonia.com.