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Chancellor's FYI, November 2005.
Apart from the Web site, the Cofrin Center for Biodiversity is bubbling with activity, even now that the leaves are falling and the warblers and thrushes have flown south. Two weeks ago we hosted the annual meeting of the Raptor Research Foundation, bringing together experts on hawks, owls and eagles from all over the world. About 20 UW-Green Bay students played a role by helping with field trips, operating projectors and lights during the scientific sessions, and attending the presentations. This week UW Sea Grant, also housed at the Biodiversity Center headquarters in Mary Ann Cofrin Hall, is sponsoring a conference on the health of Lake Michigan, attracting more than 220 scientists, government officials, and others for a two-day event. Such events take place every year across campus, again demonstrating the University’s role as a source of new and often exciting information.
    Back in the trenches, science students at UW-Green Bay are busy analyzing data and writing reports from studies conducted last spring and summer, many funded by the Cofrin Family Endowment and other sources such as research grants from government agencies and private organizations.
    Even a quick survey of this year’s “lineup” illustrates the extent to which these student-scientists are making an impact in Northeast Wisconsin.
    Marci Johnson, Andy Hinickle, and Stacy Nye are studying how black bears co-exist with people in northern Wisconsin, led by adjunct faculty member Dr. Chris Katz. Amy Orleskie, together with a team of other students, is applying GIS technology to identify “important bird conservation areas” in Door County and northern Wisconsin. She also is working with The Nature Conservancy on a collaborative conservation strategy for the Green Bay watershed.
    Nick Walton is studying dragonflies and Craig Destree is surveying bees at Toft Point in Door County, supervised by Prof. Amy Wolf. Jay Watson also is looking at bees in the Arboretum and, along with Angela Kittell, has been designing a hiking trail at Manitowoc County’s Point Creek Natural Area. Walton, Jenna King, and Web-developer Jennifer Davis are creating a Web site for training and testing volunteer bird observers, with funding from the Wisconsin DNR.
    Amy Wortman is studying squirrel movements on the Cofrin Arboretum, the 300-acre natural laboratory surrounding campus. Carolina Bacelis, with her adviser Prof. Michael Draney, is studying spiders at Pt. au Sauble, UW-Green Bay’s most recently added of our five University-managed natural areas.

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 Black rule for design only.

Other work in the Green Bay ecosystem is being conducted by Prof. Tara Reed and her students Amanda Lederer and Amir Salim. Heather Gentry, Juniper Sundance, Kathy Groves, and others are working on various research projects in the Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest, where UW-Green Bay has a long history of cooperation with the U.S. Forest Service.
    Closer to home, Tracy Houston is working on conservation planning in the Red Banks/Gilson Creek area in Brown County, with funding from the Wisconsin Coastal Management Program. Michelle Eis, a student in Environmental Policy, is examining public use patterns in the Cofrin Arboretum under the supervision of Prof. Denise Scheberle. Greg Brahe and Jessica McCuskey are studying development of American toads in the Arboretum with their faculty adviser, Prof. Dan Meinhardt.
    Finally, the Biodiversity Center is cooperating with an ambitious ecological monitoring project led by Prof. Kevin Fermanich and Emeritus Prof. Bud Harris, involving dozens of high school students and their teachers in the Fox River watershed.
    This list of projects represents just a sample of the many academic activities happening across campus. I think it’s important to recognize that these student-scientists are achieving visible success in the same way as athletes on the playing field or performers on stage.
    Although relatively few of these activities garner headlines (actually, some have — we’ve recently had papers by grad students published in very prestigious journals), all are vital in fulfilling UW-Green Bay’s role as a university. If history can be used as a guide, students engaged in these activities are destined for leadership in their careers, in some cases leadership that affects all of us.
    Thanks to the good fortune of our geography (a campus on the shores of a world-class water resource, proximity to one of eastern North America’s most extensive forested landscapes, etc.) and the generosity of people like the Cofrin family and others, we have many opportunities here at UW-Green Bay to cultivate meaningful hands-on learning experiences.
    I don’t think we can underestimate the importance of these opportunities.

Thank you for your interest in our students and programs,
     Bob Howe


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