Connections and coffee, fall 2021

 "Find a peer group of women to provide professional support" suggest the authors of Ten simple rules for women principal investigators during a pandemic.  Research has shown that women generally benefit from networking and group mentoring.  Further, women's stress can be moderated by social supports.  Its also not a surprise that short breaks help individuals regroup and look at challenges through a refreshed lens.  So, take a BYO snack or meal break on First Mondays (Register for Mondays) at noon, and/or  Third Thursdays (Register for Thursdays) at 8am.  Sessions are hosted by the ESF Women's Caucus and are open to employees, students, and alumnae.

All sessions are online, with a phone in option, so that folks can participate from  on campus (main or satellite) or off.  217 Bray Hall is also reserved during each session for those without a workspace conducive to participation.

You can ask questions or share resources anytime by subscribing to:

·    ESFWomen is configured as a discussion forum, but is used most frequently to share event reminders and registration links! 

·    FamilyResources.  Child- and elder-care impact a number of students and employees regardless of gender/gender identity  By spinning off those discussions, we hope to make them more accessible to parents and other caregivers who need them (ATM or for the future), unclutter the inboxes of those who don’t, and underscore “balancing work and family” as universal workplace concerns.

REGISTRATION:

1st Mondays, noon-1pm: Register for Mondays

3rd  Thursdays, 8am-9am: Register for Thursdays

For more information about the ESF Women's Caucus, or our formal or informal mentoring programs, please visit: https://www.esf.edu/womenscaucus or contact the program coordinator, 

Heather Engelman engelman@esf.edu or 315-470-4752

Coffee Break: Virtual Edition

During the standard business week, it gets so busy that we have skipped lunch, opted not to refill water bottle to save that time (and that of the inevitable restroom break)—and we are running out of steam carrying more than our fair shares of mental load and taking care of everyone around us.  The new need for "social distancing" and remote learning for our students and for some of us, for our children, may actually increase the need for contact this semester.  So, put on the brakes, recharge batteries a bit, reconnect, bounce ideas off of one another, and offer and receive advice about handling work and life pressures--from wherever you happen to be.

Unfortunately, with this format, we must ask you to provide your own coffee/tea and snacks, but we can still offer an ear and a (virtual) shoulder.  We have got this, and we have each other's backs!  

We are keeping the same schedule, [Mostly] Third Thursdays (3/26 and 4/16) 3:30-4:30 and First Fridays (4/3, 5/1), 11:40-12:35, but rather than walking across campus:  meet.google.com/sru-kxfo-qt or dial: +1 518-600-1124  PIN: 751998318#

Workshop: Writing for Scientific Publication--Dr. Ruth Yanai

Publishing is an important part of the research process, but writing papers is not what attracted most of us to our respective fields.  Learning to write papers with minimal effort and maximum impact will help you for the rest of your career. Participants received general  advice on organizing writing efforts and specific examples of the steps to go through in preparing each section of your paper, and left the workshop with working drafts of their abstracts. Dr. Yanai has lots of useful tips http://www.esf.edu/for/yanai/publishing/default.htm  Cosponsored by WISE, GSA, and ESF Women's Caucus. 

"Like Blood from our Veins:" Perspectives on water in post-communist Poland. October 20, 2009.

Dr. Sharon Moran, Associate Professor, Department of Environmental Studies, briefly discussed Poland's rich history, highlights of two of her projects, and invited participants to sample meats, bread and sweets representative of the country's cuisine.

Poland's transition to a market economy and a democratic government, creative/energetic/idealistic leaders in 1999, coupled with a main watershed covering 53% of the country and most of its industrial center, and that it was the last unregulated in Europe made the country very open for Sharon Moran's doctoral research.  The country's location between Germany and Russia also means that the borders have shifted a lot over the years.  Despite this, there is a great sense of national pride--especially for the communal opposition of Nazi occupiers.  Reconstruction in Warsaw used authentic building techniques so that new building are almost indistinguishable from the originals.  New signs now mark the site of the Warsaw ghetto that housed Polish Jews during that time.

Municipal Waste Management during the Early Part of the transition from a welfaristic to a neoliberal orientation.  She found great variation in the incentives to improve water across the country:  better quality for profit, a brewer subsidizing projects, commercial interests.

Local perception of drinking water:  Warsaw has cheap filtered tap water, commercial bottled water is available but not frequently purchased.  It also has >100 deep wells throughout the cite fed by a common aquifer, drilled by the government in late 50s in  so that good quality drinking water would be available should bombing resume.  Workers would bottle their own and bring this great tasting water home.  Many of the wellhouses are open 24/7.  Wells are tested periodically, and local variations due affect quality and individual wells may be closed temporarily.She expected that this practice developed because it was cheaper than commercial bottled water.  Instead, she heard that the water tastes wonderful, and that its safe (respondents would know if it were otherwise, and "they" would close).  Further, most of the interviewees were unaware that the filtered river water from their taps was actually still contaminated. 

Lunchtime Learning Seminars are offered by the Office of Multicultural Affairs.

Bringing women's ways of knowing to deliberative democracy

Dr. Sue Senecah, Faculty of Environmental Studies, examined the history of "Tech-Reg" decision making nvite, Inform, Ignore), and contrasted it with the more collaborative approaches to problem solving that encourage systems thinking and respect different ways of knowing (traditional as well as scientific).  The former assumes linear cause and effect; the later recognizes that much conflict arises from real or perceived obstacles to participation, and that solutions come from building a trusting relationship.  Dr. Senecah notes that trust does not denote liking, but r that other party is true to his or her word.  Out of this discussion came a realization of participants that traditional ways of knowing uses as much (if not more) listening as well as talking, which means that there may be "uncomfortable" silences as each party absorbs the others words.

Can girls be fishermen? A discussion on recreation and gender,

Dr. Diane Kuehn looked at the factor's in people's lives that impacted their participation in sport fishing.  She wanted to know why fishing has declined over the last decade, and why only 12-14% of those that fish are women.  The results of her two-part surveys indicate that there is a significant difference in the starting age of anglers:  males had started at an average age of 7, and all started prior to adulthood; females had started at an average age of 10, and 22% had been introduced to the sport as adults.  Most had learned from their fathers; the adult women were introduced by their partners or spouses.  Grandfathers and uncles were more likely to teach nephews and grandsons than nieces and granddaughters. Kuehn also looked at frequency and opportunity to fish.  In all age groups, females fished less frequently. Their activity was influenced by the support of other family members.  Males, on the other hand, were influenced more by their commitment to the sport.  Socialization during the activity was important to both genders during adolescence, and fishing as a family tradition was very important to girls.  Women were much more focuses on the social aspect of fishing.  While this can be important to men, too, they also cited the sport of it, and men were much more likely to fish by themselves.
Kuehn then inquired of the participants about their favorite outdoor activities, why they enjoy them, and who indoctrinated them.

Sustainable Development and Social Power

What changes would be needed in current structures of social power to support sustainable development?  What alternatives can we learn from women and nature? Dr. Valerie Luzadis shared her thesis that:  the current dominate structures of social power limit our ability to live sustainable with nature and among ourselves.  Dr. Luzadis briefly discussed the difference between "power over" and "power to do", and provided additional background information that has shaped her thinking on the subject prior to inviting responses (and there were many!) from the participants.  Participants added that although hierarchies are not necessarily bad, but they are often too rigid to be effective, and by relying on "majority rules" rather than consensus, non-majority members are often overlooked.  Other participants related social levels to trophic levels, and considered the impact of reciprocity and co-evolution of members, as well as the opportunities presented by gaps in biological systems.