IAN offers a new course for developing report card

Drs. Heath Kelsey, Simon Costanzo, and William Dennison will teach a course titled "Healthy Rivers for All: setting the course for sustainability with river basin health report cards" beginning 2 November 2017 and running through 25 January 2018. Participants will learn the complete process of report card generation, including stakeholder mapping and engagement, conceptualization of ecosystem function, selection of indicators and benchmarks, data analysis, communication of results, and leveraging the report card to make real change. Check out the course page for more details.

Practitioner's Guide to Developing Basin Report Cards

The Practitioner's Guide to Developing Basin Report Cards as a hard cover bookIAN, in partnership with the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), has released a "Practitioner's Guide to Developing Basin Report Cards". The Guide is a free reference and resource for government or non-profit employees, development officials, basin managers, private sector representatives, community organizers, academics, journalists, and any and all interested in the health and future of freshwater resources. The Guide provides an overview of basin report cards and their use, the mechanics of report cards, and how to leverage the process and results to drive change.

Ecological drought in the Hawaiian Islands newsletter

Image of the front cover of the ecological drought in the Hawaiian Islands newsletterThe Department of the Interior Climate Science Centers and their managing organization, the National Climate Change and Wildlife Center at the U.S. Geological Survey have chosen the emerging climate science field of ecological drought as a research focus area. This newsletter highlights the outcomes of a two-day workshop held in Honolulu, Hawai'i. The Hawaiian Islands are among the most isolated and recently inhabited places on Earth. These island landscapes and ecosystem services are uniquely susceptible to changing climate. Today, as drought events become more severe, contemporary communities must also learn to adapt. The paucity of scientific information on drought limits the ability of managers to respond to severe drought events. Through retrospective climate analyses, and engaging traditional knowledge and agency managers, there is an opportunity to better understand how droughts have changed over the past centuries, as well as how people have managed resources during severe droughts.

Watch out: IAN just learned how to be more persuasive!

IAN team photo from persuasive writing workshopThe IAN team came together in Annapolis, Maryland for a one-day communication skills training workshop led by John Sturtevant. Over the course of the day John covered a wide variety of persuasive writing topics including the goals and objectives of writing, syllogism, and how to structure a basic argument. While this training is usually prepared for the business world, the straightforward principles will be easily applied to IAN's work in science communication and ecohealth assessments. The workshop was dynamic, interactive, and fun. The team is looking forward to its next training with John in the new year.

IAN at RiverSymposium 2017

Participants at the 2017 RiverSymposium play WWF's Get the Grade gameIAN was well represented at the 20th Annual RiverSymposium September 18-20 in Brisbane, Australia. In addition to talks given on advances in ecosystem health report cards, Heath Kelsey and Simon Costanzo hosted a special session to play "Get the Grade," a game we developed through the Healthy Rivers for All Partnership with WWF. The game introduces people to the benefits of using report cards in decision making. Bill Dennison stole the show as emcee of the Gala Dinner for the presentation of the 19th annual International Riverprize, the highlight of which was a fantastic karaoke adaptation of The Beatle's Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. It was a great night and a productive conference!

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