What Climate Resilience Can Mean on Campuses

In March 2019, Benjamin Newton, the sustainability director at Central Community College (CCC) in Grand Island, Nebraska, watched what meteorologists called a bomb cyclone. First came a snow storm that froze the land, then heavy rains that brought on intense flooding, and lastly heat.

“They say here in the Midwest you can experience all three seasons in one day. Well, that's what happened that month,” said Newton. “When the weather warmed up after the storm, all the rivers were still frozen, but the ice started breaking up. Our rivers moved with one-ton ice chunks. It was like seeing a bunch of one-ton pick-up trucks floating down the river. That caused our worst flooding in 50 years.”