In the Media

In the roughly five decades following the publication of Milton Friedman’s iconic advocacy of profitability as the single normative goal of managers of public companies, innumerable articles and editorials have been written criticizing Friedman’s thesis. Even President Joe Biden publicly rejected the argument that a corporation’s primary responsibility is to its shareholders.

The primary criticism of Friedman’s position is that a sole focus on profitability ignores the social responsibility that businesses have to other constituents (besides shareholders) including consumers, employers, suppliers of inputs, the broader communities where companies do business and, for many, the environment. Today, this critique is associated with environmental, social, and governance (ESG) initiatives, which prioritize broader social goals even if they harm the financial interests of shareholders.

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Column by WWU CBE emeritus professor Steven Globerman

“There never used to be any funding for this kind of work,” says Robin Kodner, a biologist at Western Washington University who’s at the forefront of a new push to understand what folks in the Pacific Northwest call “watermelon snow” — if they’ve heard of it at all. A nickname for it in the French Alps is sang de glacier, or glacier blood. While red and pink are the most common colors, different types of snow algae produce a rainbow of hues, including orange, yellow and green.

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Story features the research of WWU's Robin Kodner and Alia Khan of the College of the Environment

“There are places that once held millions and millions of oysters and now they are completely gone,” said Marco Hatch, an environmental sciences professor at Western Washington University and a partner in the Indigenous Aquaculture Collaborative Network that helped organize the Salish Summit.

“It was the norm around here to have incumbents run unopposed,” said Todd Donovan, a professor of political science at Western Washington University and a sitting county council member. Donovan is not up for election this year.

“Even with open seats, a lot of the time nobody would run except for one candidate,” Donovan added. “Those days are clearly gone.”

Co-author Asmaa Boujibar, of Western Washington University, who performed the modeling described in the paper, added: “Our model, based on laboratory experiments, confirms that the majority of chromium in Mercury is concentrated within its core. Due to the unique composition and formation conditions of Mercury, we cannot directly compare its surface composition with data obtained from terrestrial rocks. Therefore, it is essential to conduct experiments that simulate  the specific oxygen-deficient environment in which the planet was formed, distinct from Earth or Mars.”

CNN — 

The first of four supermoons to rise in 2023, July’s lunar display will appear to be brighter in the night sky than any other full moon event that has occurred this year.

The full moon will rise on Monday, July 3, and reach peak illumination below the horizon at 7:39 a.m. ET, according to The Old Farmer’s Almanac. Local weather conditions allowing, you can view the celestial event by looking to the southeast after the sun sets.

“A supermoon is when the moon appears a little bit bigger in our sky,” said Dr. Shannon Schmoll, director of the Abrams Planetarium at Michigan State University. “As the moon goes around the Earth, it’s not a perfect circle. So, there are points in its orbit where it’s a little bit closer or a little bit farther from the Earth.”

When the orb reaches its full moon phase at a point in its path where it is closer to the Earth, it appears to be slightly larger and a supermoon occurs, Schmoll explained. While the size difference between a supermoon and a typical full moon may not be immediately apparent to the naked eye, The Old Farmer’s Almanac says the first full moon of summer will be more luminous and 224,895.4 miles (361,934 kilometers) from Earth.

This month’s moon is also known as the buck moon. July is typically when male deer’s antlers grow during an annual cycle of shedding and regrowth, according to the almanac.

There are several other names for the buck moon that come from Native American peoples, according to Western Washington University. Names like hot moon refer to summer weather while terms like raspberry moon and ripe corn moon signify the best times for harvesting fruit and other crops.

The changes in the magnitude and timing of the melting — the exposure of bare ground earlier in the season — can cause problems in the Mountain West, affecting ecosystems and species that rely on cool water downstream and reservoirs designed to accommodate more gradual snowmelt. In places like the Artic, glacier melt can cause sea level rise, threatening flooding on coastlines and in lakes.

“When we add light-absorbing particles that essentially darken the snow — like snow algae, black carbon or dust — it reduces its ability to reflect solar radiation,” said Alia Khan, a biogeochemist that studies glaciers at Western Washington University.

A new study is underway to identify the number — and types — of bumblebees in Skagit and Whatcom counties.

The study, which is led by Western Washington University graduate student Annie Jolliff, will also provide information about when the bees emerge from their nests each year.

Survey sites in the two counties are diverse. They include parks, a clear-cut forest area, the Western Washington University campus and Blanchard Mountain Farm in Bow.

Paraffin is the most common wax produced worldwide, and it’s relatively common in cosmetics. But paraffin is made from petroleum, and a market has popped up for renewable alternatives to beauty products.

Researchers at Western Washington University and Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute hope they’ve found the next big thing: wax derived from algae.

For the better part of the last 20 years, Western Washington University environmental science professor Marco Hatch has had his hands in the muddy shores of the Pacific Northwest and Canada, digging for clams. 

Specifically, Hatch has dedicated his life's work to clam gardens and the cultural importance to the Indigenous people of the region. For centuries, they would place heavy rocks at the low tide line to build a short wall. The high tide would deposit sediment, creating the ideal habitat for clams to grow and thrive, and for other small marine species, like crabs and young fish, to find safe harbor. They managed and harvested the gardens, before colonization. 

Story first ran in the Cascadia Daily News, and can be read here:

https://www.cascadiadaily.com/news/2023/may/09/western-professor-works-to-revitalize-clam-gardens/