Western Window episode 40

This month’s show is hosted by Chris Roselli of the WWU Alumni Association and Kevin Miller, a student at Western.   Following is the story lineup for this episode:

1. Education Outdoors -- Students from Western’s Huxley College of the Environment host local middle-schoolers for a day of outdoor science and fun at the Gordon Carter Environmental Learning Center on Lake Whatcom, learning about everything from stream macroinvertebrates to the effects of fertilizer on the lake’s water quality.
2. Taking Steps Toward Mental Wellness -- Western’s Building Resilience And Voicing Empathy (BRAVE) program aims to provide resources for those who struggle with depression and provide support for their friends and family.
3. Learning to Clean Up -- SMOCS – the Science and Management of Contaminated Sites – is a series of classes at Western that takes students through the processes of cleaning up contaminated sites, from Bellingham’s waterfront to the Hanford Nuclear Site. Students learn the processes involved in cleanup and how planning along the way can prevent toxic waste from contaminating the ecosystem.
4. Music in the Air -- Western alumnus Ryan Dudenbostel has returned to his alma mater to conduct the WWU Symphony Orchestra. Having travelled and performed around the world and being one of only a dozen Americans asked to compete in the internal conducting competition in Barcelona, what brought him back home?
5. Robotics Under the Sea -- A WWU Extended Education program at Western’s Shannon Point Marine Center in Anacortes challenged middle-schoolers to build remotely operated vehicles (ROVs) from scratch that can collect scientific data and explore the sea in new ways.