Students serve a vital role in this project by supporting the examination and understanding of how ecology, urban planning, floodplain management and conservation can come together to foster urban resilience and human well-being.  By engaging graduate students in the work of the Earth Stewardship Initiative, we aim to generate materials and documentation to synthesize conference events as well as create implementable plans to enhance food resiliency, promote species diversity and pollinator habitat and reduce erosion and other maintenance challenges while increasing cultural venues and improving urban microclimates.

 

Selected students have the opportunity to be active participants working with local practitioners, stakeholders, and clients on actual planning projects that informs decision makers, implements management, and follows with scientific evaluation of the outcomes.

 

Materials generated from the conference will be integrated into a Yale University Fall 2015 course on urban ecology, as well as a potential distributed graduate seminar in the fall of 2015.