Hiatus

by William Lynn Posted on Monday, 30 May 2011

Hiatus

Well, the spring semester is over, and all grades are filed. It has been a good semester. I am particularly pleased with my student’s final papers. Members of both my interpretive environmental policy course as well as the senior seminar on sustainability have turned in insightful work.

So this blog will be going on hiatus for a time. There are several projects that will consume my attention over the next six months. In my spare time, I will work on a thorough revision of the website. I’m going to begin a process of streamlining the structure and code in advance of moving to a Web 2.0 platform. In addition, I am planning on refocusing the content of the blog, and need to give that a bit of thought. I will resume posting sometime in the new year.

Cheers, Bill

Posted in IT | Comments Off

What’s It Worth? The Economic Value of College Majors

by William Lynn Posted on Monday, 23 May 2011

Bachelor salaries

The value of a college degree varies by major, field and highest degree earned. There is some interesting data from Georgetown University’s Center on Education and the Workforce, encapsulated in the report What’s It Worth? The Economic Value of College Majors.

Note that this data only represents the value of a bachelors degree alone. Many fields such as ethics and public policy require a masters or doctorate, which is not covered in this data. In addition, the study does not include specific data on majors in interdisciplinary fields like animal studies and environmental studies. And of course, this study says nothing about the personal and political values of less remunerative majors, quality of life, or vast differences of individual economic and social circumstances.

Use this information to help you think about, not make, your choices about a major.

You can read a short overview of the report at the The Chronicle of Higher Education, or download the full report from Georgetown.

Cheers, Bill

Posted in Advising | Comments Off

Final Papers

by William Lynn Posted on Monday, 16 May 2011

Marking paperA gentle reminder that this is finals week. Good luck with your exams and papers!

Please remember that final papers in all my courses are due on Friday at midnight via email attachment. In the final rush to finish up, don’t forget to consult the Style Guide, and check that your citations and references are in Author-Date format. Recall too the various writing resources listed on this blog, and the library website.

Cheers, Bill

Posted in Teaching | Comments Off

Envi 309 – Interpretive Policy Analysis Papers

by William Lynn Posted on Monday, 9 May 2011

End of the line
Announcements
None.

Administration
Our final week of classes! You’ve been a great class, and I’m going to miss our conversations together.

For those of you who are seniors, the end is finally here. It is the end of the line, so stay focused to finish up, and enjoy your well earned graduation. :)

Old Business
Last week we discussed symbolic actions and objects, and how they inform the interpretation of public policy. We examined salutes, American exceptionalism, the confederate battle flag and public space in Columbia (South Carolina), cars and public space in Brazil, endangered species lawsuits and legislation, natural resource agency politics, the concept of umbrella species, political art, and animal art . All this from the perspectives of ritual analysis, myth analysis, and discourse analysis. From a hermeneutic point of view, this wide variety of phenomena can be considered as texts to be read for their meaning and implications.

To finish off the week, we also undertook a detailed interpretation of the movie Avatar. What we found is that Avatar is more than a simple action movie, or a straightforward critique of American military adventurism and neo-colonialism. There are layers of ethical meaning about the well-being of people, animals and nature embedded throughout the film, albeit subordinated to its composition as a mass market block-buster.

New Business
Tuesday is the due date for the first draft of your interpretive policy analysis (IPA) paper.

Recall that this paper builds upon and extends your previous abstract and case study, with an interpretation of the policy meanings and implications of the case itself. While it would be preferable to triangulate on this using interview, immersion and documentary evidence, given the context of this class, you’ll be looking at secondary qualitative data and analysis via documents and articles.

As part of our discussion on Tuesday, don’t forget to bring a complete draft of your IPA, and prepare a statement of how you are using two concepts from the interpretive turn to explore your policy topic.

After we finish our discussion, I’ll administer the course evaluations. I’ll need a volunteer to drop off the evaluations in Paresky.

See you soon!

Cheers, Bill

Posted in Environment, Policy, Teaching | Comments Off