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March 2018 Newsletter

March 2018 Newsletter


 Welcome to the Southeast Climate Science Center’s March 2018 Newsletter.

In this newsletter you will find:

SE CSC News
Resources
Notable Publications
Tribal News
Partner News
Webinars
Upcoming Events
Opportunities


For news and upcoming events related to the Southeast Climate Science Center subscribe to our monthly newsletter.

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Photo Credits: Alan Cressler, USGS

Southeast Climate Science Center News

Beginning in February, Dr. Derek Aday, Professor and Head of the Dept of Applied Ecology at NC State, assumed the role of University Director for the SE CSC. Learn more about him.

Other new faces at the SE CSC: Kate Malpeli, Science Communications Specialist, providing communications support also for NCCWSC, and Xiao Xiao, Research Associate, working on decision modeling of climate adaptation planning for cultural resources. We also have several new SE CSC Faculty Affiliates.

Next in the Global Change Seminar series organized by the SE CSC Global Change Fellows will be on March 29, at 3:30 in 101 David Clark Labs on NC State campus. “Integrating Ecosystem Services into Decision Making” will feature talks by Duke’s Mark Borsuk and Consortium PI Lydia Olander. The final event in the series will be on April 12 with a panel discussion on the topic of “The Risks and Rewards of Scientific Activism.” Check the News on our website for more information and remote connection details.

USGS Research Ecologist Adam Terando gave a presentation at February meeting of Chatham Conservation Partnership. The meeting focused on how changes in climate are predicted to impact natural resources in Chatham County, NC and what is being done to prepare for and adapt to those changes. See meeting summary.

Acting USGS Director Ryan Boyles was instructor at workshop Climate Change, Climate Models, & Best Practices For Using Them For Impact Assessments & Adaptation Planning. It was held as part of the 2018 Meeting of the North Carolina Chapter of the American Fisheries Society.

Consortium PI Paul Armsworth organized a SE CSC Working Group on Co-production of Research in Southern Appalachians and Tennessee at National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis, at University of Tennessee in Knoxville. Participants included representatives from universities, SE CSC, ORNL, USGS, Eastern Band of Cherokee, USFS Southern Research Station, TNC TN, Great Smoky Mountains National Park and TN Wildlife Resources Agency.

Consortium PI Lydia Olander convened a symposium on Feb. 23 to develop research collaborations among Duke University, NC State, and USGS scientists. Researchers discussed their work on climate science, climate impacts on ecosystems and people, and decision-making for climate adaptation and developed ideas for new collaborative research for the Southeast

Lots of great new publications from SE CSC researchers, Global Change Fellows, and Faculty Affiliates have come out:

Paul R. Armsworth, H.B. Jackson, S.-H. Cho, M. Clark, J.E. Fargione, G.D. Iacona, T. Kim, E.R. Larson, T.S. Minney, and N.A. Sutton. (2018), Factoring economic costs into conservation planning may not improve agreement over priorities for protection. Nature Communications. Read the article.

Savage, A. M.,  E. Youngsteadt, A.F. Ernst, S.A. Powers, Robert R. Dunn, and Steven D. Frank. (2018), Homogenizing an urban habitat mosaic: arthropod diversity declines in New York City parks after Super Storm Sandy. Ecological Applications. Read the article.

Hamblin, A.L., E. Youngsteadt, and Steven D. Frank. (2018), Wild bee abundance declines with urban warming, regardless of floral density. Urban Ecosystems. Read the article.

Meineke, E.K. and Steven D. Frank. (2018), Water availability drives urban tree growth responses to herbivory and warming. Journal of Applied Ecology. Read the article.

Christopher S. Galik and Lydia P. Olander. (2018), Facilitating markets and mitigation: A systematic review of early-action incentives in the U.S. Land Use Policy. Read the article.

Grodsky, Steve M., J.W. Campbell, Sarah R. Fritts, T.B. Wigley and Chris E. Moorman. (2018), Variable responses of non-native and native ants to coarse woody debris removal following forest bioenergy harvests. Forest Ecology and Management. Read the article.

Karanci, Ayse, Liliana Velásquez-Montoya, J.F. Paniagua-Arroyave, P.N. Adams, and Margery F. Overton. (2018), Beach Management Practices and Occupation Dynamics: An Agent-Based Modeling Study for the Coastal Town of Nags Head, NC, USA. In: Botero C., Cervantes O., Finkl C. (eds) Beach Management Tools – Concepts, Methodologies and Case Studies. Coastal Research Library, vol 24. Springer, Cham. Read the article.

Yando, E.S., Michael J. Osland, M.W. Hester. (2018), Microspatial ecotone dynamics at a shifting range limit: plant–soil variation across salt marsh–mangrove interfaces. Oecologia. Read the article.

Velasquez Montoya, Liliana, E.J. Sciaudone, H. Mitasova, and Margery F. Overton. (2018), Observation and modeling of the evolution of an ephemeral storm-induced inlet: Pea Island Breach, North Carolina, USA. Continental Shelf Research. Read the article.

Mills, L.S., E.V. Bragina, A.V. Kumar, Marketa Zimova, D.J.R. Lafferty, J. Feltner, B.M. Davis, K. Hackländer, P.C. Alves, J.M. Good, J. Melo-Ferreira, A. Dietz, A.V. Abramov, N. Lopatina, and K. Fay. (2018), Winter color polymorphisms identify global hot spots for evolutionary rescue from climate change. Science. Read the article.

See other SE CSC-supported publications in our Journals and Articles database.

Latest from Conservation Corridor: Connectivity as a proxy for gene flow to infer local adaptation.[divider]

Resources

FEATURED RESOURCE

National Phenology Network Visualization Tool

This new data visualization tool developed by the USA National Phenology Network provides functions to choose specific phenological observations from the large database in order to tailor summaries and analyses to a user’s needs. Options include:

  • Filter data by year, species, and/or partner group that collected the observations

  • Select data geographically by selecting layers (optional)

  • Visualize data with a scatter plot (showing the relationship between two sets of data), calendar (showing annual timing of phenophase activity),  or map (showing ground-based observations against phenology maps of Accumulated Growing Degree Days and Spring Index models)

  • Share a link to the map you have created, or download the dataset you have filtered.

Investigate the tool.

Other Resources

Responding to Climate Change Channel. A global forum for research responding to the impacts of climate change. This compilation of open access research publications by PLOS highlights research efforts from a range of disciplines focused on understanding, evaluating, predicting, mitigating, and adapting to the causes and effects of the changing climate. The Channel Editors showcase the most up to date and impactful research to assist stakeholders responding to the impacts of climate change, including researchers, policymakers, educators and the general public. Learn more.

Climate Wizard. Developed through collaboration between The Nature Conservancy, The University of Washington, and The University of Southern Mississippi, the Climate Wizard enables technical and non-technical audiences to easily and intuitively access leading climate change information and visualize the impacts anywhere on Earth. This first-generation web-based program allows a user to choose a state or country and see both the climate change that has occurred to date and the climate change that is predicted to occur. This brings together the full range of climate history and impacts for a landscape in a user-friendly format. Learn more.

Lessons From Hurricane Harvey: Houston’s Struggle Is America’s Tale. Description of impacts and response in Houston metropolitan area to damage from Hurricane Harvey. Learn more.

Trees and Stormwater. The Ohio Kentucky Indiana Regional Council of Governments and its team of national partners have developed a guide for local decision makers to integrate trees into stormwater management design and policy applicable across the nation. The guide is being designed to help overcome the widespread lack of understanding, acceptance, and credibility of using trees for managing stormwater by providing a practical tool that informs local decision makers of options and best practices for including trees in stormwater facility design regulations and policies. Learn more.

The Dynamic Darters. Story Map by NRCS describing two darter fish species in the Coosa River system in Georgia, Tennessee, and Alabama, which successfully avoided being listed as endangered under the Endangered Species Act as a result of water quality improvements by local landowners and farmers. Learn more.

Get Your Science Used—Six Guidelines to Improve Your Products. This is the summary of a workshop in which experts in risk communication offered insights into the communication challenges of probabilistic hazard products, suggested tips, and shared their strategies for making products that a targeted audience can understand and use. Although the workshop was held to broaden the understanding and use of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) National Seismic Hazard Maps (NSHM), the workshop outcomes presented in this report can benefit anyone who develops products based on technical information. Learn more.

Highlights of notable firsts for women at the Department of the Interior. Learn more.

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Notable Publications

The sensitivity of ecosystem service models to choices of input data and spatial resolution
Authors describe a comparative study of ecosystem services model results based on varying data and model selection choices. They compared results for carbon, water, and sediment from InVEST and WaSSI models, using (1) land cover data at 30 and 300 m resolution and (2) three different input land cover datasets, representing national, provincial, and subwatershed scales in Rwanda. WaSSI and simpler InVEST models (carbon storage and annual water yield) were relatively insensitive to the choice of spatial resolution, but more complex InVEST models (seasonal water yield and sediment regulation) produced large differences when applied at differing resolution. They conclude that in certain cases (e.g., simpler models and national-scale analyses), results can be robust to data and modeling choices. For more complex models, those with different output metrics, and subnational to site-based analyses in heterogeneous environments, data and model choices may strongly influence results. Link to article.

Designing connected marine reserves in the face of global warming
Marine reserves are widely used to protect species important for conservation and fisheries and to help maintain ecological processes that sustain their populations, including recruitment and dispersal. Authors evaluated the performance of marine reserve networks as influenced by ocean warming, which can disrupt connectivity by shortening potential dispersal pathways through changes in planktonic larval duration. They developed a framework for designing marine reserve networks that integrates graph theory and changes in larval connectivity associated with ocean warming, and compared reserve networks designed to achieve representation of species and ecosystems with networks designed to also maximize connectivity under current and future ocean-warming scenarios. They conclude that, given potential decreases in PLD due to ocean warming, future marine reserve networks will require more and/or larger reserves in closer proximity to maintain larval connectivity. Link to article.

Solving Problems in Fisheries Management: Proof of Concept Using Structured Decision Making at the Undergraduate Level
Fisheries management problems are generally complex because they are socio-ecological systems characterized by issues of scale, stakeholder conflict, and structural uncertainty with respect to the influence of management on the resource. To address the need of fisheries management agencies for staff that can demonstrate problem-solving skills and communicate to a diverse set of stakeholders, problem-based learning was incorporated into an undergraduate introductory fisheries class using a structured decision making (SDM) framework. Student teams followed established SDM steps to address a problem of local, regional, or national significance. Among other things, the SDM framework allowed students to identify and acknowledge key uncertainties related to various aspects of the problem and determine the influence of lack of information on the decision. Providing students with tools to help frame, decompose and solve future complex problems better prepares the next generation of managers as state and federal natural resources agencies are increasing their use of SDM and adaptive management frameworks (i.e., the iterative form of SDM) for fisheries management problems. Link to article.

Re-thinking the present: The role of a historical focus in climate change adaptation research
There is a growing recognition that adaptation to climate change requires an understanding of social processes that unfold across extended temporal trajectories. Yet, despite a move to reconceptualize adaptation as ‘pathways of change and response’ with a deeper temporal dimension, the past generally remains poorly integrated into adaptation studies. A relatively small amount of research within the subdiscipline of historical climatology has engaged with theories from mainstream adaptation to understand societies in the past, but there has been little influence in the other direction. Authors undertook a comprehensive review and critique of existing approaches to historical climate-society research, and present three principal areas where historians should engage with climate change adaptation. The first, particularizing adaptation, requires the development of long-term empirical studies that uncover societal relations to climate in a particular place – including climate’s cultural dimensions – which can provide a baseline and contextualization for climate change adaptation options. The second, institutional path dependency and memory, argues for a focus on the evolution of formal institutions with a responsibility for adaptation, to understand how historical events and decisions inform and constrain practices today. The third area of engagement is for an appreciation of the history of ideas and concepts that underpin climate change adaptation. Link to article.

Deconstructing climate misinformation to identify reasoning errors
When people lack expertise or skill to evaluate the science behind a science-based claim, they typically rely on heuristics such as substituting judgment about something complex (i.e. climate science) with judgment about something simple (i.e. the character of people who speak about climate science) and are therefore vulnerable to misleading information. Misinformation about climate change has confused the public and stalled support for mitigation policies. Inoculation theory is one approach to effectively neutralize the influence of misinformation. Authors propose inoculating against misinformation using a strategy based on critical thinking methods to analyze and detect poor reasoning within denialist claims. Since it is based on general critical thinking methods, it is accessible to those who lack expertise in climate science. Application of this approach to 42 common denialist claims showed that they all demonstrate fallacious reasoning and fail to refute the scientific consensus regarding anthropogenic global warming. This was designed to act as a resource for communicators and educators who teach climate science and/or critical thinking. Link to article.


Tribal News 

Professor captures history of Isle de Jean Charles as original area disappears. Learn more.

Scientific Partner Wanted. Developing a Tribal-Owned Flood Monitoring System in Grand Bayou Village, Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana. The desired scientific partners will have knowledge of the Louisiana Coast, as well as of the Master Plan. They must be willing and able to work closely with the community and be knowledgeable in the utilization of low cost monitoring systems. Thriving Earth Exchange asks all scientific partners to work with the community to help define a project with concrete local impact that they can contribute to as pro-bono volunteers and collaborators. This work can also position the scientists and community to seek additional funding, together, for the next stage. Learn more.

National Tribal Forum on Air Quality. The NTF provides environmental professionals from tribes, EPA, and other organizations an opportunity to meet and discuss current policies, regulatory initiatives, and technical topics in air quality. The NTF is a cooperative endeavor co-sponsored by The Institute for Tribal Environmental Professionals (ITEP) and the National Tribal Air Association (NTAA), made possible by funding from US EPA and other sponsors. There is a pre-conference workshop on Communicating Climate Change. May 14-17, 2018 Black Bear Casino Resort, Carlton, Minnesota. Learn more.

2018 National Conference of the Native American Fish and Wildlife Society (NAFWS). May 8-10, Warwick, RI. Hosted by the Narragansett Indian Tribe this year, the NAFWS is calling for presentations on areas that include, but are not limited to: Climate Change, Conservation Law Enforcement/Training, Fisheries Management, Wildlife Management, Environmental Protection, and Youth Programs. More information.

Updated informational brochures about the BIA Tribal Resilience Program, learn more,  and Tribal Resilience Programs for Youth, learn more.

Climate Adaptation Leadership Award. The Association of Fish and Wildlife Agencies and partners are seeking nominations for the Climate Adaptation Leadership Award, which recognizes outstanding efforts to increase the resilience of America’s valuable living natural resources and the many people, businesses and communities that depend on them. Individuals, groups, organizations, and government agencies are eligible to apply. See past awardees in the Tribal Category from 2017 here and 2016 here. Nominations will be accepted using the online form until April 13. Additional information and nomination form.

Request for Proposals – Tribal Climate Liaison. The Great Plains Tribal Water Alliance, Inc. (“Alliance”) is accepting proposals for a consultant agreement to perform professional services as a Tribal Climate Liaison. This agreement will require extensive travel to rural Indian Reservations within the North Central Region, which includes the states of Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, and Kansas. The position is located at the North Central Climate Science Center in Fort Collins, Colorado, where he/she will work closely with the Climate Science Center staff. The consultant reports to the Alliance Board of Directors. Proposals are due by March 30, sent by email to DCrowGhost@standingrock.org. Submit questions by March 20.


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Partner News

From the South Atlantic LCC:
Aligning conservation capacity and need in the Southeast. Learn more.
TNC vs NFWF coastal resilience assessments. Learn more.

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Webinars

Find more webinar information in our calendar.

Mar 22 | 12:00 PM-1:00 PM | Economic Valuation of Natural Infrastructure Provided by the Jacques Cousteau National Estuarine Research Reserve

Mar 28 | 3:30 PM-4:30 PM | Supporting Climate Adaption Planning for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts: What Surprising Changes will Occur to our Climate, Sea Level and Water Resources?

Apr 3 | 12:00 PM-1:00 PM | Coastal Water Quality Satellite Observations in Puerto Rico after Extreme Hurricane Events

Apr 5 | 12:00 PM-1:00 PM | Mapping Sea Level Rise Impacts to Oregon’s Tidal Wetlands: Tools for Climate Change Adaptation

Apr 10 | 12:00 PM-1:00 PM | Natural Shoreline Infrastructure: Working with Nature to Increase Coastal Resilience

Apr 12 | 12:00 PM-1:00 PM | Landscape Ecology Influences Estuarine Community Dynamics and Service Delivery

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Upcoming Events

Find more upcoming events in our calendar.

March 26-30 | 83rd North American Wildlife and Natural Resources Conference | Norfolk, VA
The conference format is designed so that attendees leave with: 1) A better understanding of the origins, complexities and likely solutions to current conservation issues, and 2) A better sense of the need for and the methods to achieve coordinated, cooperative management of the continent’s wildlife. More information.

April 5 | Florida Water and Climate Alliance Workshop | Tallahassee, FL
FloridaWCA provides a venue for information exchange and informal discussions of interest to water resources managers, utilities, scientists and regulators throughout Florida regarding climate science, tools and models, and communication to enhance water supply operations and resources. To register or if you have any questions contact Lisette Staal, UF Water Institute (lstaal@ufl.edu)

Apr 14 | Coastal Cultures Conference 2018-Emergency Preparedness and Cultural Continuation | Hunting Island, SC
Coastal areas especially the Sea Islands of the Gullah/Geechee Nation have endured a great deal of impacts from hurricanes and climate change over the past decade. How to prepare for the future has become a major issue for those that reside on islands around the world. This conference will focus on some of the methods of addressing this. More information.

April 17-18 | Adaptation Planning for Coastal Communities | Beaufort, NC
The course is designed for planners, public works staff, floodplain managers, hazard mitigation planners, sustainability managers, emergency managers, community groups, members of civic organizations, and coastal resource managers. The course covers:  basic elements of an adaptation planning framework; translating climate science into impacts on local community assets; qualitative approach to scope and compile a vulnerability assessment; locally relevant adaptation strategies and actions; implementation options for strategies; stakeholder engagement processes and tools. Registration.

April 20 | UNC Climate Change and Resilience Symposium | Chapel Hill, NC
Two expert panels, “Climate Change Communication” and “Rural Disaster Recovery and Hurricane Matthew,” will bring together leading practitioners, researchers, local government representatives, and community organizers for rich discussion about climate change, hazards, and resilience in 2018. Includes a student poster session. More information.

Aug 5-10 | 2018 Early Career Researcher Professional Development Training | Baton Rouge, LA
South Central Climate Science Center announces the third Early Career Researcher Professional Development Training designed for graduate students, post-docs, and early career researchers (i.e., graduated within the last five years) from any discipline conducting climate-related research with relevance to the south-central U.S. (i.e., New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, or Texas/Louisiana coast). Participants will be selected based on a competitive application process. The deadline to apply is 5:00 PM Central Time on Monday, April 2, 2018. Information and application.

Sept 17-19 | 2018 Carolinas Climate Resilience Conference | Columbia, SC
Community representatives, local, state, and federal government staff and officials, private sector representatives, practitioners, and researchers are invited to share experiences in working to increase climate resilience in the Carolinas. Sessions will cover a variety of topics from climate communications and working with diverse communities to increase resilience, to innovations in technology and financing climate adaptation. Submissions are open for proposals for individual presentations as well as full sessions, which can either be 1-1/2 hours or 3 hours. Submission deadline is Friday, April 13, 2018. Presentation Submission Guidelines & Forms.

June 11-15 | Gulf of Mexico Alliance All Hands Meeting | St. Petersburg, FL
Submissions are requested for the Tools Café at the 2018 All Hands meeting. Scheduled to coincide with the reception on Tuesday, June 12, 2018, the event provides an opportunity for partners to demonstrate their online or paper-based tool(s). The activity is intended to be an interactive experience to learn how the resources work. Submissions are due by Friday, April 13, 2018 to Dave.Reed@MyFWC.com. Submission details.

May 30-June 1 | 2018 State of the Coast Conference | New Orleans, LA
The State of the Coast Conference is the largest state-wide conference of its kind providing an interdisciplinary forum to exchange timely and relevant information on the dynamic conditions of Louisiana’s coastal communities, environment, and economy. The Coalition to Restore Coastal Louisiana, The Water Institute of the Gulf, and the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority of Louisiana partner to produce this forum, the need for which grows with every acre of land lost to the Gulf. More information.

At NC State

March 21 | 5:30 PM-7:30 PM | 101 David Clark Labs
Mark Eakin, NOAA
Chasing Coral Film Screening and Discussion

March 22 | 3:30 PM-4:30 PM | 101 David Clark Labs
Mark Eakin, NOAA
Chasing Coral Bleaching: a present and growing ecological disaster

March 22 | 3:30 PM | Talley Student Union Mountains Ballroom
Göran Ericsson, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
From Rare to Numerous – A Swedish Conservation Success for​ Moose, Wolves and Scientists

March 26 | 12:50 PM-1:40 PM | 1216 Jordan Hall Addition
Seema Sheth, Assistant Professor, Plant and Microbial Biology
The Evolutionary Ecology of Geographic Ranges in Western North American Monkeyflowers

March 29 | 9:00 AM-10:30 AM | 1214 Jordan Hall Addition
Matt Jurgonas, Parks, Recreation and Tourism Management
A Framework for Rural Coastal Community Resilience: Assessing Diverse Perceptions of Adaptive Capacity for Climate Change

March 29 & April 12 | Global Change Seminar Series | 101 David Clark Labs
Organized by the SE CSC Global Change Fellows with speakers and discussions on topics related to global change exposure, impacts, and adaptation. 3:30 pm.


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Opportunities

Hiring Announcements

Public Communications Specialist. This position shares results of research projects and outreach efforts funded or administered by the Water Resources Research Institute of the University of North Carolina and North Carolina Space Grant. This includes working with other team members, researchers and community partners to present timely information through varied communication venues including printed and online resources, social media, story maps, reports for individual projects and the full programs, videos, podcasts, newsletters, blog posts, program identity pieces, and educational materials. More information.

Postdoctoral Fellow. The Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at the University of Connecticut, in collaboration with UNC-Chapel Hill and Georgetown University, invites applications for a multi-year NSF-funded Postdoctoral Fellow to work on spatio-temporal patterns and ecological consequences of phenological mismatch across three trophic levels. Funded by NSF?s Macrosystems Biology program, the project seeks to quantify ecological patterns of phenological asynchrony between plants, Lepidoptera, and birds, and to explore demographic consequences of mismatch. The Fellow will join a highly collaborative and dynamic group of researchers across 8 North American institutions. More information.

Student Opportunities

NOAA Student Opportunities. Learn more.

Data Management Training Fellows. The Environmental Data Initiative announces six data management training fellowships for the summer 2018. The fellows will receive training in data management and gain hands-on experience through participation in data preparation, archiving and publishing with scientists at specific host research sites. The training program begins with an in-person workshop at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque (June 5 – June 7, 2018), during which the fellows learn about the process of data publishing. The knowledge gained will then be applied at the host sites. The application deadline is March 25. More information. Please contact Susanne Grossman-Clarke (grossmanclar@wisc.edu) for further questions.

Master’s Graduate Assistantship –  Design & Implementation of Citizen Science
The College of Natural Resources at North Carolina State University invites applications for a M.S.-level assistantship beginning in Fall 2018. The successful applicant will work under the supervision of Dr. Caren Cooper (Dept. of Forestry and Environmental Resources & NC Museum of Natural Sciences) and be self-motivated and hardworking with interests in human dimensions, communication, and policy research related to citizen science. With funds from the EPA, and in collaboration with social and environmental justice organizations and Virginia Tech, the student will assist with a new project to discover, model, and communicate risk of lead in tap water across the United States. To apply, submit a pre-application to Dr. Cooper, cbcoope3@ncsu.edu, by April 2.

Research Grants

NOAA | Environmental Literacy Grants
Supporting the Education of K-12 Students and the Public for Community Resilience. Many U.S. communities are increasingly contending with issues related to preventing, withstanding, and recovering from disruptions caused by extreme weather, such as severe storms, tornadoes, hurricanes, flooding, heavy precipitation events, persistent drought, heat waves, increased global temperatures, acidification of the ocean, and sea level rise. These extreme weather and climate events put stress on infrastructure, ecological systems, and the humans that live in the impacted places. Education projects focused on resilience enable and empower community members, including children and youth, to protect themselves and their communities from these hazards.. Applications due April 6, 2018.

The Wildlife Conservation Society | Climate Adaptation Fund
This program supports projects that implement effective interventions for wildlife adaptation to climate change. The WCS will provide up to $2.5 million in competitive grants in 2018 for projects for one to two years in length and for $50,000 to $250,000 per project. Awards will be made for applied, on-the-ground projects focused on implementing priority conservation actions in order to adapt to climate change at a landscape scale. This grant opportunity is for U.S.-based non-profit conservation organizations with approved IRS 501(c)(3) status, however, Tribal governments and universities may partner on proposals submitted by an eligible non-profit conservation organization. Proposals due April 6, 2018.

EPA | Environmental Education Local Grants Program
The purpose of the Environmental Education Local Grants Program in each EPA Region is to support locally-focused environmental education projects that increase public awareness and knowledge about environmental and conservation issues and provide the skills that participants in its funded projects need to make informed decisions and take responsible actions toward the environment. Proposals due April 11.

NSF | Cultivating Cultures for Ethical STEM
Cultivating Cultures for Ethical STEM funds research projects that identify (1) factors that are effective in the formation of ethical STEM researchers and (2) approaches to developing those factors in all the fields of science and engineering that NSF supports. Proposals are requested for research that explores the following: ‘What constitutes responsible conduct for research, and which cultural and institutional contexts promote ethical STEM research and practice and why?’ Proposals due April 22, 2018.

Miscellaneous

Call for Papers. Journal of Science Communication Special Issue on Communication at the Intersection of Science and Politics
This call invites research papers and essays that explore the communication at the intersection of science and politics and thus contribute to our understanding of this novel area of science communication. We invite contributions from communication science and related disciplines. Deadline for full papers is June 30.