THE NRES SECONDARY MAJOR IS SUPPORTED BY THE OFFICE OF THE PROVOST, COLLEGE OF AGRICULTURE, COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCES, DEPARTMENT OF BIOLOGICAL & AGRICULTURAL ENGINEERING, Department of geography, AND GENEROUS ALUMNI AND DONORS LIKE YOU!

Acquiring a sediment core from Marion County Lake in Marion County, Kansas.

Ten students  – from three colleges and seven different majors – successfully completed the NRES capstone course in Spring 2018.  Faculty advisors were Dr. John Harrington, Jr. (Geography), Dr. Abby Langston (Geography), and Dr. Vahid Rahmani (Biological & Agricultural Engineering).

Students worked on three different projects including “Influences of Nutrient Accumulation, Sedimentation Loading, and Organic Matter on Water Quality in Marion County”, “Marion County Park and Lake Sediment and Water Quality Study”, and “Identification of Sediment Sources in the Tributaries of Marion County Park and Lake to Develop Future Erosion Management Plan.”  Project reports and scientific poster presentations can be viewed and downloaded from the NRES website.

Congratulations to students Jacob Allen (Biological & Agricultural Engineering), Charles Balkenbusch (Geology), Alan Ddamulira (Biological & Agricultural Engineering), Hannah Gerardy (Agronomy), Colin Keller (Geography), Lucas Linder (Agricultural Economics), Cole Maddox (Agricultural Technology & Management), Elisa Trigo (Animal Sciences), Hannah Wallace (Agronomy), and Tessa Zee (Agronomy).

The Spring 2018 NRES Seminar Series featured guest presentations by five researchers.  Special thanks to Matt Meyerhoff (USDA-NRCS), Dr. Audrey Joslin (Geography), Dr. Marie Weide (Geography), Dr. Karin Goldberg (Geology), Dr. Prathap Parameswaran (Civil Engineering) for their thought-provoking talks and discussion.

The seminar series helps us achieve our student learning outcomes by expanding students broad-based knowledge of natural resources/environmental science and by illustrating the commonalities (and differences) in academic perspectives for studying and solving contemporary natural resources issues.

This series, which continues to grow in popularity since its inception in Spring 2014, is focused on undergraduate students and was established to help build a sense of community, an appreciation for the breadth and depth of issues and approaches, and awareness of current research in natural resources and environmental science fields.

Dr. Colby Moorberg, Department of Agronomy

We welcome Dr. Colby Moorberg from the Department of Agronomy and Dr. Matthew Sanderson from the Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work as the newest members of the NRES Board of Directors.

Dr. Matthew Sanderson, Department of Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work

Dr. Moorberg is an agronomist with teaching and research interests in soils, particularly soil-root interactions with both agronomic and ecological applications.  He takes over for long-time NRES board member Dr. Mickey Ransom who moved on and is currently serving as the interim head of the Department of Agronomy.  Dr. Sanderson is a sociologist interested in understanding the relations between people and the ecosphere in the context of globalization.The terms for both new board members run from 2018-2021.

Current board member Dr. Trisha Moore, Biological and Agricultural Engineering was re-elected to another three year term that will also expire in 2021.

During our Spring 2018 meeting, the NRES Governing Board approved the following courses as a new block electives within the NRES curriculum:

ANTH 310 Environmental Anthropology: Living with Change in the Anthropocene
Social Sciences/Humanities

BAE 643 Life Cycle Assessment
Applied Sciences and Technology

BAE 664 Green Stormwater Infrastructure Design & Assessment
Applied Sciences and Technology

GEOG 600 Mountain Geography
Social Sciences/Humanities

The NRES Secondary Major is pleased to include this course to our list of approved block electives.  If you have a suggestion for a new course that should be considered for inclusion in the program, please see the procedure outlined in our Suggest a New NRES Course web page.