It was T-4 days until S25 departed for their Louisiana Field Seminar, what better way to mark the moment than with another interdisciplinary panel? The theme? Hurricanes!
We covered a lot of ground, and it helped that GROUND is precisely what we were talking about in every sense of the word.
Why is ground in Louisiana disappearing? What does it look like to be on the ground experiencing extreme weather? To answer these questions, we had to ground ourselves first…
As is the Mystic way, our panel was all-hands-on-deck, with faculty chiming in on all the “hows”:
1. History: How the legacy of the Great Mississippi River Flood of 1927 informs local interpretations of current events – and who absorbs the risk when levees break.
2. Geology: How hurricanes come to be. Hint: lots of warm water and converging winds. The most intense hurricanes have been shifting poleward.
3. Ecology: How coral react to hurricanes. Damage and fragmentation, naturally, but did you know the cold upwelling after a storm can actually be a reprieve from bleaching? That’s what experts call a stabilizing feedback loop.
4. Literature: How do collective preparation and resilience appear in hurricane writing? People are not defined by one event, and hurricane survivors are much more than victims. 5. Policy: How do Congressional statutes relate to executive regulations? We pondered whether pluralism must mean vague law writing and how disagreements between branches of government can stall action.
After the interdisciplinary panel, students broke into groups to design ideal ways to communicate about climate and hurricanes to different audiences. Some made content for a TikTok audience, others a Twitter audience. One group created a lesson plan for an elementary school class, and others created talking points for a mixed-generation family dinner. It became clear to students that if your message, language and approach aren’t right for your audience, even the most important and compelling information can be missed!