Happy World Water Day!

Did you save water today? The UN has declared March 22nd as World Water Day since 1993.

For more information and fun stuff, please visit:  UN World Water Day

World Water Day Brochure

As many as 280 geographers have just one destination on their minds this week: NIU

The NIU Department of Geography is hosting the annual meeting of the West Lakes Division of the Association of American Geographers.

This year’s meeting will be held jointly with the East Lakes Division. The meeting begins with an evening reception on Thursday, Oct. 25, and concludes with afternoon field trips on Saturday, Oct. 27.

“Based upon pre-registration totals to date, we expect 230 to 280 geography faculty, professionals and students here in DeKalb,” said Andrew Krmenec, geography chair.

For more information, click here.

Noted Palentologist to speak at Augustana College on Oct. 4th

Augustana College will be hosting a free public lecture by noted paleoanthropologist Dr. Louise Leakey from the Koobi Fora Research Project in Kenya, Africa. Louise is the granddaughter of famous paleoanthropologists Louis and Mary Leakey and the daughter of paleoanthropoloigsts Richard and Meave Leakey. She will be giving a lecture titled "A Human Journey: What Fossils Tell Us." The lecture will be held on Thursday, October 4th from 7:30-8:30pm. For more information, please follow the links:

http://www.augustana.edu/x11824.xml?eventid=8646

http://www.roycecarlton.com/speaker/profile/Louise-Leakey.html

River/Lake Walk by NIU Student Subunit of Illinois Lakes Management Association

On Saturday, April 7th, the NIU Student Subunit of Illinois Lakes Management Association organized a River/Lake Walk to clean up the East Lagoon and the Kishwaukee River. Turnout for this event was excellent! About 15 students, faculty/staff members, and their friends showed up, eager to help our environment and conserve water resources. We met at Montgomery Hall at 9:00 a.m. and after enjoying some donuts, we worked our way around the lagoon and along Kishwaukee River in small groups, picking up trash and recyclables along the way. In total, the individual groups removed approximately 150 pounds of garbage from the water and surrounding shorelines. Keeping trash and other debris out of the waters and shores of the East Lagoon and Kishwaukee River is imperative to preserving our beautiful campus for future generations of NIU students and the DeKalb community.

The NIU Student Subunit meets every Monday at 4:30 In Davis Hall room 103. We will be doing monthly clean-ups of the Lagoon as well as water quality testing, screening environmental films, presentations by guest speakers in water quality related fields, and many other activities each week. Next Monday, April 16th, we will be having a guest speaker come in to give a talk about Rain Gardens, so please make sure to attend!

(post submitted by Evan Bing; pictures by Wei Luo and Melissa Burlingame)

NIU Student Subunit of the Illinois Lakes Management Association

The NIU Student Subunit of the Illinois Lakes Management Association (ILMA) is a student organization seeking to enhance students' knowledge of preserving our valuable national water resources, such as lakes, ponds, rivers, and watersheds. The Illinois Lakes Management Association (http://www.ilma-lakes.org/) established the NIU Student Subunit with the intent of reaching students currently persuing an education in environmental sciences.

We have fun and interesting activities planned throughout the semester such as water quality sampling of the Lagoon and Kishwaukee river using radiosondes, volunteer-based lake clean-ups, and the ILMA annual conference March 1-3 at the Holmes Student Center that will provide a great opportunity for those seeking to network with professionals in water quality-related fields. We aim to not only help maintain the Lagoon and Kishwaukee River, but also to involve the Dekalb community so we may work as a team to restore and preserve their quality for future generations.

There are currently no fees to join our organization! Those interested may contact Evan Bing (President) via email: evanbing@gmail.com or by phone: (847) 274-4910. "Like" our Facebook page for more information: http://www.facebook.com/NIUILMA

Geography students and faculty (Dr. Greene and Luo) will be actively invovled in the ILMA annual conference. NIU students can attend sessions for free. Details can be found at http://www.ilma-lakes.org/ilma-27th-annual-conference.

NIU Geography Club Activities

The goal the the NIU Geography Club is to expand on the interest of the subject outside the classroom. We are a relatively small and new club, but we are looking to expand and become recognized by the university. Anyone with any interest in geography is encouraged to join the Geography Club. A meeting will take place Tuesday, February 21st at 6pm in Davis Hall. We will be discussing club events for the end of the spring semester. Derek Bus can be contacted at Derek.N.Bus@Gmail.com for questions concerning upcoming club meetings and events.
(post submitted by Derek Bus)

Dr. Rich Greene on BBC News about the World's Largest Cities

Dr. Rich Greene was recently featured on BBC News about the World's Largest Cities. More at the follwoing links:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16761784
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00n1j58#synopsis

Congratulations to Rich!