Contact: Chris Chesrown
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480-731-8503

August 1, 2000

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Honors Forum Lecture Series to Explore Oceans to Outer Space

“Water: Origin and Destiny of Life,” is the topic of the 2000-2001 Honors Forum Lecture Series of The Maricopa Community Colleges.

Six speakers renowned for their expertise in topics including outer space, oceanography, origins of life, and history of water in the Southwest will speak on Wednesday evenings, 7:30 p.m. in the Bulpitt Auditorium of Phoenix College, 1202 W. Thomas. All talks are free and open to the public.

The 2000-2001 Honors Forum Lecture Series, in its 19th year, is offered in conjunction with Phi Theta Kappa, international honor society for two-year colleges.

Dates of appearances, speakers, and topics are:

Sept. 20: “Beyond Imagination: Life in Space.” Former NASA astronaut, Dr. George D. Nelson, is the director of Project 2061, which is engaged in the reform of science, math and technology education. The project aims to create a system whereby all high school graduates are literate in these areas. In addition, Dr. Nelson is a senior staff member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has been an administrator for research and professor of astronomy and education at the University of Washington and has taught graduate courses in stellar atmospheres and solar physics. Research interests include science education and radiative transfer and hydrodynamics. In the early ‘90s, Dr. Nelson was a fellow of the prestigious American Council on Education.

For 11 years beginning in 1978, Dr. Nelson served as a NASA astronaut and flew as a mission specialist aboard three space shuttle flights – including on the crew of the flight of Discovery in 1989. The successful flight followed the loss of the Challenger and Dr. Nelson was extensively involved in reworking procedures and in re-engineering space shuttle components and software. He continues to advise NASA.

Dr. Nelson, of Washington, D.C., earned a B.S. in physics from Harvey Mudd College and an M.S. and Ph.D. in astronomy from the University of Washington.

Oct. 25: “Sustainable Seas: The Vision, The Reality.” Oceanographer Dr. Sylvia A. Earle is chair of the Deep Ocean Exploration and Research Marine Operations and is the 1998 National Geographic Society Explorer in Residence. In addition, Dr. Earle is the Center for Marine Conservation Ambassador for the Oceans, and is the leader of the Sustainable Seas Expeditions – a five-year study of the National Marine Sanctuaries sponsored by National Geographic and funded by the Goldman Foundation. This adjunct scientist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute serves on numerous boards and committees relating to marine research, policy and conservation.

Dr. Earle has led more than 50 expeditions worldwide involving more than 6,000 hours in underwater research. She led the first official team of women aquanauts and boasts a depth record of 1,000 meters as a solo diver. In addition, this woman of the ocean has authored more than 100 publications about marine science and technology, including the book Sea Change in 1995.

In the early 1980s, she served on the President’s Advisory Committee on Oceans and Atmosphere and, in 1990, was appointed as Chief Scientist of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, where she served for two years. Dr. Earle has a B.S. from Florida State University and M.S. and Ph.Ds from Duke University. She also has honorary degrees from 11 colleges and universities.

Nov. 15: “The American Southwest: Hydraulic Society At the Crossroads of History.” A well of information about the history and politics of water in Arizona, Dr. Jack L. August is chief historian and executive advisor in the Natural Resources Division of the Attorney General’s Office. This Prescott resident and native Arizonan is a key member of the state’s Water Rights Adjudication Team, which helps courts determine uses and distribution of Colorado River waters among Indian and non-Indian users in the state. Dr. August teaches history courses about the American West, the far Southwest, and the environment via Interactive Instructional Television for Northern Arizona University.

This former Fulbright Scholar and Pulitzer Prize nominee has written extensively on topics relating to the modern American West. His most recent book, Vision in the Desert: Carl Hayden and Hydropolitics in the American Southwest, was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize in History in 2000, and is a candidate for numerous upcoming awards. Distinguished historian Howard Roberts Lamar, former president of Yale University, considers the book a groundbreaking analysis that fills a major gap in the modern history of the Southwest.

Feb. 28: “In Search of Human Origins.” In 1974, renowned American paleoanthropologist Dr. Donald C. Johanson discovered the 3.18 million-year-old hominid skeleton “Lucy” in Ethiopia – and changed forever the understanding of early hominid evolution. This prolific researcher and writer received soon funding from prestigious organizations such as the National Geographic Society and returned to the filed in Ethiopia where he found “The First Family” – 13 individuals who died in a single geological moment. In 1975, Dr. Johanson was appointed curator of physical anthropology at the Cleveland Museum of Natural History. In 1981, he founded the Institute of Human Origins in Berkeley, Ca. and, in 1997, he relocated headquarters to Arizona State University where he is director and professor of anthropology.

Dr. Johanson has carried out field work in Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan and Tanzania. He has authored numerous books, including Lucy, Lucy’s Child, Blueprints: Solving the Mystery of Evolution, and Ancestors: In Search of Human Origins. Films have been produced that highlight the pioneering work of Dr. Johanson and his team in Ethiopia. Also, he has hosted the PBS “Nature” series, narrated the National Geographic Society film, “Fossils: Clues to the Past,” and was host and narrator of a three-part NOVA series based on his Ancestors book. He professes that the human species has a responsibility to protecting and conserving the natural world.

March 21, 2001: A Song for the Blue Ocean. Renowned marine researcher and conservationist Dr. Carl Safina has been close to the sea all of his life. His widely praised book, Song for the Blue Oceans, is an account of serious overhunting of the seas -- of the potential for regeneration of ocean life. Dr. Safina, a lecturer at Yale University, is a recipient of the American Fisheries Society Carl R. Sullivan Conservation Award and a winner of the Pew Charitable Trust prestigious Scholar’s Award in Conservation and the Environment.

Dr. Safina earned his PhD in ecology from Rutgers University in 1987. Since then, he has been engaged in major efforts to ban high seas driftnets, to overhaul federal fisheries law in the U.S., to use international agreements to restore depleted populations of tuna, sharks, and other fishes, and to achieve passage of a new high seas fisheries treaty through the United Nations. In 1990, he founded the Living Oceans Program at the Hon National Audubon Society where he is currently vice president for marine conservation.

He is the author of more than a hundred scientific and popular publications about ecology and saving marine life. Song for the Blue Ocean was chosen a New York Times Notable Book of the Year, a Los Angeles Times Best Nonfiction selection, and a Library Journal Best Science Book selection.

April 18: Living Downstream: an Ecologist Looks At Cancer and the Environment Ecologist, author and cancer survivor Dr. Sandra Steingraber is an internationally recognized expert on the environmental links to cancer. She is the author of the widely acclaimed Living Downstream. . . which presents cancer as a human rights issue and offers data on toxic releases and statistics from U.S. cancer registries. She was recently appointed to serve on President Clinton’s National Action Plan on Breast Cancer, administered by the U.S.Department of Health and Human Services.

In 1997, she was named a Ms. Magazine Woman of the Year. In 1998, she received the first Jenifer Altman Foundation award for “poetically using science to elucidate causes of cancer.” Also, the New England chapter of the American Medical Association presented her the Will Solimene Award for excellence in medial communication. In 1999, the Sierra Club heralded Dr. Steingraber as “the new Rachel Carson.”

Dr. Steingraber is a faculty member at Cornell University’s Center for the Environment in Ithaca, N.Y. She has taught biology at Columbia College, Chicago and has been a visiting professor at the University of Illinois, Radcliffe/Harvard, and Northeastern University. She has a Ph.D. in biology from the University of Michigan and a M.A. in English from Illinois State University.

For more information about The Maricopa Community College District Honors Forum Lecture Series, please call Mary Beth Mason at 480-731-8295.

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March 13, 2002