UNL students plan Focus Nebraska for Earth week events

The University of Nebraska-Lincoln's student government, ASUN, and the Environmental Resource Center are organizing a weeklong event, "Focus Nebraska" April 18-22 during the week of Earth Day, April 22.

The main goal of "Focus Nebraska" is to educate students and the rest of the university community about the climate and the environment. Activities and programs have been planned, such as campuswide bike rides, lectures, documentary films, tree planting and an art display. Speakers include Tom Sanders, senior vice president of HDR; David Harwood from the UNL-based ANDRILL Antarctic climate research project, and Joel Sartore, National Geographic photographer. The events are free and open to the public.

April 18: 5 p.m., bike ride, meet at Broyhill Fountain at Nebraska Union Plaza for a bike ride around Lincoln's best trails. At 6:30 p.m. in Othmer Hall 106, lecture by Sanders, who will discuss sustainable development and the engineering job market for green jobs.

April 19: 7:30 p.m., Jackie Gaughan Multicultural Center Room 212, screening of the NET television documentary "Secrets Beneath the Ice," illustrating the groundbreaking research made in the Antarctic by Harwood and his ANDRILL colleagues.

April 21: 7:30 p.m., Nebraska East Union Great Plains Room, keynote speech by Sartore, a life-long Nebraskan who brings a sense of humor and a Midwestern work ethic to all of his National Geographic magazine assignments. Two decades with the National Geographic Society have allowed him to cover everything from the remote Amazon rain forest to beer-drinking, mountain-racing firefighters in the United Kingdom. Sartore is committed to conservation, especially in the Great Plains. He will talk about his experiences as a photographer and use those experiences to make sense of global warming.

April 22: 10 a.m.-noon, 19th and Vine Parking Garage (west side), tree planting. Trees and shovels will be provided.

For more information on Focus Nebraska or to be a volunteer during tree planting, contact Matan Gill at (402) 917-6583 or by email, or Madelene Eversoll at (402) 430-8184 or by email.

WRITER: Kelly Bartling, University Communications, (402) 472-2059