Geography News Spring/Summer 2010

Embedding Sustainability in Business Workshops

Workshop 1:  Monday 28th June – Corporate Environmental Management
Presenters:  Alison Maguire, Business School and Agne Prochorskaite, IESR
Room: LT014 Ashley Building, Leek Road, Stoke Campus

Workshop 2:  Wednesday 30th June – Renewable Energy as an income stream
Presenter Neil Packer, Faculty of Computing Engineering and Technology
Room: BG035 Brindley Building, Leek Road, Stoke Campus

Workshop 3: Friday 2nd July - EMS for SMEs: A step-by-step approach to implementing an environmental management system
Presenters:  Alison Maguire, Business School and Agne Prochorskaite, IESR
Room: LT014 Ashley Building, Leek Road, Stoke Campus

Lunch 12:00-12:30, Workshop 12:30 – 16:00               

Fees £25 per workshop or £50 for all three.
Payment options: Cheque (made out to Staffordshire University), for invoices or credit cards please contact Christine Dover 01782 294110 c.j.dover@staffs.ac.uk

For general queries contact:  Jon Fairburn, IESR 01782 294038 jon.fairburn@staffs.ac.uk

For location maps www.staffs.ac.uk/maps , IESR website  www.staffs.ac.uk/iesr

In June 2010 our Geography department has been ranked 8th out of 62 departments across the country in the Guardian Rankings for their University guide 2011.
Clearly beating many other prestigious universities.

Following the success of the first talk in the new series of free Public Lectures in Regeneration, organised by the Institute for Environment, Sustainability and Regeneration, tickets are still available for the next talks:

Thursday 27th May 2010
Robert Napier Chairman of the Homes & Communities Agency (previously Chairman of English Partnerships): Regeneration post-election – is it sustainable?

Thursday 24th June 2010
John Dover Professor of Ecology at Staffordshire University: Green Infrastructure: a survival tool for business and communities.

All talks will take place in Ashley Lecture Theatre LT1, Leek Road campus, Stoke-on-Trent ST4 2DF.
Talks start at 7.30 p.m. prompt.
Entry is by ticket available from Christine Dover 01782 294110 c.j.dover@staffs.ac.uk

On April 23rd 2010 Level 2/3 students studying regeneration went on a field course around North Staffordshire.

The visit led by Jon Fairburn and John Ambrose included visiting Festival Park, the new housing and urban realm at Burslem, improvements  to Westport Lake and the new eco-friendly visitor centre, Stoke City Footbal Club and Trentham Gardens.

Jon said ‘The students were particularly taken with the new housing at Burslem, which is encouraging if we want to retain graduates in the area.’

In April 2010 Level 3 students from the Geography department travelled to Barcelona for a week-long field course.

Whilst in Barcelona, students explored the urban geography of the city and the physical geography of the surrounding area.
In groups, students undertook independent research projects on topics ranging from urban regeneration to slope stability in the nearby Collserola hills.
Each student also provided a short presentation on a topic relating to the city and its surrounding area.

There was also of course time for the students to relax - enjoying the sunshine on one of Barcelona's beaches, visiting one of the city's many museums, or experiencing the atmosphere at the famous Nou Camp stadium, home of Barcelona FC.

Cycling in Stoke

Cycling Stoke have £9.6 million to spend over three years to improve cycling in Stoke on Trent.
Since October 2009 Cycling Stoke and the Geography Department have been collaborating by using students to investigate cycling in the general public, and staff and students at Staffordshire University.

Fiona Tweed has been invited to be one of a small advisory team of outstanding academics, stakeholders and policy makers from across Europe.

The group will offer expert guidance to the European Commission funded 7th Framework project CAPHAZ-NET (Social Capacity Building for Natural Hazards: Towards More Resilient Societies).

This project aims to identify and assess existing practices and policies for social capacity building in the field of natural hazards across Europe. The project will make recommendations to enhance the resilience of European societies to the impacts of natural hazards.

The ERASMUS programme allows both staff and students to study at partner Universities, one of the links we have is with Oldenburg University in Germany.
Students from geography, biology, ecology and forensic science would all fit into the programme of study well.

Please see associated word document (DOC, file size: 41KB) with full details.

Other resources

There is a box file in the Learning Resource Centre 4th Floor Mellor Building, marked Oldenburg – ERASMUS with more information.

Key contacts

Jon Fairburn from the Geography has been to Oldenburg and you can have an informal chat with him or email him at Jon.Fairburn@staffs.ac.uk.

Ingo Mose head of the Regional Science group ingo.mose@uni-oldenburg.de

Katja Kaboth responsible for incoming international students at Oldenburg University katja.kaboth@uni-oldenburg.de

Susan Lloyd International Office, Staffordshire University 01782 294838 s.r.lloyd@staffs.ac.uk