Announcing the 2009 Student Essay Competition Sustainability through Earth Observation and Engineering
By Maeve Hickok, posted on July 13th, 2009 in Articles, Earth Observation, Education, Energy, Oceans, Sustainability, Technology
Editors Note: This competition is sponsored by the IEEE Foundation and offers $900 cash prizes for contest winners. Click HERE for competition details.
Earthzine will host its first essay competition for college and university students with the goal of supporting and advancing the twin themes of sustainability in the 21st century: social equity and environmental protection.
The competition was announced today at the plenary session of the 2009 IGARSS in Cape Town, South Africa July 12-17, and Earthzine plans to spread word of the contest through IEEE student chapters and academic institutions and programs. The entry deadline is October 17, 2009. Contest guidelines are here.
“When IEEE President John Vig launched the President’s Sustainability Initiative, we saw Earthzine as a great vehicle to support the institute’s PSI and to involve undergraduate and graduate students in thinking and writing about these issues,” said Earthzine Editor-in-Chief Paul Racette.
“Social equity in the distribution and accessibility of Earth’s resources and to rapidly advancing technologies and their applications poses both significant challenges and opportunities to engineers and Earth observers. These opportunities and challenges are of incredible complexity and interest. Add environmental protection as a dual theme of equal importance and we believe we have the basis for a lively, important contest of ideas,” he said.
The competition will also support Earthzine’s mission in the Global Earth Observation System of Systems and make use of its blog capabilities.
“Brad Allenby laid the groundwork for this contest in his previously-published essay and white paper on the President’s Sustainability Initiative. The IEEE Foundation has generously supported the prizes. And Dave Mullins, Associate Editor for Education, has done a wonderful job putting together the essay guidelines and the judging rubric,” Racette said.
“We hope we’ll get students from all over Earth engaged in a lively discussion of sustainability, social equity, and environmental protection, issues that are important to us all.”
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