2016 TEDC Announces Faculty Grant Winners
TEDC has announced this year's faculty grant winners and their projects during Earth Week 2016. New School faculty from across the university apply policy, design, and social justice perspectives to address critical environmental issues generated by the impacts of climate change and other environmental threats to community well-being. Faculty grant winners will continue their projects throughout the year. The winners and their projects are:BEYOND THE POLAR BEARS: ALTERNATIVE VISUALS FOR EXISTING SOCIAL MEDIA PLATFORMS THAT COMMUNICATE TO NEW AUDIENCESWendy Popp, Part-time Assistant Professor, BFA Illustration Program, Parsons School of Design“Beyond the Polar Bears: Alternative Visuals for existing social media platforms that communicate to new audiences about climate change” will collaborate with 350.org to provide visual ideas with which to connect the public and college audiences with engaging digital storytelling artworks that help communicate key climate messages.THE TAR SANDS SONGBOOKTanya Kalmanovitch, Associate Professor, Mannes School of Music"The Tar Sands Song Book" will be a collection of at least 15 new open-form compositions and an interdisciplinary performance project that make the impact of tar sands development visible and audible from multiple perspectives.MOBILIZING MAPS FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIESStephen Metts, Part-time Lecturer, Milano School of International Affairs, Management, and Urban Policy“Mobilizing Maps for Sustainable Communities” seeks to build a robust open source mapping resource for local community members in their opposition to further expansion of natural gas infrastructure.TESTING THE WATERSBarent Roth, Part-time Lecturer, BFA Integrated Design Program, Parsons School of Design“Testing the Waters” will refine, design and develop 23 low cost trawls pulling a floating device with a net on the water’s surface to gather data about plastic pollution in the Earth’s oceans.FOOD SECURITYFabio Parasecoli, Associate Professor and Coordinator of Food Studies, Schools of Public EngagementRachel Knopf, Assistant Director of Wellness and Health, Student Health Services“Urban Food Security in Context: the Lived Experience of Hunger at The New School” will focus on issues of food security at different levels: the students’ awareness of the needs of their food insecure peers, the functioning of food banks from a strategic and service design point of view, the systems and social hierarchies that affect food insecurity, and the impact of food policy on urban environments.DRONES FOR REFUGEESBrian McGrath, Dean, School of Constructed Environments, Parsons School of DesignMehdi Salehi, Part-time Lecturer, School of Art, Media, and Technology, Parsons School of Design“Drones for Refugees” is a drones monitoring system ensuring the safe arrival of refugees. Since 2015 the EU has received more than 1.2 million refugees mostly from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq. Over the past 2 years an estimated 8,000 people have lost their lives trying to cross into Europe. Drones for Refugees aims to support their safe arrival.ADDRESSING ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH RISKS THROUGH COMMUNITY ACTION RESEARCH AND LOCAL KNOWLEDGEIvan Ramirez, Assistant Professor of Environmental Health, Eugene Lang College of Liberal Arts“Addressing Environmental Health Risks through Community Action Research and Local Knowledge: Pilot Study in Williamsburg and Greenpoint, Brooklyn” will seek to understand how climate variability, extremes and changes interact with social dynamics to impact the health of residents in New York City, particularly communities of color and socioeconomically poor populations.