UA/GLOBE Soil Moisture Project - Fall 1997 Newsletter

Southwest Area
Fall 1997 Newsletter

Vol. 1, No. 1

TRAINING

Fall 1997 Biosphere2 Teacher Training

Dates: Nov. 7-8 and 14-15; Approximately 0800-1700; Limited to ~20
Registration information and form: http://www.hwr.arizona.edu/globe/train/b2c1197/reginfo.html
To be added to training mail list, send email to: Jim Washburne jwash@hwr.arizona.edu
Send workshop registration to: Ms. Sallie Cochran educate@bio2.edu FAX: (520) 896-6361
Make hotel reservations with: Ms. Veronica Gillen vgillen@bio2.edu (520) 896-6204

1997 Summer Supplement to the Teachers Guide

This should be mailed to you from Washington early this Fall. It contains mostly new activities and protocols. Carefully add this material to your GLOBE Teachers Guide. Note that the new pages are numbered by section and do not systematically fit into the numbering scheme in the 1996 Teacher Guide. In many cases, this new material includes exciting new introductory activities so do not set it aside thinking that it is just more protocols. The only pages you should remove and discard are 5-23 to 5-36, 5-63 to 5-72, and 5-83 to 5-88 in the soil section. These pages have been extensively revised in the 1997 supplement. In the GPS section, Offset GPS is now a protocol so you might draw a line through these old pages to indicate that the new pages should be used (it is difficult to remove the old pages without removing current material because of how the two-sidded copies are organized). Now your Big Blue Book is even Bigger! Send any questions or comments about the new protocols to the science PI of that section.

RESEARCH

News Flash: 1997 Promises to be a strong El Nino year!

GLOBE schools are urged to look into historical monthly precipitation and temperature trends in their area. Is this winter unusual? What other GLOBE observations might be affected by extreme precipitation or temperatures? Have your students study the correlation between your weather and the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO) index. Here are some useful data resources:

ENSO background: http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/ENSO/
and http://www.dir.ucar.edu/esig/enso/
Monthly weather data (use CLIMVIS, Global historical climate data): http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/homepg/interprod.html
Southern Oscillation Index and Sea Surface Temperature (SST) Data: http://nic.fb4.noaa.gov:80/data/cddb/
El Nino-related Climatology Data: http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/toga-tao/el-nino/climatology.html
US Climate Normals: http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/USclimate/
In the News: http://www.usatoday.com/weather/wnino0.htm

1998 Summer GLOBE Student Environmental Conference - Helsenki, FINLAND

Very limited participation (~6 groups from US). Watch www.globe.gov around Oct. 1 for notice of US competition.
Electronic Research Posters will be accepted. Contact Jim Washburne, jwash@hwr.arizona.edu for help formatting your reports in HTML.
Examples: Not yet - watch "www.hwr.arizona.edu/globe/support/posters.html" for future info

Upper San Pedro Basin Research Activities

Student/Teacher volunteers are needed for short and long-term monitoring of the hydrology, vegetation, soils and atmospheric conditions along the Upper San Pedro riparian corridor as part of a multi-national ground, air and satellite effort to study the interactions between man and the environment in this beautiful but sensitive area. Find out more about it from the links and contacts below.

Semi-Arid Land Surface-Atmosphere (SALSA) Program Web Site
ARS Southwest Watershed Research Center Web Site
Contact: jwash@hwr.arizona.edu | bgoff@tucson.ars.ag.gov
The next intensive study period is: Oct. 12-14.

COLLABORATIONS

Do you remember how hard it was to get started with GLOBE? Questions about equipment, computer, classroom and resources are common. Consider the following opportunities to mentor a fellow GLOBE teacher and have your students develop GLOBE buddies around the world.

Mexican GLOBE School Collaborations

Our goals here are to support bilingual teacher training and to promote and support cross border collaborations between GLOBE schools. Cyndy will be in Mexico City around mid-September and will meet with the Mexico country coordinator. She would like to know if your school is interested in partnering with a Mexican school. Let her know at: chenzel@ccit.arizona.edu

Mexico plans on training its first teachers at Biosphere 2 around 3/98.
Country coordinator info can be found under "GLOBE Countries" at: http://globe.fsl.noaa.gov/INTL/Virtual.html?contact&MX
If you have school contacts in Mexico, know of other cross border programs of interest, or speak Spanish and could help us with training, contact Sara Chavarria: spchavar@u.arizona.edu

Las Vegas GLOBE School Collaborations

About 40 teachers were trained Aug. 4-7 1997. Only about 10 have equipment and some are still working on getting email.
All these teachers are from Clark Co. around Las Vegas, a rapidly growing urban environment not unlike that of Tucson or Phoenix.
The two coordinators below will select pairs of schools. You do not have to have started data collection. This activity is can be purely supportive or based on collaborative research.
Contact: jwash@hwr.arizona.edu | williams@nevada.edu

International Partnership Programs

Great way to learn/share with students in a different culture!

Sister Cities International - The World's Premier Citizen Diplomacy Network, http://www.sister-cities.org/
See GLOBE Bulletin (8/19/97) for more info (globe.fsl.noaa.gov/GB/)
Hands Across the Border
World Wise Schools - An Essential Resource in Global Learning, http://www.peacecorps.gov/www/dp/wws1.html

SUPPORT

Arizona GLOBE Teacher Mail List

Use to keep in touch, ask questions, collaborate! Any messages sent will be automatically forwarded to over 50 teachers on the list so avoid pointless chit-chat but do share your problems and successes. Be selective in responding/replying to the group rather than the individual. Be sure to include your name, school and email within your message as this information is not necessarily known to others.

To send a message, use: azglobe@hwr.arizona.edu
To subscribe or unsubscribe, send an email to: Jim Washburne, jwash@hwr.arizona.edu

Whiteriver Skills Workshop, 8/9/97

The 12 participants (and families) listed below attended a weekend skills workshop in the White Mountains hosted by GLOBE teacher Pat Miller and the East Fork Lutheran Mission School. Last April's Biosphere 2 Center teacher trainees wanted to get together and sample a different corner of Arizona than the desert surrounding most of us. Although only 850 m higher than Tucson, this area gets almost 100 cm of snow each year. We practiced: Soils, Hydrology, Land Cover, and Atmosphere protocols and activities, discussed implementation and collaboration. This newsletter is one outcome from these exciting discussions. Be sure to have your students monitor both the East Fork and Cibecue Schools for some interesting Arizona Mountain observations.

Participants: (l-r): Jan, Terrie, Jim, Elisabeth, Diane, Gary, Mary, Allen, Jill, John, Adrian, Pat

Western Arizona Skills Workshop, Fall-Winter 1997??

We would like to have a similar one day workshop to bring schools in western Arizona (Ajo, Gila Bend, San Luis, Lake Havasu, ??) together to practice the latest protocols, discuss implementation and collaboration. Please let us know if you have a school/nature site that would support a group (with some people needing overnight lodging). Contact: jwash@hwr.arizona.edu

Arizona Advisory Council on Environmental Education Grants

Grants range from $1,000 to $10,000 and can be used for SITE DEVELOPMENT, FIELD TRIPS and TEACHER TRAINING
APPLICATION deadline is Sept. 30, 1997
Contact: AACEE Coordinator, Arizona State Land Department, 1616 W. Adams, Phoenix, AZ 85007, 602/542-4625

1997 Summer Meeting Notebook

Second Annual International/Science Conference, Airlie, VA http://globe.fsl.noaa.gov/events/airlie1997/index.html
GLOBE U.S. Teachers Conference, Colorado Springs, CO http://globe.fsl.noaa.gov/events/cosprings1997/index.html

RESOURCES

Useful GLOBE web links

Summary of GLOBE Program Goals and Objectives, http://www.globe.gov/ghome/shareinfo.html
New Systems Developments at NGDC, http://swat.ngdc.noaa.gov/globe/contents.html
Trainer's Resource Room, http://globe.hq.nasa.gov/
GLOBE Resource Room, http://globe.ngdc.noaa.gov/sda-bin/wt?gh/GRR+U+Dg(gmx/el)
1996 Teacher's Guide - On-Line, http://globe.ngdc.noaa.gov/sda-bin/wt?gh/GRR+U+Dg(gmx/el)Gn(GLOBE~20Teacher's~20Guide)
GLOBE logo B&W masters (EPS, PDF, TIFF), http://globe1.globe.gov/js/logo/logo.html

Back to the Soil Moisture Home Page: http://www.hwr.arizona.edu/globe/globe_home.html

Last updated: 9/12/97, Please send me your Comments or Contributions: globe@hwr.arizona.edu
This URL is: http://www.hwr.arizona.edu/globe/support/news0897.html

Southwest Area Fall 1997 Newsletter