Wetland Restoration

less than 15

Small-group seminar

University with graduate programs, including doctoral programs

This is a combined undergraduate/graduate course environmental studies centered around a wetland restoration adjacent to the Lower 9th Ward. Graduate students serve as mentors to undergraduates. It satisfies either science or social studies or environmental studies requirements.

The course is centered issues of wetland restoration in an environmental justice community. The four-week course is based in New Orleans and consists of field trips and readings in wetland science, social science, land tenure. One week is devoted to service learning. All students are expected to keep a journal.

The overall goal is to provide a learning opportunity in a project to create a thriving, healthy wetland and neighborhood focal point. Immediate restoration of BBWT is ecologically impossible because the current soil and water conditions of BBWT cannot support a cypress-tupelo swamp. Steps to establish the goal are to work with the Holy Cross Neighborhood Association's (HCNA) Center for Sustainable and Engaged Development (CSED) in the following activities

 Identify immediate adaptive restoration solutions by continuing to collect baseline data about the salinity, chemical composition, and hydrology of BBWT;

 Provide the community with concrete evidence of restoration efforts by planting small, self-contained test-plots in BBWT with potentially successful species that have been identified through research;

 Inspire long-term commitment to restoration in the community by creating wetland science curriculum for local students that engages their interests with hands-on activities at BBWT;

 Connect residents to restoration efforts and invite them to participate in outreach activities by attending twice-monthly HCNA meetings, distributing pamphlets, and engaging in face-to-face conversations.

The main feature is basing the course in the environmental justice community, the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans.

The course has a 10-year history that included a university-wide forum, reshman seminar, honors course, Water Resources Management practicum, and eb-based EJ course. The 2010 version was team taught by members of the School of Human Ecology, Department of Geoscience, and Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies. The course was based in New Orleans, which required a funding from multiple external sources.

The evaluation is by student contribution to research products for the community, course feedback forms, and student growth as represented by their journal entries.

Syllabus (Acrobat (PDF) 162kB Mar15 13)

Education and Outreach in Environmental Justice (Acrobat (PDF) 376kB Mar15 13) On-line EJ Course Materials (Zip Archive 133.1MB Mar15 13)

Alexander, F.S., (2005) Land bank authorities: A guide for the creation and operation of local land banks. Local Initiatives Support Corporation.

Caffey, R. H., Savoie, K, Shirly, M. (2003) Stewardship incentives for Louisiana's Coastal Landowners. National Sea Grant Library.

Colten, C. E. (2002). Basin Street Blues: drainage and environmental equity in New Orleans, 1890-1930. Journal of Historic Geography, 28 (2), 237-257.

Colten, C. E. (2005). Unnatural Metropolis. Baton Rouge, LA: Louisiana State University Press.

Colten, C. E. (2006). Vulnerability and place: Flat land and uneven risk in New Orleans. American Anthropologist, 108(5), 731.

Costanza, R., Perez-Maqueo, O. Martinez, M. L., Sutton, P., Anderson, S. J., Mulder, K. (2008). The Value of Coastal Wetlands for Hurricane Protection. Ambio, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, 37(4).

Day, J. W., Boesch, D. F., Clairain, E. J, Kemp, G. P., Laska, S. B., Mitsch, W. J., Orth, K., Mashriqui, H., Reed, D. J., Shabman, L, Simenstad, C. A., Streever, B. J., Twilley, R. R., Watson, C. C., Wells, J. T. Whigham, D. F. (2007, March). Restoration of the Mississippi Delta: Lessons from Hurricanes Katrina and Rita. Science, 315 1679-1684.
Day, J., Ford, M., Kemp, P., Lopez, J,. (2006) A Guide for the Army Corps' Congressionally-directed closure of the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet. http://www.edf.org/documents/5665_Report%20-%20Mister%20Must%20Go.pdf
Davis, M. (2008). A whole new ballgame: coastal restoration, storm protection, and the legal landscape after Katrina. Louisiana Law Review. Winter, 2008, #419.
Dunlap, R. E. & Van Liere, K. D. (1978) The "new environmental paradigm". The Journal of Environmental Education, 9, 10-19.

Dunlap, R. E., Van Liere, K. D., Mertig, A. D. & Jones, R.E. (2000) Measuring endorsement of the new ecological paradigm: A revised NEP scale. Journal of Social Issues, 56, (3), 425-442.

Fischetti, M. (2001). Drowning New Orleans. Scientific America. October, 2001, 76-85.

Godsil, R., Huang, A., and Solomon, G. (2009). Contaminants in the air and soil after the flood: Opportunities and limitations for community empowerment, in Race, Place and Environmental Justice after Hurricane Katrina: Struggles to reclaim, rebuild, and revitalize New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, ed. By R. D. Bullard and B. Wright, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, p. 115-138.

Greater New Orleans Community Data Center (2002). Lower 9th Ward Snapshot. Retrieved on November, 27, 2007 from http://www.gnocdc.org/orleans/8/22/snapshot.html

Greater New Orleans Community Data Center (2000). Holy Cross Neighborhood Snapshot. Retrieved on November, 27, 2007 from http://www.gnocdc.org/orleans/8/22/snapshot.html

Guagnano, G. A., Stern, P. C. & Dietz, T. (1995) Influences on attitude-behavior relationships: A natural experiment with curbside recycling. Environment and Behavior, 27, 699-718.

Grunwald, M., Glasser, S. B. (2005). The Slow Drowning of New Orleans. Washington Post. October 9, 2005.

Hartman Engineering (2001). Bayou Bienvenue Pump Station and Diversion and Terracing Feasibility study, Orleans and St. Bernard Parishes, No. PO-25, XPO-74A.

Hesse, I.D., Day, J. W. Jr., and Doyle, T. W. (1998). Long Term Growth Enhancement of Bald Cypress from Municipal Wastewater Application, Environmental Management Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 119–127.

Houck, O. (2006). Can We Save New Orleans, Tulane Environmental Law Journal, Volume 19, Spring 2006, Issue 1.
Landphair, J. (2007). The forgotten People of New Orleans: community, vulnerability, and the Lower Ninth Ward. The Journal of American History. Through the Eye of Katrina, Special Issue. 94, December, 2007. Retrieved May 4, 2009 from http://www.journalofamericanhistory.org/projects/katrina/Landphair.html
Louisiana Coastal Wetlands Conservation and Restoration Task Force and the Wetlands Conservation and Restoration Authority (1998). Coast 2050, LDNR, 161 pp. http://www.lca.gov/net_prod_download/public/lca_net_pub_products/doc/2050report.pdf
Minkler, M. (2005). Community-based research partnerships: challenges and opportunities. Journal of Urban Health, Bulletin of the New York Academy of Medicine. 82(2), 2.
Mitsch, W. J., and Gosselink, J.G. (2007). Wetlands (4th ed.), John Wiley, 582 pp.

Nance, E (2009) Making the case for community-based laboratories, in Race, Place and Environmental Justice after Hurricane Katrina: Struggles to reclaim, rebuild, and revitalize New Orleans and the Gulf Coast, ed. By R. D. Bullard and B. Wright, Westview Press, Boulder, CO, p. 153-168.

Pastor, M., Bullard, R., Boyce, J., Fothergill, A., Morello-Frosch, R., & Wright, B. (2006). In the Wake of the storm: environment, disaster and race after Katrina. New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 52 pp.

Reyes, J. (no year). The development of the land policy in Louisiana, 2pp. http://www.tobin.com/documents/dev_of_land_policy_in_louisiana.pdf

Sandercock, L. (1998). Towards Cosmopolis: planning for multicultural cities, London: John Wiley, 258 pp.
Solnit, R. (2007). The Lower Ninth Ward Battles Back. The Nation, September 10/17, 2007

Stern, P. C. (2000). Toward a coherent theory of environmentally significant behavior. Journal of Social Issues, 56, (3), 407-424.

Stern, P. C., Dietz, T., Abel, T., Guagnano, G. A. & Kalof, L. (1999). A value-belief-norm theory of support for social movements: The case of environmentalism. Human Ecology Review, 6, (2), 81-97.

Strauss, A. (1987). Qualitative Analysis for Social Scientists. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Tidwell, M. (2003). Bayou Farewell. New York, NY: Panthean Books.

Tulane/Xavier Center for Bioenvironmental Research and Louisiana Department of Natural Resources (2006). Sustainable Restoration: Holy Cross district and the Lower 9th Ward.
http://davidrmacaulay.typepad.com/SustainableRestorationPlan.pdf

Water Resources Management Practicum-2007 (2008). Wetland Restoration and Community-Based Development of Bayou Bienvenue, Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans. Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 95 pp. http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/wrm/workshops/2007/no/
Water Resources Management Practicum-20008 (2009). The Bayou Bienvenue Wetland Triangle: An Interdisciplinary Look at the Complex Issues affecting the Restoration of a Former Cypress Swamp. Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 182 pp.
https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/groups/WRM-URPL-NOLA/2008%20DELIVERABLES/Final%20Document%20October%202009/WRM%20NOLA%202008%20Final%20Document%2010-25.pdf?uniq=-gtkmfy
Wiltse, Ariane (June 26, 2007). Sustaining the nine, Gambit Weekly, 26-33.
White Jr., L. (1967). The historical roots of our ecological crisis. Science, 155: 1203-1207.