Exploring, representing, performing and communicating human life lies at the heart of the humanities and arts. Throughout time, the arts and humanities have fueled the human spirit, defining what it means to be human. They bring a unique set of knowledge and methods to understanding human nature, human experience, how people create, and what it means to be human in relation to each other and the environment. The approaches in the humanities and arts have important implications for understanding any problem that involves how humans behave, how they interact, how they pursue a quality of life, and how they create and change over time.

Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) education.

One of the clearly defined challenges identified by the Obama administration is increasing the number of students pursuing careers in the STEM fields. This is also an area that has been identified as important for Idaho by the Governor and the State Board of Education. The University of Idaho has a number of disconnected programs in this area spanning most Colleges and Institutes. Yet, there is no overarching theme that identifies our vision. Broadly speaking this area will address student pipeline issues in K-20 as well as increasing the public’s awareness of science topics. Important aspects of this program will include interventions, research on teaching pedagogies and learning as well as assessment. Targeted groups could include rural, urban, and under-represented populations. Possible areas of study and intervention could include teacher preparation as well as parental support and attitudes. Prof. Gregson has been appointed the coordinator for these activities. .

Real-time evolution.

All around us we can witness these changes occurring in real time.  They threaten our way of life on many fronts from emerging diseases and parasites to natural selection of agricultural pests.   Our drugs, vaccines and pesticides induce an arms race as we try to stay one step ahead of the rapidly evolving microbes and bugs.  Understanding the basic  processes involved in these modifications are essential if we are win this arms race and improve the quality of life for this and future generations.

By understanding these evolutionary processes, we can tip the balance in our favor and take the steps necessary to control and cure some of the most prevalent diseases.   But evolution can also be made to work for us.  Artificial selection and directed evolution are used as tools to produce better crops and medicines, and to create new industries that use genes and organisms to degrade pollutants or generate biofuels.

The University of Idaho already has strength and success in this area.  This effort will involve forming new collaborations among the disciplines such as life sciences, ecological sciences, mathematics, statistics, computer sciences, physics, chemistry, and engineering, to name only the most obvious.

Prof. L. Forney, Professor of Biology, is the coordinator for this area.

Nexus of energy production and use, agriculture and the environment.

Taken individually, these three areas represent some of the biggest challenges facing mankind.  Yet, these three systems are so strongly coupled at their nexus through their reliance on finite resources or external factors so that a major change in one will strongly impact the other two.  Amongst these critical resources lies water.  The projected population increase in the next two decades alone will place increasing demands on these three systems thus forcing choices that will favor one or more at the expense of the others.  The demands put upon each system reflect societal choices as well as physical constraints.  Understanding the critical processes that occur at the nexus of these systems will aid in making informed decisions for the future.

Often these choices are made by considering one of the three systems in isolation from the other two.  Yet, the reality is that the three systems are so closely coupled that changes in one will often produce profound changes in the other two.

Already a scarce commodity in most parts of the world, changing the amount of water used in one system at the expense of the other two will have significant effects on both physical and societal processes.  Thus, it is important to study the three as one large, complex system. This approach is particularly important as one considers long term changes induced by global climate change.

The University of Idaho has significant strength in these separate areas as well as available  natural study areas comprising Idaho and the Inland Northwest.   This program fits in well with the EPSCoR program and builds upon strengths in IWRRI, the Waters of the West, the Ecohydraulics Center and the Colleges of Law, Art and Architecture, Natural Resources and Agriculture and Life Sciences to name a few. .

Dr. John Tracy, Director of IWRRI, is the coordinator for this area.

Transition of landscapes and the structures they support from wilderness to urbanization.

The process of urbanization is one the most pressing problems facing the nation and world but is also among the least understood.  It induces profound changes to the social, economic and physical characteristics in the region in which it occurs and often impacts surrounding areas.  This problem involves the study of environments consisting of several distinct geophysical, biological and social structures that interact and evolve with time.  The evolution of the system depends on external drivers such as the climate, policy and physical design decisions.  Prime study areas could be the Spokane to Coeur d’Alene corridor or the Boise area.

Studying large, complex systems such as these would require long-term projects to develop an understanding of the urbanization process and its effects on the social and physical landscape. With these studies, models predicting the impacts of proposed physical design and policy decisions could be created.

There are already two teams established in this area.  We have already won a Long-Term Agroecosystem Project planning grant in partnership with Washington State University and Oregon State University to study dry-land cereal production in the inland Pacific North West.  A second team led by the University of Idaho in partnership with Washington State University, the U.S. Forest Service, the Idaho National Laboratory and various communities is developing proposals to study the dynamic interactions between human and natural systems.

Dr. J. Gosz, Associate Dean, College of Natural Resources, is the coordinator for this area.