Bryn Mawr College

New York - Thursday, October 23, 2008, 5:30–8 pm

The Bryn Mawr Alumnae Association is honored to invite you to a reception at the New York Times Building to introduce you to President Jane Dammen McAuliffe. The reception will also include Bryn Mawr's New York Classroom, a faculty-student panel moderated by President McAuliffe. We will be joined by Ellen Stroud, Assistant Professor of Growth and Structure of Cities and Environmental Studies on the Alderfer Fund, and two of her students, Annie Morse '09 and Analiz Vergara '10. . A U.S. environmental historian, Professor Stroud's research and teaching emphasize unexpected and counterintuitive connections between people and nature. “Getting students who don't initially think of themselves as environmentalists per se to recognize the many ways in which nature affects their lives is one of the true pleasures of researching and teaching in urban environmental studies,” she says. She and her students will talk about opportunities for student field work and engagement in both the Philadelphia area and the world through Bryn Mawr's Praxis and environmental studies programs. We hope to see you there!

Reception Schedule

Faculty Bios

Ellen Stroud

Assistant Professor of Growth and Structure of Cities and Environmental Studies on the Alderfer Fund

Professor Stroud teaches in the Growth and Structure of Cities and the Environmental Studies programs. A U.S. environmental historian, she received her B.A. from the University of Michigan, her M.A. from the University of Oregon, and Ph.D. from Columbia University. She taught in the history department at Oberlin College for five years and is in her third year at Bryn Mawr. Her first book, Seeing the Trees: How Cities Brought Forests Back to the Northeastern United States, will be published with the University of Washington Press in 2009, in its Weyerhaeuser Environmental Books Series, edited by William Cronon. Her publications include articles in the Radical History Review, History and Theory, and Environmental History. Her 1999 Radical History Review article, "Troubled Waters in Ecotopia: Environmental Racism in Portland, Oregon," won the American Society for Environmental History Alice Hamilton prize for the best article in environmental history published outside of the society's own journal, and she has been honored with fellowships from the American Council of Learned Societies, the National Science Foundation, the Environmental Protection Agency, and Harvard's Charles Warren Center for Studies in American History. She is currently working on her second book, Dead as Dirt: An Environmental History of the Dead Body, and is consulting on a new environmental history exhibit at the State Museum of Pennsylvania. Ellen Stroud teaches in the Growth and Structure of Cities and the Environmental Studies programs at Bryn Mawr College. A U.S. environmental historian, she received her B.A. from the University of Michigan, her M.A. from the University of Oregon, and Ph.D. from Columbia University. She taught in the history department at Oberlin College for five years before joining the Bryn Mawr faculty. Her first book, Seeing the Trees: How Cities Brought Forests Back to the Northeastern United States, will be published with the University of Washington Press in 2009. Her other publications include articles in the Radical History Review, History and Theory, and Environmental History. She is currently working on her second book, Dead as Dirt: An Environmental History of the Dead Body, and is consulting on a new environmental history exhibit at the State Museum of Pennsylvania.

Student bios

Analiz Vergara '10

Analiz Vergara, a junior from Quito, Ecuador, is an economics major with a concentration in Environmental Studies. She has participated in the College’s Leadership Development Program and has been awarded the Maureen Brennan ('71) Grant for Internships In Environmental Studies. She is a founder and member of the national coordination team of the GEO Juvenil Ecuador (GEO for Youth Ecuador), a youth empowerment and environmental education program. In the past she has been an Associate Advisor for the UN Environment Programme's Youth Advisory Council and a spokesperson for children's environmental needs (in the World Summit on Sustainable Development). She has represented her country in international meetings on Youth, Development and the Environment such as the World Youth Parliament for Water in Canada, the UN Environment Program International Youth Conferences in Russia and India, and the Global Youth Retreat in Kenya. In the future, she would like to continue to work in the development of sustainable and empowering initiatives for progress in countries such as Ecuador.

Annie Morse '09

Annie Morse, a senior from Manchester-by-the-sea, Massachusetts, is a major in the Growth and Structure of Cities with a concentration in Environmental Studies. She works as a tour guide in the Bryn Mawr Admissions Office and has worked in three nonprofit internships in the Boston area during her summers. She worked as a wildlife technician at the Trustees of Reservations, as a nonprofit consultant fellow at the Conservation Law Foundation Ventures group, and as a marketing and program intern at the Common Impact nonprofit consulting group. Last semester, she studied environmental law and the effects of globalization on the southern African economy in Cape Town, South Africa. At Bryn Mawr, Annie has been a customs person, an alumnae regional scholar, and is currently a teaching assistant for the environmental studies introductory course.