Science academy hosts research presentations, meeting at AMP

The Asia Pacific Academy of Science, Education, and Environmental Management held its 10th public meeting and hosted five presentations at the American Memorial Park auditorium on Nov. 25, 2008

About 85 people were in attendance, the group’s largest attendance to date, and most stayed until the end of each of the five talks. The meeting lasted from 6:30pm to 9:30pm.

The audience included island and regional scientists, resource managers, and science instructors, and also secondary and postsecondary science students.

Each presentation was followed by a topic-focused discussion with a question-and-answer segment.

Haldre Rogers, a graduate student at the Biology Department of the University of Washington, held a presentation on forest biology. She is conducting research on the islands as part of her doctoral program. The nature of this research involves comparing the forests of Guam with the forests of the CNMI islands, with the main focus being to evaluate the dispersal patterns of forest trees’ seeds within each island. The fact that the island of Guam’s forests suffer from the almost complete lack of birds due to predation by the invasive Brown Tree Snake, Boiga irregularis, is hypothesized to eventually cause and result in a change in island forest community structure and species biodiversity.

Dr. Roger Goodwill’s presentation focused on migratory species biology. Dr. Goodwill, Department of Biology chairperson at the Brigham Young University in Hawaii, presented findings from his team’s research on the Pacific Golden Plover. Dr. Goodwill reported that his team’s studies have shown that flocks of Pacific Golden Plovers traveling along the flyways of the Pacific are now known to stop over in Japan. This is new information to science in that it was previously theorized that the Western Pacific birds traveled exclusively to the tundra area of Siberia, Russia.

Kimberly Vaillancourt, a science instructor at Hopwood Junior High School, had a presentation on Education and a Current Resource Management Issue. Vaillancourt and six of her students presented on their use of debate as method of learning about science and resource management issues within a classroom setting.

Dr. Dilip Nandwani of NMC CREES, talked about the application of new and improved plant varieties to the CNMI islands of Saipan, Tinian and Rota. Dr. Nandwani discussed the common problem of constantly reusing the same parent plant materials, particularly from the common local crops of taro, sweet potato, and both eating and cooking banana.

The last presenter, Dr. Gary Denton, director and environmental toxicologist at the University of Guam’s Water & Environmental Research Institute of the Western Pacific, presented his team’s findings on the principle source of mercury, a toxic heavy metal, impacting fish between Micro Beach and Hafa Adai Beach in Garapan. The team’s investigation tracked the contamination back along a drainage channel to an old incinerator site at the CHC public hospital.

At the meeting, Academy leaders also announced the group’s name change from “Western Pacific Academy of Science and Environmental Management.” Reasons for the change include seeking a greater involvement among island science educators and an effort to include more participation from the Asia-Pacific region’s science, education, and environmental management community.

The group is certified as a nonprofit, nongovernmental corporate entity and is in the process of seeking federal recognition as a “501C/3” status organization. APASEEM’s officers include Andre Kozij, treasurer; Kimberly Vaillancourt, secretary; Larry Oney, vice president; and John Furey, president. [B][I](PR)[/I][/B]