Transcript UWC earth institute - University of Western Cape

THE UNIVERSITY OF THE
WESTERN CAPE
UWC’s SLOGAN
FROM HOPE TO ACTION THROUGH
KNOWLEDGE
UWC’s specific strength
• Very keen to participate
• > 40 years experience with raising
educationally disadvantaged learners to
the same standard at degree level as
graduates from other Universities as
almost all have jobs and many are in
senior management positions now
Mathematical modelling
• Mathematical modelling of the
environment, natural resource exploitation
and the economics thereof
• Focus Areas:
– Topology
– Graph theory
– Fluid dynamics
– Biomaths
– Math of finance
Earth Sciences
• Climate Change and its impact on
– Erosion patterns
– Soil type change and the concomitant change
in water penetration characteristics
– Aquifer recharge
– Groundwater movement and behaviour
Conservation Biology and IOI
• Climate Change and its impact on
– Biodiversity and its management
• Time series analysis
• Remote-sensing products
• Calculation of vegetation-health and water stress
determination with remote sensing techniques
• Operational Biological Oceanography
CLIMATE CHANGE
• Common Denominator across the
sciences
– Mathematics
– Physics
– Earth Sciences
– Conservation Biology
– Marine Biology
Methods
• Earth Systems Science approach
– We must use each others’ strengths to complement
each other rather than stare ourselves blind on our
own expertise
• Significant experience with the integration of
Physical Sciences and various humanities
– Integrated Water Resources Management
– Environmental Awareness and Techniques
• Sustainable development principles
• Distance, contact and adult learning
– NISL
– CACE
EAT
• Full first year course
• Full second year course
• Half third year course
EAT Content
• Deals with aspect of the environment from
the viewpoint of
– The lawyer
– The geographer
– The Geologist
– The Social Scientists
– Management
– Economics?
IWRM
• Similar to EAT but and MSc level
• Takes in people of different backgrounds
• Looks at all aspects of managing the
resource
EAT and IWRM
• Difficult to manage
– Breaking down faculty barriers is hard
– Breaking open the Silos is even harder
– Requires a dedicated player who has tenacity
to engage all role players on an on going
basis
• Yet it’s the only way to go with the Earth
Institute
THANK YOU