The UW-Madison Environmental Breakfast Seminar

The chief goal of the seminar is to promote broad interdisciplinary conversation among colleagues interested in any and all aspects of the environment.  We pride ourselves in having regular members representing the full range of intellectual divisions of the campus, as well as members from outside the university whose professional work involves environmental issues on a regular basis.  The format of the seminar is intentionally designed to encourage regular participation in the hope of fostering genuine collegiality, even real friendship, among colleagues who might not otherwise cross paths with each other on a regular basis.  It's a great place to build and engage a genuine intellectual community, and we are eager to involve new folks in our early-morning enterprise.

What perhaps makes the seminar most unusual is its early hour: we meet for a 75-minute conversation over breakfast every two weeks.  We know the hour is early, but we've moved it up by 15 minutes so that the sessions now run from 7:30-8:45 on (roughly) alternate Tuesday mornings.  The virtue of this hour is that there are rarely any conflicting meetings or classes in this slot, and since one of our goals is to build a strong sense of community among UW colleagues and Madison environmental professionals, regular participation is something we try hard to facilitate.

How the Seminar Works:

• Although we occasionally make exceptions, we generally prefer presentations by regular members as opposed to invited guests.
  
• We ask members of the group to serve as "discussion launchers" roughly once a year.
  
• The job of the discussion launcher is to talk for 30-40 minutes with the goal of provoking lively discussion, not just lecturing.
  
• No prior reading is expected, so that seminar members can show up with no advance preparation.
  
• Discussion launchers are asked to address their peers as if they were speaking to intelligent undergraduates who are capable of understanding anything that is well explained even if they have little prior knowledge about it.
  
• Discussion launchers are asked to supply their own A-V equipment because we have no budget to rent same and I have no clerical staff to handle ordering it.
  
• The seminar is open to UW-Madison faculty and staff members and invited members of the greater Madison community.
  
• We ask members to come as frequently as they can, ideally not just for sessions on topics that interest them (though everyone is always welcome).

If all this sounds intriguing and tempting to you, please come give it a try.  Who knows?  You might get hooked, and we'd love to have you join us!  

Seminar Meeting Dates for Academic Year 2008-09:

The Environmental Breakfast Seminar meets \every other Tuesday at Memorial Union, in a room designated on the "Today in the Union" (TITU) bulletin boards near the entrances of the building. During Fall 2008 we will meet from 7:15-8:25am, and during Spring 2008 we will meet from 7:30-8:45am. Meetings this year are on the following dates:

9/23: Bill Cronon, Facilitator: Introductory Session: Reintroducing Ourselves, and Brainstorming Topics for the Seminar in 2008-09

10/7:

10/21: Ron Seely, Wisconsin State Journal, "The Practice of Environmental Journalism"

11/4:

11/18:

12/2:

1/27:

2/10:

2/24:

3/10:

3/31:

4/14:

4/28:

How to Join the Seminar:

If you would like to be added to the email list for the seminar, just send a request to Bill Cronon at wcronon@wisc.edu.

Past Seminar Presentations:

For a complete list of past presentations to the seminar, click here.