Intermountain SAF News Items
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Regional and National Issues and Events
Regional and National news may be found by visiting SAF's National home page at: www.safnet.org.
thE-forester: The National Office mails an email newsletter, thE-forester, to subscribing SAF members. Recent issues of thE-forester are posted for the benefit of members without email accounts and for non-members.
Forest Policy Updates: Each week the Legislature is in session, SAF's National Policy staff compiles a synopsis of information relating to forestry and natural resources. The most recent issues are posted here. Information on current happenings in States is included.
USU STUDENT CHAPTER WINS 2008 SAF QUIZ BOWL
Recent meeting Articles and Photos:
- "Centennial Celebration," Intermountain SAF Annual Meeting, Boise, April 7 & 8, 2000
- Tour of Kennecott Copper, Magna, Utah, May 19, 2000
- Lynx Workshop, Big Piney, Wyoming, November 2-3, 2000
- New Directions in Silviculture and Watershed Mangement, Garden City, Utah, June 27-28, 2002
- Mechanical Fuels Treatment Demonstration, Kamas, Utah, October 3, 2003
- Ecological Restoration of Southwest Ponderosa Pine and Pinyon-Juniper Ecosystems, St. George, Utah, May 11-13, 2005
- Vegetation Management in Bryce Canyon National Park and Dixie National Forest, Bryce Canyon National Park, Utah, May 2007
- Mountain Pine Beetle Mortality and Wildfire Risk in the Stanley Valley, Stanley, Idaho, June 2007
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Fire as a Vegetation Management Tool (post-treatment
follow-up to the May 2007 meeting), Bryce, Utah, May 2008
Utah Forest News article on the Bryce meeting
Meeting Schedules and Agendas from Prior Years
UTAH FOREST NEWS,
An index of the periodic newsletter designed for professional and
non-professionals alike. Published by
the Forestry Extension Service of
AWARDS AND RECOGNITION
The Society of American Foresters recognizes and honors members who
have performed service to the forestry profession and to the Society through
various Awards. A list of Intermountain SAF member
awards is available through this link.
IMSAF POSITION STATEMENTS
PILOT PROJECTS CAN TEST ALTERNATIVE
APPROACHES FOR MANAGING FEDERAL LANDS
A joint position statement of the Inland Empire and Intermountain Societies,
Society of American Foresters, December 2002
These excerpts provide a historical perspective of the Intermountain Society from 1944 to 2000.
Theodore
W. Daniel, 96, died on Friday, July 30, 2004, in
IMSAF PROVIDES FINANCIAL ASSISTANCE TO 4-H FORESTRY CLUB
August 2006
Utah Chapter SAF recently provided $500 and the Intermountain Section SAF provided $250 to the Emery County, Utah 4H Forestry team to help defray travel expenses for their participation in the National Forestry Contest in Weston, West Virginia on July 23-27. This was the first time that Utah was represented at this event.
Gaylene Conder, Extension secretary in Emery County and contact for the Utah 4H Forestry Team, said it was a "great experience, they learned a lot, now they know what to study, the kids gained friends for life, and many came back using southern drawls."
Fifteen teams were present, mostly from the South, the Utah team loved the Arkansas and Tennessee teams, and want to continue this next year. Darren McAvoy offered some coaching help for the next year's team.
More information on this event is available @ http://extension.usu.edu/forestry/Kids/4-H.htm.
HANDBOOK HELPS
AT-RISK COMMUNITIES BETTER PREPARE FOR WILDFIRES - SAF News Release
A coalition of organizations concerned about protecting communities
from catastrophic wildfires has released a step-by-step handbook that guides
local communities in wildfire prone areas to better prepare and reduce the
future risks of catastrophic wildfires. The handbook, developed jointly by the
Society of American Foresters, the National Association of State Foresters
(NASF), the National Association of Counties (NACo), the Western
Governors’ Association (WGA), and the Communities Committee of the
Seventh American Forest Congress, and endorsed by the Southern Governors' Association, offers a detailed description of
how to create a community wildfire protection plan as allowed by the Healthy
Forests Restoration Act of 2003 (HFRA).
For a copy of the handbook, titled “Preparing a
Community Wildfire Protection Plan: A Handbook for Wildland-Urban Interface
Communities” and other resources for developing community wildfire
protection plans, visit the SAF website http://www.safnet.org/policyandpress/cwpp.cfm
Please keep your information on file with SAF up-to-date.
Provide changes to:
Changing Demographics in Forestry
Enrollments at
Terry L. Sharik, Head, Department of Forest Resources,
August 2000
Changes in our undergraduate enrollments since 1988 reflect changing demands on the part of our students and changes in the forestry and related natural resource professions in general. In 1988, we enrolled 65 undergraduates in three degree programs, i.e., Forestry (44), Recreation Resource Management (13), and Environmental Studies (8). By 1999, our enrollment had increased to 162 students in these same three degree programs, with numbers at 48, 22, and 92, respectively. These data indicate that Forestry enrollments have remained relatively flat over this 12-year period while enrollments in Environmental Studies have increased dramatically. Put another way, Forestry went from representing two-thirds of our enrollment in 1988 to accounting for less than a third at the present, while Environmental Studies jumped from 12 to 57 percent over the same period.
These shifts in enrollment call into question the
allocation of resources among our degree programs. It is interesting to note
that we have 9 required courses at the upperclass level in our Forestry major
which are required of no other major in the College of Natural Resources and
are taken by few students outside the Forestry major (with the exception of the
Fire Management course, FR 4520). Consequently enrollments are low, averaging
about 12 students per academic year. In contrast, we have no courses required
by Environmental Studies students that are not required of most other students
in the College, and thus enrollments in these courses are much larger (on the
order of 50-100 students). If we assume that student/faculty ratio is a good
indicator of the quality of education, then we may conclude from this analysis
that Forestry students receive a very high quality education relative to other
majors in our department, and indeed the college. Moreover, they receive this
quality at a very low cost, USU ranking second from the bottom nationally in
terms of undergraduate tuition among research universities in the
The above sorts of inequities and inefficiencies,
coupled with a desire to enhance the overall quality of education for our
undergraduates, prompted the
Clearly our proposed undergraduate education model has strong implications for accreditation of our undergraduate Forestry degree program. Accreditation aside, some on our faculty are deeply concerned that the loss of traditional degrees will render our students unemployable. However, at the same time, SAF is undergoing a review of its accreditation standards. It will be interesting to see what the accredited forestry degree program will look like at the beginning of the next millennium, if indeed there is such a degree program.
Educational Programs and Volunteer Foresters
During the 1999-2000 school year the SAF National
Office participated in an educational mailing to elementary school teachers in
the Intermountain area, offering a copy of our Centennial video
"Foresters: Growing Forests for Our Future." SAF offered to
arrange for a professional forester to visit the classroom to show the
15-minute video and engage students in a discussion about natural resource
management. SAF was overwhelmed by requests and recruited the help of some
generous member and non-member foresters. Response from the teachers and
students was highly favorable and rewarding, including "thank you" letters from many of the students. SAF would like to
extend thanks to the following foresters who donated their time to participate
in this educational program:
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Doug Austin |
Bob Earl |
Rob Mrowka |
John Shaw |
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Brad Exton |
Doug Page |
Bob Davis |
Reese Pope |
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Henry Lachowski |
Jeannie Higgins |
Barbara Gardner |
Ron Larsen |
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Randy Kaufman |
Gary Cornell |
Clark Fleege |
Morris Huffman |
Founding Member of Greenpeace Speaks Out for
Sustainable Forestry
Dr. Patrick Moore heads Greenspirit,
Forests of Discord
SAF has recently published a new booklet concerning
controversies surrounding the management of public lands entitled Forests
of Discord. ". . . the language that governs the public lands is
sometimes contradictory, and clear direction about priorities is lacking.
. . . Multiple use has become an engine of conflict that pits one
interest group against another and denies land managers a clear mandate."
Click here to view the Executive Summary (pdf format, order form attached).
MacCleery Paper on Ecological Sustainability
and Consumption
Friends of IMSAF
Intermountain SAF has established "IMSAF Friends" for non-members who
wish to be involved in meetings and functions. Friends receive meeting announcements
and are welcome to participate in Chapter functions. Friends do not receive SAF
national publications, nor do they have voting or office-holding privileges,
and there are no educational or professional requirements for SAF Friends
(these items are associated with membership). Friends may learn of meeting
schedules at no cost via the Intermountain SAF Web page or via email. To
receive postal notification, Friends pay a nominal fee of $5/year, which is
used to cover announcement and newsletter publication and postage. You may
inquire with any of the SAF
Officers if interested
in becoming a SAF Friend.