Overview
Christopher Winslow, PhD
Director, Ohio Sea Grant
Director, Community Engagement Core
The Ohio State University
Research focused on the mitigation, toxigenicity, and human exposure risks to cyanobacterial Harmful Algal Blooms (cHAB) is arguably an ineffective exercise unless there are efforts to change behavior. The Community Engagement Core (CEC) of the Great Lakes Center for Fresh Waters and Human Health has already driven successes bridging the gap between the science and regional stakeholders; i.e., decision makers, agency staff, students, local business, media personnel, and watershed residents. The CEC uses a multifaceted approach to engage a diverse audience of stakeholders to change behavior, inform management decisions, and identify policies that could be proposed to address the effects of climate change on cHABs and human health in the Great Lakes region.
CEC Team
Heather Triezenberg, PhD
Associate Director, Michigan Sea Grant
Community Engagement
Michigan State University
Drs. Christopher Winslow and Heather Triezenberg, and their teams, have years of experience designing and deploying informal outreach and formal education programming that help resource managers
- use ecosystem-based approaches to manage land, water and living resources in coastal areas;
- implement sustainable economic and environmental development practices and policies;
- implement hazard resiliency practices to prepare for, respond to, or minimize coastal hazardous events; and
- develop outreach products and tools that advance environmental literacy and workforce development.
CEC Goals
- Strengthen environmental literacy
- Disseminate and implement scientific research findings to the general public and enhance scientific writing by engaging with media partners and journalism departments
- Identify and address research gaps by engaging with key and diverse stakeholders
(e.g., decision makers, agency staff, students, local business, media personnel, diverse and underrepresented watershed residents) - Prevent future issues by informing management and policy levers
- Reducing or eliminating harm by engaging with individuals that have increased risk of exposure to cHABs
- Recruit and train a diverse next-generation of scientists (see Opportunities)
CEC Collaborations
University of Toledo’s Environmental, Occupational, and Community Medicine Program
- Facilitate community and stakeholder involvement in clinical and translational research and
- Address disparities toward health equity by identifying the environmental, structural, and sociocultural factors that contribute to poor health outcomes for high-risk groups.
Community Science with the U.S. Coast Guard
U.S. Coast Guard ice-breaking assets are safe and reliable platforms for surveys and research on ice-covered lakes. The Center uses these assets to investigate the relationship between ice cover extent and winter blooms.
Lake Erie Charter Captains Association
Routine monitoring programs are necessary to determine the health of Lake Erie and to understand the drivers of ecological problems. Because academic resources are unable to sample everywhere, the Center enlists the help of charter captain partners. In addition to providing risk data to charter captains to share with their clients, captains play a role in educating thousands of clients on the causes of blooms, bloom impacts, and how clients can be part of the solution.