Earth Week Skills!

                 Dumpster diving, welcome to my skills.  Last Thursday at 2:00pm, the crew leaders kicked off some earth day celebrations by collecting 280 pounds of garbage from the student union dumpster.  After loading the trash into our WCC trucks, we took it to the university's physical plant for some sorting.  The University of Wyoming student union is blessed with an extensive array sorting bins so that it is crystal clear where to put what refuse.  The paper bin even has a narrow slot so that only paper should fit in.  Generally, people don't put trash in the recycling, but they certainly feel free to put their recycling in the trash-THIS IS RIDICULOUS!  So, after weighing all of our sloppy food covered bags, we tore them open and began to remove recyclables.  We pulled our about 40 pounds of 'resonable' recycling. By that I mean that the bottles/plastics/and papers were clean enough to be recycled.  If you think about 40 pounds of plastics and papers, that really is quite a quantity.  Also in consideration were the heaps and heaps of food in the trash that could have been composted if the union had that available.  We were particularly perturbed by the university catering services compostable cups that wound up in the trash instead of the recycling.  Additionally, with only a 5% margin for error at the recycling plant, it is critical that people don't put trash in bottles and remove lids, which actually aren't recyclable.
                The next day, we made our way to the salvage yard in Laramie.  After spending about an hour sifting through scrap metal in the freezing cold, we had gathered enough materials to construct a gigantic sage grouse.  For those of you not from the west, the sage grouse is a very strange looking chicken-type creature that is now protected in 'core areas' in Wyoming so that it is not listed on the federal endangered species list.  Our goal, is to create the frame of a gigantic sage grouse to put in the center of campus on earth day that students can fill with recyclables that our campus actually recycles.  (Hint-you should all google the sage grouse).  My real point here is that we can all do a little bit better at being effective recyclers.  I know many people who think that recycling really doesn't matter, but is there anyone who can't spare quite literally 10 seconds to make sure their product gets put in the correct bin.  Take a little time and make a little change to your routine...Because lots of little changes make one big difference.

Happy Earth Week!

The Forest Service

Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the forest service had an idea that the forest service would be responsible to "provide the greatest amount of good for the greatest amount of people in the long run".  National forests and grasslands encompass 193 million acres of land in the US, and area equivalent to the size of Texas.  Although it's managed by the Department of Agriculture, the forest service is budgeted through the Department of the Interior.    In addition to managing our nations forests and grasslands, the Forest Service is also the largest forestry research organization in the world.  Another mission of the forest service is to achieve an effective workforce that represents the full range of diversity of the american people.

By sustaining the health, diversity, and productivity of the country's forests and grasslands, the forest service is able to meet the needs of current and future generations.  One of the main missions of the forest service is to listen to the people and respond to their needs through decision making.  Through a multiple use ecological management policy, I'm sure the forest service will continue to effectively manage our grasslands and forests for years to come.

Greetings from...

Colorado fire camp, where I am well on my way to becoming a sawyer.  In fact, I've come far enough that I now pronounce the word as it should be SAWyer and not SOYyer.  Essentially, I'm learning with 13 other WCC crew leaders and supervisors how to safely operate and maintain a chainsaw for tree felling(simply put, cutting down trees).

We arrived wednesday night in a caravan of pickup trucks and suburbans in Salida, Colorado(population 5,000 and elevation 8,000 feet).  Salida is nestled up in the mountains 3 hours southwest from Denver and home to the fire camp where students can eat sleep and saw for two days in the comfort of the Ponderosa Lodge.  All day thursday was spent in the classroom learning the jargon and safety information that allows us to pick up a saw in the first place.  This morning we spent additional time in the classroom, learning all the parts of the saw and how to perform maintenance daily and weekly.  After lunch we ventured outside to the saw shop where we took our saw apart for maintenance and finally, sharpened the chains and fueled up.

My first attempt at firing up was definitely rough.  Donning all of our PPE(personal protective equipment) including saw chaps, hard hats, glasses, and ear plugs, I failed to hear the engine fire on choke, thus I instantly concluded I was a bad sawyer.  But, after a few tries and some assistance I got er' started and gave the throttle a nice squeeze.  Now, a fully fueled and oiled saw is no light object.  It is cumbersome and awkward for a beginner, and only experience makes those imperfections fade away.  Watching our instructor Mark hold the saw in class on day one, I assumed that the saw was light and as long as I studied, this would all be simple.  Wrong.  You could read saw books all day but when the saw is in your hands, your newly acquired knowledge flies out the window.  But, such is the way of learning and being a student.

Tomorrow, we head into the field to fell some real trees.  I'm optimistic about the forecast for scatted thunderstorms and 30mph winds tomorrow.  I mean really, anything worse than that would be like felling trees in a hurricane.  No biggie.  Maybe I'll switch paths and become a lumberjack(or Jill).  Maybe I'll get my red card and fight wildland fires for the big bucks.  Or maybe I'll just be a really good tree feller for the WCC.  Either way, my point is that it's nice to be a student again.   There's so much to learn!

Negotiation

Past negotiation experiences have left me not so satisfied.  As a sometimes 'glass half empty' person, I think that if I have to negotiate then I'm already at a disadvantage.  In order to gain something, then I must lose something else.  With a modestly reasonable other party, you can actually leave a negotiation having gained something of value.  The magic of negotiation, as I learned from Dr. Steve Smutko is that in negotiation, value can be created by assigning points to the desired outcomes of each party.  Dr. Smutko is University of Wyoming's Chair of Collaborative Practice and an economics proffesor.  He has facilitated numerous public policy decisions in the mountain west as well as the southeastern U.S., and teaches negotiation analysis to UW students.  Like a good economist, Dr. Smutko conveyed his points about negotiation to our class by assigning half the class one role, and the other half another role.  For example, I was assigned to be the agent of Sally Soprano, a fictional opera singer looking to get back into the industry.  The other party was the Lyric opera house, looking for a performer for their upcoming show.  With the addition of many other factors, we had to work with the opera house to agree on a salary for Sally Soprano.  Ultimately, our negotiations were what I would call collaborative.  We understood that both parties had desired outcomes and we worked together to achieve them.

I'm hoping that this summer the negotiations will be much more simple.  I've made up an image in my mind of two crew members who both want the last pancake at breakfast.  Sam and I, trusty crew leaders, will sweep in with our super-people capes and and alternating lines say "hey guys, how bout one of you breaks it in half and then the other gets to pick which half they get!".  Obviously, we're familiar with this age old trick, which ensures that the splitter will do what they can to ensure the pancake is actually evenly split.  After all, the other party will pick which half they get.

Negotiation is a two way street, but if both parties can approach the proceedings from the 'glass half full' perspective, they have everything to gain and nothing to lose.