Emerald Ash Borer Watch

What would the world be like without trees? Would we stop and notice, or just move along and continue our daily routine? How would it effect our environment and would it be good for our children's future? If any of these questions do indeed need to be answered then the most logical flow of action would be to recognize a "danger" or "threat" to the nature community.

A common problem in history has been the introduction of non-indigenous species to a new environment. Whether the action is intentional or not, it usually is never a good thing and causes problems for not only that species, but its new environment as well. The biggest recent example of this issue has been the "Emerald Ash Borer," which has been feeding off the local Ash trees in the Midwest and destroying a majority of the Ash tree population.

The issue of this outbreak has been discussed by head scientists and various state agencies across the country and as the awareness grows it is easy to see why this is a serious problem. There are some who believe that it is already too late for the Midwest Ash trees but for the rest of the United States and Canada, something must be done.

How exactly is the Ash Borer destroying the Ash tree population? The insect burrows itself into the tree and the larvae cuts off the nutrients to the core of the tree draining the life from the inside. Every Ash tree is susceptible to the Emerald Ash Borer, even the ones at private residences. However, with any outbreak, there are steps and precautions that are taking place to save as many of the Ash trees as possible. The National Association of County Agricultural Agents or the NACAA partnered with Minnesota Department of Agriculture in 2008 to create the Emerald Ash Borer First Detective Program. The state of Minnesota contained and quarantined the areas that the Emerald Ash Borer began appearing and began giving medicine to trees and used chemicals to remove some of the Ash Borer's. The program worked and the population of Ash Trees in Minnesota was protected enough where the Ash Borer was contained and the battle continues today.

"Minnesota and Maine have the two largest ash tree populations in the US and Minnesota’s wetland hardwood forests are more than 50% ash. This invasive specie is posed to dramatically change Minnesota’s forests"  (NACAA.com).

Since the state of Minnesota was smart enough to prepare for the outbreak, they were able to save many Ash trees, but what about other states? The outbreak had reportedly started in Detroit, so how are adjoining states like Indiana handling the Emerald Ash Borer crisis?

Indiana had an Emerald Ash Borer awareness week in May of 2013, where it stated that the week was to encourage governments, businesses, and communities to join and raise awareness of the outbreak and help save the 8 billion Ash trees in Indiana alone. Community not-for-profit organizations like Keep Indianapolis Beautiful helped neighborhoods tag Ash trees and raise awareness of the insect in 2011. The tagging process allowed residents to send an application in to notify KIB of an Ash tree and in turn they tagged the tree to be monitored from the threat. They also offer other great programs like "Neighborwoods", which help various communities plant trees and try and combat the dead Ash trees with the growth of new ones.

"Emerald Ash Borer Awareness Week is an opportunity for the government to join forces with business, industry, environmental groups, community organizations, tourists, and citizens to take action against the spread and introduction of EAB." (http://www.in.gov/dnr/)

Regardless of what State one may reside, or community they may live in, the threat of non-indigenous species hurting the environment is very serious. It is up to all of us, to be aware of the potential threat that the Emerald Ash Borer causes, and learn what we can do to aid in the protection of nature and our communities. It might just be one tree here or there, but wide spread, the devastation would be a generation without shade and beauty. In the end it is up to all of us when possible to grow creative partnerships to benefit education and transform the community through service.

Midpoint Presentation Blog

The idea of time moving faster than you realize can be scary when things like a big group project need to be completed. Having been given the assignment of helping KIB with a video, I expected hurdles to be jumped over, but I am very surprised at the amount of tasks that had to be knocked out before progress could be made. Rallying as a team and getting things accomplished is not difficult with the individuals we have working on this video. Passion, motivation, communication, critiquing, etc... It's all evident when Stephanie, Brad, Nan, Michael, Paige, and I are together discussing or working on the project, and it's literally been able to open each of our eyes on what needs to be done. Having just completed interviews at KIB, I have found even more confidence that this video will turn out better than expected!

What exactly is my role though? As someone who is used to the term, "project manager", I know what that role calls for and I recognize that it is a lot of work, especially when I have a Capstone to focus on, but alas.....I prevail! (so far at least!) It hasn't been easy but I feel that my role is to push along and move the project forward when no one is doing so, it's natural for people to be quickly burned out on something as large as this, and I am certainly one of them, but I consider one of my primary duties is to keep everyone on their toes and remind them what needs to be done. Communication through Facebook has been a big part of how I keep up with everyone in the group, recently I found out just how easy it is to have miscommunication when I misread a message from days ago only to find out that we might have wasted a day we could have used. It was frustrating, but knowing my project manager duties I had to correct it, so I started posting more general updates for everyone.....lesson learned.

Having personally gone on every location shoot we've done, I feel it's important that I am there as a "visible" leader, even when none of us really want to give up one of our weekend days to go film video at a park. It's a great feeling to all rally together and get some good footage for the project though, the worst part is always organizing everyone together, but once we are there, things go really well. Another one of my roles was being in charge of equipment and that was a challenge in itself. I'm not very knowledgeable when it comes to video equipment and there is a lot of terms that are thrown out there and times where I had to just shake my head and nod hoping for the best! I was able to check everything out and turn it back in within a 24 hour period that had me driving back and forth on a tight schedule, but I was able to make it work.

At the actual shoot, I got there early to set up with Brad and Michael, and even though there were a few technical it went together very smoothly. I was very pleased with everyone and still am in the full scope of the project, there has not been one person I feel is slacking. Everyone plays a part and this project is the stage! I look forward to showing off what we have so far tomorrow when we present!

Team Roles

The final project will be a really interesting experience as we are making a 5-7 minute video of the emerald ash borer and it's effect on the community adding on a quiz at the end. With the target audience being elementary school kids, we are filming scenes of trees in the park and locating ash trees to show how to correctly identify them, so we are going to have audio, film, animation, coding, and graphic work through the video.

Mike----is doing the research on Ash trees and Emerald Ash Borers for the project and he is also going to do the narration of the video as well as doing the audio as well. He was able to find an animation for us to incorporate into the video too!

Paige----is working on the quiz at the end of the video with her experience in coding, we have decided to make the quiz on the website instead of putting it in the video itself.

Stephanie----is the organizer of all the group needs and is scouting locations for filming as well as doing some graphic work as well.

Brad----is filming the scenes, as well as assisting in equipment rental and graphics. He will also team up with Nan to edit the video.

Nan---is assisting in editing the video as well as aiding Paige in the coding of the quiz. She is also helping us film too.

Blake----I am the project leader and I am filming, doing graphic work, and doing storyboards for the video. Also I am leading the flow of conversation during discussions and planning.

Having spent the past 5 weeks figuring out who we are as team members has made the deciding of roles very simple. We all talked about what our strong attributes were and decided that was the best way to assign tasks. Everyone is helping in more ways than one area on this project, which is nice because it'll be an equal share of workload and we all will have experience in all stages of the process.

The storyboards are pretty much done and the next thing we have left to do is to rent the equipment and go out to parks and film trees and locate them! It'll be a great end of the semester!

What Did You Learn In The Dark?

Being blindfolded is always an interesting experience and you never quite feel as vulnerable in anything else in life as much as you do without sight. Going into KiB I thought of many possibilities of what I might be doing while blindfolded, anything from planting trees to walking around picking up trash, but washing and cleaning up recycling bins was a nice surprise. Even if it seems a little tedious, it was actually very telling.

As I was the first one blindfolded, I completely lost my sense of surroundings and it felt like ages to walk over to the sink. I'm a very extroverted person as I was classified as an ESFJ, so it felt nice to actually just listen for once instead of talk. Having that type of personality has given me the chance to head a lot of projects in the past, but it's not necessarily something that I always want to do. Hearing Brad and Michael instruct me to pick up the hose, wash the top, wipe it down, felt just as rewarding!

Having half the group show up during the process made it an even better exercise. The team had to rally together and get involved quick with no questions asked and everyone performed well. There was even a moment where there was another group passing through as we were trying to instruct Nan on what to do, but we literally just paused and waited for them to pass and then went right back to it. Everyone was conscious and aware, which made things go very smooth! We did make the occasional reference that it was tough for Stephanie and I not to say anything when I was told not to do any instructing. I was filling a role as a team player but I definitely had the urge to shot out a little tip or hint and it was tough! I felt most comfortable just instructing the blindfolded team member on what to do because it was what made me feel the most productive and effective to the group. Even in the group discussions we talked about how smoothly it seemed to go and how everyone of us felt a little weird blindfolded but trusted each other enough to just get the job done. When given the task of washing the rest of the cart was telling too, none of us complained, we just went right too it.

It was at that moment when we really were jelling as a team and a unit. We formed an assembly line and had 2 members at each station. Handing the bins off, Washing the bins, and drying off the bins, was the 3 step plan of our system and it didn't take much storming and fell into a great sense of norming as we finished in less than 10 minutes. After getting everything done it felt very rewarding and there was almost a sense of "what's next" in my head as I felt like accomplishing something else that needed to be done. 

I've learned throughout this first half class that I am an extroverted introvert. This assignment helped me see that even with something as simple as listening to instructions when I'm blindfolded. I was comfortable listening to someone and not saying anything because I couldn't see anyway, but once I took the blindfold off and couldn't speak to anyone who was blindfolded I felt very anxious. Thinking that what I could say would offer the best advice for the fastest way possible to accomplish washing the bins was hard to let go of, but at the end of the day we ended up finishing all the tasks with flying colors and every member of the team got to experience every role. I am confident that this group will do an excellent job in assisting KiB in the future!

We Can All Just Go Fly A Kite!

Ah, Physics! I'm in college and I am required to make a kite from anything and fly it? Besides this being the best assignment ever, it was a great process to see come together. My partner Paige and I, first had the idea to fly a kite with fire like a lantern kite you see in movies like "Tangled." Obviously an open flame on campus had to be cleared by the head of the IT department and when I mentioned the words "fire extinguisher" they promptly said no, which was fine because we had assembled other ideas and plans just in case we didn't get the okay from school.

Researching kites I found that the more materials you use the less likely it is to fly. We wanted to keep the design simple, but with one goal......it has to fly and we want the full 10 points. Browsing YouTube, believe it or not the comments at the bottom of the videos were extremely helpful! You can watch a 10 minute video of someone making a kite, but they don't show it flying, so reading the majority of the comments say "Yeah, this didn't fly" or "Does it even Fly???" was an easy give away that the design might not have been a good one.

I found a sled kite video that was very simple and at the beginning and ending of the video there was proof that his design flew, and the comments were supportive and informative opposed to the other videos. I went ahead and gathered the materials which were found around the house and went in Thursday and built the kite, which would become Cup!

The group aspect of this project worked, but almost too well. All of the groups weren't taking this as a competition, we used this time to help and aid each other because we all had the same goal. What I learned from this was, compromise! Paige and I knew that the lantern was probably a long shot but we shot for the stars, but all we needed was to be in the sky.......or rather the kite be in the sky.....flying, so we went with what was simple and doable and made it our own.

I feel like if all of us would of made one kite it would have been better. I understood the assignment but it was awesome how it transcended the groups because we have already become close as a team and it was evident during the kite building process on Thursday. When someone was getting frustrated, someone was always there to lend a hand. I can't wait to see what we all accomplish together with KIB.

Group Development Comparison

During my time in N250, it's been an amazing process learning group roles and what they do for a team. What I didn't expect was learning what role would be best for me based on my personality.

The personality test that placed me in the ESFJ category was fascinating. Everyone knows who they are but not everyone understands why they are who they are. I have been in situations where I have seen classifications of personalities with the four letter types, but I never understood it and frankly felt that it was all rubbish. Well I am happy to say that I was wrong, when we had the conversation in class about what each personality meant and if it pertained to our daily lives. When I explained my extroverted-ness until I get home where I become introverted-ness, I never felt more okay with who I was because I fit into a category where people such as Dick Clark and Barbara Walters.

The personality test where we are ranked percentage wise also made a lot of sense because it ranked me as a chairman and a team player. My parents both are chairman's at their respective jobs and are heavily supportive of the team player mentality that it only makes sense I would be in both categories. I think it's a bit more difficult to see who you are in this test though because they throw a lot at you from 25 questions I think it could be a lot less accurate. It still has relevance and can be used to better a group, but I don't think it is as effective as the previous one.

Of all the stages of group development I most agree with Tuckman's Stages Model. The idea that there are two aspects of a group being interpersonal relationships and task behaviors. In all of my time at IUPUI, I have found that to be the case. It is important that the conversations stay moving and each member remembers their role. In the end Forming, Storming, Norming, Performing, and Adjourning is the structure that seems to work the most when I have been in a team that succeeds.

In my opinion, what it all comes down to is each member of the team to put in their best effort and make sacrifices if it means not doing what you ultimately want but getting the job done. In this class, I have a feeling by getting to know each other from these tests and theories, we will do a great job!

The Best and The Worst of Working in A Group!

There are certainly advantages and disadvantages from working in a group. I've worked in big to small groups in my time here at IUPUI and in one particular case, I had the worst experience and the best experience in one long semester project.

It all began when choosing in an idea in a semester long class and there were a few people in the class that were less than enthused with the outcome of the vote. For the next 5 weeks the group did very little work on the project, and the professor was very aware and decided to give me the role of leader. With as little knowledge I had in all aspects of this project, I stepped up and geared the "willing" of the group towards finishing the semester with a quality end product. With a few mopers in the group not contributing, the rest of the team worked even harder to combat that.

In the end, the project was finished and everyone who deserved it received passing grades. It was completely night and day when someone was in charge opposed to everyone coming together and showing what they had done. I am a firm believer that if you don't have deadlines being handed down by someone that is a designated leader, then it is very difficult to be successful and achieve to the highest of reward of an end product.

-Blake Salisbury