Dickinson to Durban

The final week the MOSIAC group spent in South Africa we stayed at the Koinonia Retreat Center and did some volunteer work for the Makaphutu Children’s Trust. This experience made me reflect many times during the long week after the COP on the privileges I have as well-off, white, female from the United States. While this fact does not cross my mind most days, the days we spent at work in the orphanage and in the nearby villages interacting with the people, really made me think about my privileged status. One moment especially with one of the local people in a village we distributed food to, will forever “get under my skin.” As our distribution group pulled up in our Hyundai van into a small village located in the Valley of … Read entire article »

By Prof. Jeff Niemitz One of the things we tried to do on this Mosaic was to give the students not only a sense of the UN Climate conference but also a small taste of the rest of South Africa outside the conference venue.  For ten days we saw the same wall, corridors, exhibits, and venue spaces for the negotiations and the side events explaining some of the issues either from a topical, national, or regional view.  But that was not all there was to it.  The weekend between the conference weeks we experienced the biodiversity of the large animals of Africa up close and personal.  We understood that it was not so simple as to pay the game drive guide and find the animals. In fact the game parks are actively managed … Read entire article »