Janice Weis, Associate Dean and Director of the Environmental and Natural Resources Law Program, said the conference was groundbreaking given its comprehensive scope.

“The conference moved beyond a discussion of climate change and its causes and tackled the issue of how alternative or renewable energy sources might be used to ‘green the grid,’” Weis said. “The conference looked at the economic, legal, and technical issues involved in employing a variety of different energy sources and, in doing so, allowed us to gain an appreciation for the very complex issues involved in climate change.”

Speakers addressed a wide spectrum of energy sources including ocean wave, nuclear, coal, solar, and wind, as well as the federal and state regulatory landscape that contributes to or impedes renewable energy development.

“It was clear that the speakers have been spending time in their positions giving great thought as to how all sectors—academic, private, government, and non-profit—might contribute to a better understanding of how to address climate change.”

In this video, conference participants share their motives for attending and the rolls they each play toward Greening the Grid.

As Lewis & Clark students enter the workforce, their focus on seeking global understanding and creating new knowledge aligns them with industries’ needs, especially in this time of economic turmoil.

“This is not a time to be fearful,” said Minda Heyman, director of the Center for Career and Community Engagement. “You can’t do anything from a position of fear. Instead, our office is working to empower students by encouraging them to get involved in the job-search process early and helping them tell their own stories. When students know who they are and what they have to offer to a company or organization, they’re able to take charge of their job search.”

For Lewis & Clark students, telling one’s story means articulating the connections between myriad experiences that extend far beyond the classroom, including overseas trips, internships, volunteer experiences, leadership positions, and extracurricular activities.

“Our students are tremendously talented and they are taking part in all sorts of different experiences that can help set them apart from other applicants during their job search,” Heyman said. “We’re here to help students synthesize those experiences with what they’re learning in the classroom in order to determine their path and purpose.”

The advantage of a liberal arts education and cohesive, diverse alumni community

Throughout a student’s time at Lewis & Clark, the Center for Career and Community Engagement (referred to on campus as 3CE) encourages students to make a sustained investment to the job search process. 3CE also focuses on helping students to find engagement opportunities and prepare for transitions to graduate school and the professional world by offering resources such as one-on-one meetings, resume and cover letter assistance, mock interviews, and job fairs.

This spring, 3CE also hosted a special guest lecturer on campus to help students understand how the job market has shifted and what skills are most important to businesses in the current economy. Phil Gardner, an expert in college labor markets, spoke to students, faculty, and administrators about the harsh realities of the current market.

Despite the current economy, he said, companies are hiring liberal arts students because their skills and experiences uniquely qualify them to enter jobs and immediately make an impact on business. As Gardner’s research has shown, entry-level positions have evolved in the wake of a boom in internships and now require new employees to engage in continuous learning, integrate global perspectives, and create new solutions.

At Lewis & Clark, students are continually challenged both in and out of the classroom to develop such attributes and perspectives, which is particularly relevant given the present level of competition in the professional world.

Both Heyman and Gardner stress the importance of networking as students embark on their job search. The interpersonal connections students make through their workstudy jobs, internships, study abroad trips, and other experiences, form the basis of students’ professional networks.

“Building relationships is becoming increasingly significant,” Heyman said. “A job search is not simply submitting an application anymore. It’s a communication process.”

Careers for Pioneers, a biannual networking event collaboratively organized by 3CE, Alumni and Parent Programs, and the Board of Alumni, capitalizes on the natural affinity that exists between students and alumni. Heyman hopes to continue to increase collaboration with alumni, citing the significance of such opportunities for current students.

“The alumni’s willingness to help current students build the relationships and internship opportunities that will expedite their transition into careers is so important,” Heyman said.

The Lewis & Clark alumni network is a diverse community, representing many different sectors in the job market and geographic locations around the world.

Finding value in thinking of the path, not the destination

The paths Lewis & Clark students take after graduation are comprised of many different stepping stones, Heyman said, which underscores a central mission of liberal arts education: to create life-long learners whose insatiable curiosity and adaptability makes them invaluable to countless industries. Particularly this year, graduates likely will not go directly into their careers.

Examples abound of students tapping opportunities in both influential and diverse settings around the world. Isaac Holeman ’09, will spend the next year working for an organization he co-founded in Malawi, using technology to increase access to health care. Ben Brysacz ’09 will head to Washington D.C. after graduation for an internship with the Public Service Academy, on his way to law school. For Katie Walter ’09, the next step after graduation will be Northern India, where she will conduct research to assess the salience of religious and economic themes in advocating environmental stewardship. In each case, students’ liberal arts experience at Lewis & Clark has prepared them for serious, substantial work, paving the way for careers as innovative leaders and engaged citizens of the world.

“The question we pose to graduates shouldn’t be ‘What are you going to do for the rest of your life?’ but ‘What will you do for the next year or two?’ By shifting that question, it puts the emphasis on one’s ability to grow and learn and know oneself,” Heyman said.

The initial steps Lewis & Clark students take after graduation often include service work in organizations like AmeriCorps, Teach for America, and Peace Corps. Nationwide, applications to public service programs have ballooned in recent years, with a spike this year, due to both President Obama’s call to action and the recession. With an alumni participation rate among the top in the nation, Lewis & Clark consistently prepares individuals for positions in public service.

“It’s in the DNA here,” Heyman said. “Lewis & Clark students want to make a difference and want to help solve the problems they see in the world. For some, that means joining Teach for America, for others, it’s Peace Corps or another position in the public interest.

“No matter which route our students choose after graduation, our role is to prepare them to digest these diverse experiences and understand how the experiences and their outcomes shape who they are bring them closer to finding their calling.”

The Sustainability Education Initiative is a program of professional development coursework and activities for K-12 teachers in the West Linn-Wilsonville School District. During three courses offered in 2009, Smith will prepare 50-60 teachers to incorporate sustainability issues into their classrooms and help them implement school or community projects that will enhance local natural and social environments. Participants will be eligible for small seed grants to fund start-up projects. The grant aims to increase the number of teachers implementing sustainability projects in schools, and increase student and educator awareness of local natural systems, ecologies, and social needs.

In this video, Smith visits Zenger Farm with the first cohort of teachers, and discusses the importance of teaching sustainability using place-based education.

The three-day symposium, titled “Poverty, Property, and Personhood: Challenging Gender Injustice,” includes two keynote speakers and nearly 20 other presentations, panel discussions, and performances covering a wide range of gender issues.

In this video*, student organizers senior Kacie Dalziel, junior Julia Comstock-Ross, and senior Peter Seilheimer discuss how the symposium came together and the value of  this interdisciplinary platform to discuss gender injustice.

The symposium is scheduled Wednesday, March 11 through Friday, March 13.

The students, seniors Casey Nelson and James Cotton and sophomores Betto van Waarden and Claire Battaglia, will establish community programs, communication and reconciliation workshops, facility improvements, and an interactive learning center in the interest of helping Criamar residents overcome the effects of neglect and abuse and become peaceful contributors to society.

With funding from philanthropist Kathryn Wasserman Davis’s 100 Projects for Peace initiative, the group members will draw on their diverse backgrounds, interests, and skills to achieve their goals.

“We came together around this project because it offered an opportunity for all of us to use our knowledge and talent to accomplish the most possible good,” Nelson, a sociology/anthropology and biology double major, said. “We’ll be able to do much more than just donate money—we’ll be working alongside the staff and volunteers and bringing our experiences and education to bear on the problems facing Criamar.”

The group designed its project around providing the most sustainable impact with the time and money at hand. They will use the grant money—$10,000 from 100 Projects for Peace and an additional $2,500 from Lewis & Clark—to purchase computers, educational software, supplementary food, recreation equipment, renovation supplies, landscaping materials, and chickens.

“Each component of our project will generate long-lasting effects within the orphanage,” Battaglia, a political science major, said. “For example, giving the children access to computers will meet immediate needs for additional educational opportunities, but the technological aptitude they gain will also translate into valuable job skills in the future.”

The group also hopes to inspire social change in the community by cultivating connections between the orphans and neighborhood children, in the spirit of fun and recreation.

“It’s critical that the Criamar children get to connect with other kids in their area,” van Waarden, a history major, said. “In all the countries I’ve traveled to, soccer has consistently been a way to connect with people. We think that bringing together children from the orphanage and children from the surrounding community to play soccer will encourage that same kind of bond.”

Now in its second year, the 100 Projects for Peace initiative will allow students to undertake projects in the name of peace in more than 54 countries throughout the world this summer.

“The initiative is the perfect way for Lewis & Clark students to use their liberal arts education, their critical thinking and communication skills, and their creativity to solve problems and promote peace,” Greg Caldwell, associate dean of students and director of International Students and Scholars, said. “Lewis & Clark students want to change the world, and the 100 Projects for Peace initiative gives them a chance to do just that.”

Lewis & Clark students submitted 15 project proposals this year, more than doubling the total last year. Members of the group heading to Brazil argue that even the process of writing a grant proposal increases global awareness on campus.

“This initiative opens up serious discourse on so many levels,” Cotton, a biology major, said. “Students are forced to ask themselves, ‘How do you decide what constitutes the greatest need?’ ‘Where do you think you can make the biggest difference?’ ‘What do you think is the best way to do it?’”

Battaglia and van Waarden hope to continue that discussion when they return to Lewis & Clark in the fall, sharing their lessons in classes and symposia, and advising future program applicants.

UPDATE: Read dispatches from the group’s summer in Brazil and see pictures of Criamar on their blog, Cultivating Peace.

Roosevelt High School, located in a low-income North Portland neighborhood, educates more than 850 students who speak more than 25 languages. Goessling, who received a $1500 grant from North Portland Neighborhood Services to pay for cameras and supplies, enlisted six Lewis & Clark graduate student volunteers to work with a group of Roosevelt freshmen. The Roosevelt students, all members of the Step Up program at Roosevelt, also received mentorship from Blue Moon Camera and Machine, Onda Gallery, and the Talisman Gallery.

Using a basic 120-medium format Holga camera, the students capture impressionistic images that often overlap the school yard with empty play parks, city buses, McDonald’s golden arches, and the unique peaks of the St. John’s Bridge.

“Their photos have led conversations toward a heightened sense of critical consciousness,” Goessling said. “We discuss their environmental concerns, problems at school with violence, police presence at school, litter and trash in St. Johns and at Roosevelt, and issues of racial segregation within Roosevelt.”

To showcase the photos, Goessling created a website, which allows the students to log in and edit or change their individual pages.

“This is a practical example of engaging youth to become active participants in their education,” Goessling said. “Through a process of collaboration and hard work, high school students, graduate school students, and community members taught each other about community, art, social justice, research, and empowerment.”

The photo project will culminate with an invitation-only photo exhibit on May 30 at Roosevelt High School. Goessling, a community counseling major, plans to write her thesis on the results of this project throughout the fall and graduate from Lewis & Clark in December.

“The students want their work to truly impact the decisions of powerful people in Portland —hopefully, in doing so, they will be better informed in making decisions that will affect all students,” said Goessling.

“They’ve got an operation here that looks like the old grass roots, the Eugene McCarthy and Bobby Kennedy campaigns of 1968: Go down to headquarters in Portland and you’ll see 40 or 50 people under 25,” Eisinger said.

Read more about Callahan’s and Eisinger’s thoughts on youth involvement heading into the state’s primary on May 20.

Listen to a conversation with Perez and learn about how he is already making a difference in Portland’s Latino community.

The program, which places eight students in Congressional internships, was created to provide an opportunity for students with disabilities to work on Capitol Hill and enrich their academic studies and professional experience. For Shectman, who is dyslexic, the highly competitive internship is just one more achievement in a series of academic and extra-curricular successes that include being named a Mary Stewart Rogers Scholar, making the Dean’s List, and volunteering in Portland public schools to help students with learning and behavioral difficulties.

Read about his internship and how he hopes to integrate the experience with his Lewis & Clark education to pursue policy changes in the future in the interview below:

Can you describe the internship program you were selected for and explain the type of work you’ll be doing?

I was selected to do a summer congressional internship as part of a program sponsored by the Mitsubishi Electric America Foundation and the American Association of People with Disabilities. I’ll be working in Washington DC, in the office of Congressman Steny Hoyer, the Democratic Majority Leader in the House of Representatives.

My responsibilities will most likely include legislative research, constituent services, and giving tours of the Capitol to visitors.

What do you hope to take away from the program at the end of the summer?

I hope that by the end of the summer I’ll have a better sense of how legislation moves through Congress and what goes on in a congressman’s office. I’m thrilled to be doing this internship during an election year. I’ve been volunteering for Barack Obama’s campaign, and it will be fascinating to watch the way the campaign develops from inside Congressman Hoyer’s office.

How do you think the internship will fit in with your academic work at Lewis & Clark?

I’ve been majoring in international affairs, with a minor in communication. I’m hoping the internship will help me understand better how our government works. I know a fair amount about international affairs, but I am really hoping to gain an understanding of how domestic legislation works and about Congress’s role in making foreign policy decisions. I hope the internship will help me integrate theoretical issues with how things actually happen in practice. One of the great things about going to a liberal arts college is being exposed to different disciplines and being able to make connections between those and the outside world.

What college-sponsored trips have you participated in, and how have those experiences affected you—either in your major or, more generally, in your outlook or perspective?

I traveled to Kenya for fall semester and participated in a spring break service trip to New Orleans, after Hurricane Katrina.

I grew up in a safe and comfortable home. I never had any worries about food or healthcare. But I also learned from my parents that many people weren’t so fortunate. It’s one thing to hear this and another thing to observe it first hand. My experiences in New Orleans and in Kenya, taught me about the real hardships that many people face. When I was in Africa, I was moved by how much the students I met appreciated being able to go to school to get an education.

What projects or programs are you involved in outside of the classroom?

The most important volunteer work I’ve done at Lewis & Clark has been with Dale Holloway, the coordinator of Student Support Services. I’m part of a group of Lewis & Clark students that meets with students in the Portland public schools who have learning or behavioral issues. We try to be role models for them and let them know that it is possible to succeed in college.

Also, I’m a very outdoorsy person. Two summers ago, I passed an extensive series of exams to become an assistant scuba diving instructor. Next summer, I hope to become certified with the Handicapped Scuba Association, so that I can bring my love of scuba diving to people with physical disabilities.

What are you hoping to do after graduation?

I plan to spend some time traveling, possibly back to Kenya and Tanzania, and I’m thinking about doing some volunteer work there. Afterwards, I plan to go to graduate school to study International Affairs.

After that, I could see myself doing a number of things. A position of some kind on Capitol Hill is certainly a possibility, as is working for an NGO. My time in Africa was really a life-changing experience for me, and I could see myself working on issues related to Africa.

“I really want to make a difference, and I feel that the political arena is the most effective place to do that,” Brysacz said.

Listen to a conversation with Brysacz and learn about how he hopes to impact the country’s political dialogue in the future.