We are excited to welcome a guest speaker from the University of Vermont’s Gund Institute of the Environment. Carlos Andres works with indigenous populations in Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia to bring new and critical understanding to connections between nature and mental health among populations that are typically overlooked by research, which has been focused in urban Western societies. He draws upon a decade of interdisciplinary experience with community leaders, governments, non-governmental organizations and international organizations in Ecuador, Australia, and the U.S. Below is the abstract of the recent paper that Dr. Gallegos RioFrio co-authored.

We will also hear brief progress reports on two of the ongoing pilot projects that are supported by NHH-UT.

And we will briefly discuss plans for a new award for NHH-UT from the REI Cooperative Action Fund.