World Science Fest LEARNING at its Best!

Friends,

This post reprises my coverage of the first annual World Science Festival -- one of the best, most moving and educational series of events I've ever had the privilege to attend.

Well, it's back -- June 10 - 14, with a dazzling array of programs that will take place throughout the city.

Please visit the World Science Festival site to learn more and buy tickets.

And here's hoping to see you there!

I'll again be taking in as much of festival as I can...especially for and with The Producers' Project, which helps K - 12 students and teachers make and share media on such subjects as math, science and more.....

Warmly and looking forward,

Wendy Dubit
The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable
The Producers' Project: A New Lens on Learning





Post of 06.02.08:

Recently, I realized and articulated why I’d moved to New York so many years ago: THIS is the place and pace of accelerated learning, creation and connection that I long for and love.

I was tickled when a recent Smithsonian article claimed the same, with Joan Acocella proposing that New Yorkers are a highly involved (bordering on intrusive) species of peeps pre-selected for higher energy and ambition.

I’d argue that even the wildlife here is that way:

I’ve seen Pale Male eating in public. (He drools!) I’ve communed with raccoons. (I had one as a next door neighbor until they took the scaffolding down.)

But now, can I just effuse a bit about the World Science Festival?!

This week, I was IN HEAVEN thanks to physicist Brian Greene, producer Tracy Day, actor and author Alan Alda, friend Sunny Bates and all the others whose brilliance, warmth, humor and magic formed a float of math, science and humanities such as I’d never known!

The city was at its Nobel~est….

I savored every second of Mayor Bloomberg's "NY Loves Science" speech and Leon Lederman's cosmic jokes.

I watched in anticipation and appreciation as the inaugural Kavli Prize recipients in astrophysics, neuroscience and nanoscience were announced, and was thrilled to meet founder Fred Kavli and laureates Louis E. Brus and Thomas Jessell afterwards.

There were compelling cases for vertical farms and a balanced renewable energy policy; rousing discussions about regenerative medicine and thorny bioethics issues; and impressive displays of neuroscientific fireworks -- monkeys who can manipulate mechanical third arms with their minds and minimally conscious men coming back to life.

I drilled down deep with NIH' Eric Wasserman, whose enviable title is Chief, Brain Stimulation Unit, and shared fresh ideas with Vivavi founder Josh Dorfman, who, though he calls himself the Lazy Environmentalist, is anything but lazy.

I heard Jim Gates, Lucy Hawking and others tell self-deprecating tales of science experiments gone wrong.

I was there when TPP’s own Jack Chiarello and hundreds of others came alive with wonder.

I was moved to tears by Mathemagician Arthur Benjamin’s speed and accuracy and by William Phillips’ "absolute zero" (or as close as it gets) ballooon tricks.

I had my picture taken with Ms. Frizzle of Scholastic’s Magic School Bus.

I learned from Saul Griffith how and why to shave a few thousand watts off my energy consumption and from Dan Nocera how to think and live more like a leaf.

And I went wild with joy, as we all did, when Andy Revkin (pictured above) ended a Powering the Planet town hall meeting with an accoustic guitar original about unsequestered CO2 (or was it liberated carbon?).

At dinner, I traded life stories with Eben Bayer, whose Ecovative Design centers around a fungi-based foam that will someday allow us to grow our own homes!

I don’t think I’ve ever been happier.

So when World Science Fest officially ended last night -- with a Science of Longevity session about how "the 90s are and new 50s" and with Alan Alda performing Dear Albert, which he wrote based on letters to and from Einstein -- I knew that, for me, and for so many, WSF would live on.

INSPIRED, The Producers' Project will enable K - 12 students and staff to make and share even more math and science-oriented media (music, film, television, blogs, games) than before.

I’ve bought a slew of related domain names that range from Infinitesimal to Infinite and Smallest to Allest to Adult Math.

I vow to launch a “Love Letters to Darwin” campaign someday.

And I feel as if I've value-added to my DNA....

I woke up this morning knowing....I’m going to learn a lot today!

Warmly and looking forward,

Wendy Dubit
The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable

HAPPPPY Earth Day, All

Read between the lines....

Plant! Protect! Preserve! Participate!

Educate and Celebrate!

And so muuch more....

HAPPPPY Earth Day, All!

The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable!

Welcome to SPRING and all things GREEN from The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable.

In case you haven't been here before, or haven't been back in a while, The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable is the brainchild of social entrepreneur Wendy Dubit (aka Biodiesel Babe) and the first effort out of the Renewable Media gate.

Through compelling content and concrete calls to action, The Renewables educates about and celebrates all that is renewable in energy, agriculture and life...and gives people and places the impetus and tools it takes to make their ideas and ideals real.

Here you can:

1) Learn about how people who create change do it – from Barack Obama (making history) to Gregor Mendel (making peas), Mahatma Ghandi (making peace) and Helen Keller (seeing possibilities), to Thomas Edison, Rudolph Diesel, Henry Ford, Marie Curie, Martin Luther King, Steven Jobs, Al Gore, Bette Midler, Oprah Winfrey and more.

2) Get Renewable Tools that kids, teens, families, schools, organizations, corporations and towns can use to:

3) Make Renewable Ideas and Ideals Real -- from the agricultural cooperative that makes its own energy to the inner-city community center that saves it; from the sisters who repurpose a neighborhood’s toys, to the boy who writes a renewable song that rocks the world….You make it real. We’ll make it known. Using the best of social networking tools and the power and generosity of our partners, The Renewables will help you to...

4) Be Seen. Be Heard. Create Change. Reap Renewable Rewards!


Educate, Create, Celebrate, Reward, Replicate....
Well that's our plan, anyway. Like all things, The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable will happen bigger, better and faster to the extent that we can work and play together.

Over the coming days, The Renewables' Inaugural Challenge will spotlight what's being done and what you can do as part of the Inauguration and New Administration.

Then, in time for the 2009 Growing Season, we plan to launch A Call to Open Farms that will encourage folks to visit and support as many local farms, fairs and markets as possible and to share the results in all the vibrant and viral real-world and online ways they can.

It's going to be a wonderful ride!

And for every good reason, we hope you will join us on it....

Warmly and looking forward,
Wendy Dubit and the Biodiesel Babes


Pictured above: Amelia Amon with “Green Light”

Lights Out for Earth Hour

Friends,

I seriously need reading glasses. Somehow, I misread the time on Earth Hour's excellent website about when we were supposed to turn the lights out and experience the difference that even an hour of darkness can make.

I invited friends over for the occasion, but none could come.

And so, alone at the appointed hour, I powered down all appliances, lit candles, turned my rocking chair towards twilight, and experienced realizations, revelations, and rewards that I could never have imagined.

Realization: Quiet and calm accompany darkness to a great degree. Nature seems closer when you are calm and quiet.

Revelation: More is less. Soon, I was economizing even candles. And what I could see, hear, feel in the deepening of dusk and descent of night asounded me.

Reward: A raccoon traversed my windowsill and scampered up the netted scaffolding next door.

WOW!!! Did this happen often, I wondered, and I was too busy, noisy, bustling to see?

Was this some kind of sign -- an enticement to spend more time in silence, stillness, observation, contemplation?

Or was I CRAZY?

Later, walking to dinner, I took the park path to see who else was lighting up or powering down. At the gate, I quizzed the local police: Had they been aware of Earth Hour? No. If they had been aware, would they have taken action or encouraged others to do so? Questionable. Could they notice a difference in the city lights from where they stood? Not really. And finally: Could I have been hallucinating? Though I was admittedly alone and drinking in the dark, I could swear I saw a raccoon....

Absolutely affirmative! The police were as excited as I was: They had seen a hefty critter amble out of Central Park at the time in question, in no particular hurry, headed west....

Increasingly, it seems, 'coons leave Central Park to stake out new territories, run errands and the like. One neighbor reported that a raccoon accompanied her to Duane Reade the other day. And I've since been told not to invite them in for lunch, lest they never leave.

Anyhow, I arrived at dinner EXCITED to share my tales of calmness, wildness and wonder with friends...only to learn that Earth Hour was the next night. And I'd get to do it all again....

Note: In order to conserve energy and because this experience was so moving to me...and hopefully you, too, I am reposting from last year's Earth Hour. I hope you observed, and ENJJOYED.

SPRING Into Action....

Welcome to Spring, which officially began this morning.

And here's inviting us to do wonderful, meaningful things, this season...and always!

Warmly and looking forward,
Wendy Dubit aka Biodiesel Babe.

Happy New Era!

Friends,

Despite times of great global, economic and environmental uncertainty, I have never been more proud of...and hopeful for...our country!

Wherever you were on Inauguration Day, I hope you felt, and continue to feel, the CONNECTIVITY...the inclusivity, pulse and power of being part of a new chapter in history, and of the changes in and for each of us that started taking place immediately.

Barack Obama is now our 44th President -- one amazing man who also evokes the spirit and accomplishments of Abraham Lincoln, our 16th President; Martin Luther King, whose birthday was commemorated just prior to Inauguration Day, and of each and every one of us, who are invited to be part of the New Administration.

A few ways to get and stay inspired and involved follow....with more to be posted at The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable regularly.

The Presidential Inaugural Committee wants to see where were you on January 20 at Noon?. Millions braved record cold to be on the Mall in Washington, D.C. for Barack Obama's Swearing In Ceremony and Inaugural Address. Billions watched images of the festivities streaming across screens...here in NYC (as in the above photo taken by Rick Schwab at City Hall), across the country, around the world. All were/are encouraged to send snapshots to the Official Inaugural Book, which now boasts close to seven billion images.

The New Administration wants to hear about changes that you'd like to see, and encourages you to be part of them.

The Green Inaugural Ball invites you to paricipate in the Green Economy.

An amazing confluence of caring and contribution finds the likes of John O'Donohue's Blessing for a Leader, Hannah Reimann's I Have a Dream and Amy Dixon-Kolar's Rosa Sat so Martin Could Walk so Barack Could Run weaving their way across the net and into our consciousness.

I'm finding myself returning again and again to the First Couple's First Dance and photos of the First Family...and turning daily to The While House for addresses, blogs, updates and what feels to me like real hope, right action and an invitation to be involved.

What a wonderful time, place and spirit to share!

And as always, I'd love to see and hear how you are!

Warmly and looking forward,

Wendy Dubit
Vergant, Inc. and The Renewables: Thinkable is Doable!

New Energy for America:YOURS!

Friends,

I, like many of you, was moved to hope, action and tears by the authenticity and inclusivity of the Obama campaign, and now, by Barack Obama and Joe Biden's victory, inauguration and administration...and by what it means for us as individuals, community, country, world.

As one whose Renewables tag line and experience is Thinkable is Doable, I of course resound with what Barack Obama has thought, written, spoken and now made into REALITY:

The Audacity of Hope.

Change We Can Believe In.

New Energy for America.

And I'm most struck by these words:

"I'M ASKING YOU TO BELIEVE...Not just in my ability to bring about real change in Washington....I'm asking you to believe in yours."

I hope you are as excited as I am. I plan to use my energy, efforts and posts to keep us informed and involved.

It's indeed an auspicious time to, as per Gandhi, "Be the change we want to see in the world."

I'm looking forward to it, gratefully.

Warmly,
Wendy

2009, Etched in Snow

Happy 2009!

May it herald happy, hopeful, renewable times!

All Things Renewable....

All things renewable....

Packaging, cardboard and string of course.

Energy, increasingly.

Hope, always.

May the spirit of the season be with you!

Warmly and looking forward,
Wendy

Planet First AidWay to Save!

Friends,

I’m thrilled that my brother and sister-in-law have come up with a product designed for just such times! Enter Durango, Colorado-based Planet First Aid (PFA) and its line of Energy Gift Baskets – each packed with information and items -- from compact flourescent bulbs to retractable clotheslines -- that save time, money, energy, water and the environment.

And like anything Gregg, Gretchen and their friend John would do…it’s got a lot of personality and some romance, too. Wild flower seeds are included. And in addition to CFL bulbs, there are beeswax candles encouraging us to sometimes turn off the lights altogether and go with the glow!