College of Menominee Nation Sustainable Development Institute is hosting a summit on climate change indicators and resiliency strategies demonstrated by the Great Lakes Tribal Nations. The summit will be held on August 23-25, 2011 in Keshena, Wisconsin. The purpose of the summit is to share ongoing research projects, provide information related to carbon sequestration, provide a forum to share climate change projections and experiences, and begin discussing a climate change research agenda for Great Lake Tribal Nations.
Alaskan Native, Larry Merculieff will share his experiences from ground zero of climate change. The summit will start off with an indigenous perspective from our hemisphere and will hone in on climatic predictions as seen through the lens of climatologists that focus on the Great Lakes Region. The summit will involve a tour of the Menominee forest that will highlight change in the forest and include facilitated sessions that will allow for conference participants to share their concerns and stories from their tribal communities that are related to climate change. At the conference, traditional knowledge will be interweaved with existing climatic research in a manner that is both respectful and needed. Daniel Wildcat will be giving a keynote address that will enforce the relevance of indigenous knowledge in today’s climatic concerns. Donald Wuebbles, the regional Midwest climate expert that led the modeling efforts of the climate projections, will give a presentation on Midwest climatic projections and concerns.
Please consider attending if you have an experience, project, program, research, or relationship that demonstrates tribal resiliency to climate change. We are looking for these stories to engage our communities and to take the lead on identifying research needs in our region. Information gleaned from the summit may appear in the next National Climate Assessment.