Ever since U-M hosted the first Earth Day in 1970, the campus has pioneered environmental study and activism. This semester, faculty and students are adding to that tradition by sponsoring an environmental theme semester.

Theme semesters are a recent tradition at the College of Literature, Science, and the Arts (LSA); they have focused special campus course offerings, lectures and cultural performances on such issues as comedy, evil, food and gender/bodies/borders. But this is the first time that so many other schools at the University are also involved, says John Knott, professor of English, who is one of the semester's organizers.

One of Knott's pet projects during the semester will be the March 24-25 visit of the Forgotten Language Tour. Sponsored by the Orion Society of Great Barrington, Massachusetts, the tour takes leading authors and poets around the nation to present readings, workshops and discussions aimed at promoting a deeper understanding of the natural world.

"Student involvement in planning the semester is also new," Knott says. "A student group has grown out of the planning team and will coordinate Earth Day projects, teach-ins and other activities."

Student enthusiasm was obvious when 300 of them packed the multimedia semester kickoff in the Michigan Union. Provost Nancy Cantor introduced the event, and Law School alumna Michelle Jordan, the first woman and first African American to serve as deputy regional administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, focused on the need to reduce the environmental hazards that resulted in lead poisoning and asthma in millions of American children.

Kristen Genovese '99 of Edina, Minnesota, a junior in the School of Natural Resources and Environment and a member of the student planning team, says that this was the first theme semester in which students held a key planning role.

Genovese, who is majoring in environmental policy and behavior, says the group "has met every Monday night to share information and developments from each committee. We have committees for fundraising, publicity, utilities, events and networking. I would challenge anyone to show me a meeting where the people have more fun than we do! But ultimately that's what it's all about. Everyone is excited and dedicated to making this semester a wonderful opportunity for everyone on this campus. The topic couldn't be better suited to involving everyone in our events and activities."

The theme semester is co-sponsored by LSA and the School of Natural Resources and Environment, with both offering more than 50 courses related to the environment; some are part of the standard curriculum, but others are designed especially for the semester, such as "Homeplace: Life in the Huron Valley" in environmental studies and "Literature & Culture, Changing Attitudes Towards Nature" in English.

In the Program in American Culture, Maria E. Montoya, assistant professor of history, has designed a class, "History of the North American Environment," for 15 seniors fulfilling an advanced writing requirement.

The class examines such issues as the effects of European contact on the health and lives of Native Americans, the creation of the Dust Bowl on the Great Plains in the 1930s, the impact of large-scale dam-building, the social consequences of agricultural development and other topics that range over our continent's last 500 years.

"Many students have come to think that when it comes to interaction with the environment, humans are just plain bad, " Montoya says." I want the students to think about why they think that."

Montoya says an important boon of theme semesters for faculty is that "you get to meet people in other departments, you make intellectual connections. This is my third year here, and one of the things I've found is that Michigan does interdisciplinarity very well."

Exhibits at the Museum of Art, Exhibit Museum of Natural History, School of Art and Design, and University libraries will run throughout the semester, as will a series of films and readings.

For student job-seekers, Environmental Career Day on March 12 will bring in employers in government and private organizations active in environmental issues for a job fair in the Michigan Union Ballroom. Interested persons may learn more about the semester at its Web site: http://www.umich.edu/~envsem.

A January art show in the School of Art and Design's Jean Paul Slusser Gallery was among the Environmental Theme Semester's cultural offerings. The show, "Art and the Natural World," was curated by U-M Lecturer Janie Paul, and featured the work of artists from the faculty and local community. The semester's major exhibition, Monet at Vetheuil: The Turning Point, at the U-M Museum of Art, will run through March 15.