MAEP Students participate in EPI Policy Competition

From March 23-25, 2016, the first year Master of Arts in Environment Policy students travelled to St. John’s, NL, to compete in the second annual Environmental Policy Case Competition. Grenfell Campus of Memorial University once again partnered with the province’s PolicyNL group, providing students with a unique opportunity to experience problem-based learning. Students were divided into four groups and each group was given a current problem to address that was provided by the province. The topics were: Development of an Ecosystem Services Valuation Framework, Greening Tourism, Electric Vehicle Infrastructure, and Reducing Emissions from Transporting Goods and Services.

2016 Policy Competition participating MAEP students with PolicyNL’s Chris Smith and jury members

Each student group, along with a coach and mentor, took on their respective topics with great enthusiasm and were all able to produce an interesting array of suggestions to the jury panel. The Environmental Policy Institute, along with its students, would like to thank Mr. Glenn Blackwood, Mr. Martin Goebel, Ms. Jackie Janes, and Mr. Mike Samson for being jury panelists, as well as Mr. Chris Smith for organizing the event on behalf of the NL Government. We would also like to extend a very gracious thank you to Mr. Robert Otto, Mr. Len Moores, Mr. Paul Taylor, Ms. Carol-Ann Gillard, Mr. Dave Jennings, Mr. Keith Deering, Mr. Rick Carey, and Mr. Ross Firth for all of their help in their roles of either Mentor or Senior Advisor to each of the groups.

2016 Policy Competition winners with jury members (missing: jury member Mr. Glenn Blackwood)

Congratulations to the “Reducing Emissions from Transporting Goods and Services” team, consisting of Tsai Allen, Jennifer Dare, Meghan Faught, and Ahmed Redwan, for winning first place in the Policy Case Competition. It was a hard fought battle amongst all the teams and we would like to congratulate all that participated. It is with great anticipation that we wait for next year’s competition to see what fresh and new ideas are brought forth. – Joel Hotham, MAEP student