Meet our Students: Alex Page / Community and Regional Planning

Meet our Students: Alex Page

Community and Regional Planning

What city, region, state do you call home?

The Bay Area, California

In which graduate program are you enrolled?

Community and Regional Planning

What is your area of concentration?

I’m interested in bicycle transportation, accessibility, and infrastructure. I want to empower communities to become both environmentally and economically sustainable.

What will you be doing for the Community Service Center?

My team is working with the cities of Gold Hill and Oakridge to draft and implement a surface water management plan. The EPA and DEQ have provided funding to help these cities improve the water quality on the Rogue and Willamette rivers, respectively. As components of this large endeavor, we hope to create an outreach and education plan, draft riparian ordinances, recommend low impact development practices, and provide a framework for evaluation and monitoring into the future.

How does your involvement with the Community Service Center relate to or inform your graduate studies?

My passion for bicycle transportation is rooted in environmentalism and conservation. I think a healthy environment makes happy and healthy people. My hope with promoting bicycle transportation is to improve air and water quality. The education and outreach plan is something I hope will be adaptable in advocating for bicycle infrastructure. Much of the problems facing environmental protection efforts are the lack of awareness, and the correlation between our natural environment and our future.

What can you say about the value of your Community Service Center experience?

There’s nothing more valuable than applying your learning experience to a real situation.

What outcome are you hoping for when your project ends?

I would love to see the Gold Hill and Oakridge take pride and ownership in the protection of their watershed and implement our recommendations.

More about the Community Planning Workshop(CPW)

 

Meet our Students: Casey Weisinger / Community and Regional Planning

Meet our Students: Casey Weisinger

Community and Regional Planning

What city, region, state do you call home?

Madison, WI

In which graduate program are you enrolled?

Community and Regional Planning

What is your area of concentration?

I would like to concentrate in environmental planning, specifically water quality and resource management and waste management.

What will you be doing for the Community Service Center?

I am working in the Community Planning Workshop to help small communities improve their water quality through EPA/DEQ grant funding. Some of the main aspects of our project include developing public outreach and education programs, creating voluntary riparian ordinances, and recommending best management practices to help improve stormwater runoff.

How does your involvement with the Community Service Center relate to or inform your graduate studies?

Working with the CSC provides me with experiential learning that helps me apply what I am learning to a real world scenario. It is a great way to see how actual planning works in a dynamic community and state. It also helps develop a skill set that I can use in an array of future projects.

What can you say about the value of your Community Service Center experience?

So far I have been very excited to be a part of the CSC experience! The Community Planning Workshop makes learning engaging, exciting, and dynamic. The whole hands on approach is a large reason why I picked the Community and Regional Planning program in the first place!

What outcome are you hoping for when your project ends?

I am hoping that our team was able to collaborate successfully with many different stakeholders in our project to produce a product that everyone is proud of. I hope our team can make a long-term impact for the communities we worked with. I also look forward to establishing positive relationships with people that will carry outside of the classroom.

More about the Community Planning Workshop(CPW)