That expert you read about in the New York Times discussing elephants talking to each other by name just might be your neighbor.
In an effort to better connect Colorado State University with the Fort Collins community, the university is planning a series of “Ram Talks” during the 2024-25 school year, said Kyle Henley, the university’s vice president of university marketing and communications. CSU professors, researchers and other experts will discuss their work and answer questions from those in attendance in a casual setting in Old Town Fort Collins.
The research work with elephants performed by CSU professor George Wittemyer, for instance, was featured recently in the New York Times.
“As anyone who’s lived here for any amount of time knows, we have amazing things happening here on campus all the time,” Henley said. “We have faculty in the New York Times, and incredible things happening on the research side of the house. Sometimes, it can feel like that’s happening not necessarily in your community. But the reality is this kind of cool stuff that’s happening at CSU involves your neighbors that you see at the grocery store.”
The talks will take place in a “happy-hour” style setting in the soon-to-open Fort Collins Welcome Center, operated by Visit Fort Collins, in Old Town Square (next door to Coopersmith’s Pub and Brewing) from 5-6:30 p.m. on two Wednesdays each month. Admission is free, and a cash bar and light snacks will be available.
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The series begins Sept. 4 with CSU sociology professor Jeni Cross in a talk titled, “Hidden hurdles – Inventing new approaches to old problems by re-thinking systems.”
Other speakers on the fall-semester schedule include:
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Sept. 18 – Wittemyer,“Elephant names: What we can learn from how elephants communicate”
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Oct. 2 – Professor Martin Carcasson, “Taking on the challenge of toxic polarization: better conversations in a hyper-partisan world”
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Oct. 16 – Professor Jessica Metcalf, post-doctoral fellow Valerie Seitz and Plant Growth Facilities Manager Tammy Brenner, “Morbid Trickery – What science is learning from CSU’s corpse flower”
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Nov. 6 – Associate professor Brian Tracy, “Your electric muscles are movers and sensors”
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Nov. 20 – TBD
Additional “Ram Talks” are planned for the spring semester, Henley said.
“Part of the reason we love living in a university town is so you can interact with ideas, because we’re intellectually curious,” he said. “And what better way to interact with some of the ideas than in an informal setting, where you can have a conversation, come up afterward and ask more questions if you want to. There’s a lot going on with our academics and with our research as it relates to the impact that we’re having on the community, the state, the world. This is a way to share that in a fun, informal setting, that we think people will really enjoy.”
Reporter Kelly Lyell covers education, breaking news, some sports and other topics of interest for the Coloradoan. Contact him at kellylyell@coloradoan.com, x.com/KellyLyell and facebook.com/KellyLyell.news.
This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: CSU plans casual ‘happy hour’ talks with experts in Old Town this fall
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