Earthwatch are offering the chance for science and geography educators to get out into the field and work alongside scientists to create educational resources.
From the Earthwatch website…
This year we are pleased to be able to offer 24 fully-funded educator places on a variety of different Earthwatch projects. Working alongside leading scientists for a period of between one to two weeks, small groups of five to eight educators will take part in hands-on scientific research on facilitated projects which include Dolphins of Greece and Whales and Dolphins of the Hebrides.
See their educators section for more information. The closing date is 4 May.
Ben Saunders sets off tomorrow to attempt to be the fastest person to set a new world speed record from Ward Hunt Island to the Geographic North Pole. The current record was set in 2005 by a guided team using dog sleds and numerous re-supplies in a time of 36 days 22 hours. Ben’s expedition will be solo and unsupported and on foot.
Ben will be blogging daily from the ice on his website, please follow and support him as much as possible.
Watch a short clip by Ben to show what drives him and to get a feel for what it’s like to be alone on the ice.
For two weeks, renowned polar explorer, Robert Swan will be relying solely on renewable energy as part of the E-Base Goes Live project. The team are now in place posting daily video and images. Next week they will be conducting a series of live video chats with pupils globally.
Really proud of the team - John, Ciara and Marjan for making sure the IAE expedition blog for 2041 looks so amazing, has great functionality and went live so soon after the 2041 main site.
I just love this site, but then that’s me. It’s exciting to see how far Wordpress as a platform can be taken (this is the inner geek in me).
The main site for 2041 went live on Friday. For those of you who don’t know 2041, it’s an organisation set up by Robert Swan - the first person to walk to both poles - to preserve Antarctica.
The 2041 team have some amazing projects lined up this year, all coming soon. First off, the E-Base on King George Island off the Antarctic peninsula goes live at the beginning of March, broadcasting live on renewable energy. If they can live off solar and wind, etc. in Antarctica, it’s a message to us all to give it a go at home.
Then in mid-March the E-Base Goes Live team will be joined by a team from global corporations learning about leadership and sustainability on the Inspire Antarctic Expedition.
And if that’s not enough, the 2041 yacht on the Voyage for Cleaner Energy, will be engaging audiences along the West Coast of the US from the beginning of April.
Finally, a big big thank you to the teams at Digital Explorer and 2041 for working so hard to make this happen.
Great for all those heading south. Your progress can now be followed on Google Earth with newly updated satellite imagery. The imagery stops at about 82.5 degrees South as there is no satellite imagery available this close to the pole.
There is a call for as much user generated content (images, video, etc.) as possible to be added to this newly enhanced area. So, get going and if you need any help then let us know.
Have a look at Digital Explorer’s work for Wilderness Expertise, a youth expedition company, designing a series of Virtual Expeditions with Google Earth.
It’s great to see the Digital Explorer methodology slowly branching out into the mainstream.
In March 2008, Robert Swan and the Inspire Antarctic team will be broadcasting live from the newly launched E-Base in Bellingshausen on King George Island. Robert will be living solely off renewable energy for 2 weeks and sharing his daily experiences with the world through a cutting-edge, interactive website (to be launched mid-February 2008).
Through daily video broadcasts, photography and live chats, Robert and the 2041 team aim to bring the message of preserving Antarctica, promoting sustainable lifestyles and combating climate change to a wider audience.
Follow the adventure online, beginning March 1, 2008, and be sure to check out the BRAND NEW WEBSITE, going live mid-February 2008!!
Best of luck to Andy Pag as he sets off on his truly inspirational journey to Mali in a truck powered by bio-diesel from waste confectionery. Andy is not only delivering an inspirational message to all of us, but is also a leader in remote communications so expect some great digital media on the site.
The BioTruck team are attempting the first ever Carbon-Negative driving expedition across the Sahara Desert to Timbuktu in Mali, West Africa.
To do this they will use a mix of carbon cutting techniques, including biofuels and offsetting, and the outcome is being analysed with independent assistance from CarbonAided, using industry standard methodologies to verify the Carbon-Negative claim.
Timbuktu is a city that has suffered from the effect of climate change. Once a river port town, the shifting sands of the Sahara have moved the river 20km away and are now threatening the towns very existence as enormous dunes encroach on the outskirts.
The Expedition will explore and raise awareness of the value of different carbon reducing measures, and will be powered entirely on a unique biodiesel fuel made by Ecotec from waste chocolate!
Ecotec are also donating one of their small scale biodiesel production units to MFC in Mali who will use it to allow local women to re-cycle their used cooking oil into eco-friendly fuel and supplement their income at the same time.
There’s a recycling theme to the expedition too; all the equipment used has been salvaged from the scrap yard and will remain in Mali where it will continue to be used. That includes the BioTruck itself.
As part of the preparations for the HSBC Offscreen Student Expedition 2008, Jamie Buchanan-Dunlop travelled to Lebanon to investigate how to galvanise a massive online audience for the expedition to the UK in July 2008.
The Offscreen Education Programme used the Digital Explorer model on the joint expedition in February 2007, giving it a design edge inconceivable a year ago.
The next collaboration sees 8 students and 4 teachers from Lebanon, Bahrain, the UAE and Oman come to the UK in July 2008. Whilst in Beirut Injaz Lebanon and the British Council organised a Youth focus group to look at technology and web trends amongst teenagers in Beirut and beyond (download the full report - pdf 44k).
There were a couple of interesting points. The first that Facebook has complete dominance as the social networking platform amongst young people. The second was that call rates on mobiles are prohibitively high and so there is a large text and bluetooth culture. Interestingly, the dominance of Facebook made RSS an anathema and Flickr obsolete. Some still used YouTube, but again the video functionality of Facebook was a big factor.
Earthwatch are offering the chance for science and geography educators to get out into the field and work alongside scientists to create educational resources.
Great for all those heading south. Your progress can now be followed on Google Earth with newly updated satellite imagery. The imagery stops at about 82.5 degrees South as there is no satellite imagery available this close to the pole.
Through daily video broadcasts, photography and live chats, Robert and the 2041 team aim to bring the message of preserving Antarctica, promoting sustainable lifestyles and combating climate change to a wider audience.
The 
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