Does The Unmet Need For Contraceptives Have A Relationship With Abortion Rates?

Emily Pawelek, Environmental Studies Program

Many women all over the world feel as if their families are contributing to the statistics of  unmet need for contraceptives. The unmet need of contraceptives refers to the number of women who wish to limit childbearing but do not use any contraceptive device or technique. Unwanted pregnancies resulting from the unmet need often lead to abortions, whether legal or unsafe. Unsafe abortions are usually self-inflicted or not done by a trained professional, often causing death of the woman. Using global data sets from UNdata, a branch of the United Nations Statistics Division, the unmet need for contraceptives and the sum of legal and unsafe abortions will be compared against each other. Once this is completed, there will be evidence whether or not the two statistics correlate with each other and whether that correlation is positive or negative. This data will be mapped graphically on a global scale and presented with information on each country represented in the data. 

Mapping the Vernacular Geography of Southwestern University Students

Kyle Mathis, Environmental Studies Program

Vernacular geography is the sense of place that is reflected in ordinary people’s language use. This is the way that people discuss and refer to locations central to their world in their own customary terms - such as the unofficial names for streets, neighborhoods, landmarks, and other geographic features. These places often have boundaries that change from individual to individual based on their personal interactions and experiences with those places. Variations among individuals’ definitions of a place
make vernacular geography difficult to map. This project attempts to create a map - based on the concept of vernacular geography - of Southwestern and the parts of Georgetown (landmarks, prominent areas, and commonly used parts of town) with which Southwestern students interact.

Food Access: A Spatial Analysis of Food Deserts and Farmers’ Markets

Lisa Morse, Environmental Studies Program

Recent studies have drawn attention to issues of food security in regards to areas that are considered “food deserts.” While there are multiple definitions for food deserts, this study will apply the definition used by the Healthy Food Financing Initiative, which defines food deserts to be low-income census tracts where a significant portion of the residents have low access to supermarkets or large grocery stores. Low access is defined as being located more than 1 mile away from a supermarket in urban areas and more than ten miles away from a supermarket in rural areas. Researchers from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) have developed useful maps and data detailing areas that are defined as food deserts. For this study, a spatial analysis will be conducted to compare how access to farmers’ markets varies in areas defined as food deserts and non-food deserts. Since farmers’ markets have been gaining much popularity due to the increased demand for fresh and local foods, it is advantageous to see where these markets are located in relation to the actual need for healthy foods in the communities. Social and economic demographic data will also be evaluated to provide a deeper analysis of the inequalities surrounding food access to both supermarkets and farmers’ markets.

Southwestern: A Virtual Tour

In the rapidly advancing technological age, virtual environments are becoming increasingly prevalent.  Video games and virtual reality have put the users in the middle of the action to immerse them in a completely simulated setting.  Is this just a phase?  Or, will virtual reality be a major component of spatial learning and understanding for future generations?  Before, Southwestern University’s virtual tour is comprised of photos and brief snippets of information.  By using and working with Google, the user can navigate the campus similarly to Google Streetview.  Now, it is a virtual environment, made up of 360-degree panorama points where the user can look up, down, and all around the SU campus from their computer or smartphone.  This innovative use of the Google platform to work with a virtual tour of campus has not been done in this capacity before and would test the limits of this tool and of virtual environments in general.

The Effect of Damming on the Blanda River Flow Regime

Iceland is one of the only countries in the world that can claim to have a completely clean energy portfolio.  The demand for hydropower is still increasing, and Iceland has dammed many of its rivers to meet this need at the expense of their riparian ecosystems.  The regulation of flow regimes and creation of reservoirs has had a significant impact on the ecosystems in and around the rivers of Iceland.  The Blanda River has been utilized for hydropower since the early 1990’s, and will be used to model the effect of the dam on the downstream flow regime using Digital Elevation Modeling and Flow Accumulation.  By using these models along with river flow data, we will be able to analyze the effects felt as a result of the dam.

Oldest Churches in Georgetown

Proper Systems of Land Use: Farming

Source: 

Global Consequences of Land Use
Jonathan A. Foley et al. Science 309, 570 (2005);
DOI: 10.1126/science.1111772 

When thinking about Land Use, the general population tends to think more on a scale of deforestation, habitat destruction, logging, and farming. Things that are relatively brought up or seen in your daily activities. In this study about Land Use, it is concluded that "subsistence agriculture, clearing tropical forests, intensifying farm production and expanding urban centers" is changing the makeup of the worlds landscapes and at the expense of the environment. 

An example of this is found through comparing different types of land and the trade offs of human activity on these land types. 

In these diagrams we find that while maintaining a Natural Ecosystem is beneficial to the ecosystem, we clash with the ecosystem as we do not benefit financially and do not benefit from the land we considered to be "not used". In an Intensive Cropland, we essentially destroy the natural landscape and soil makeup. There is no natural regulation other than possibly restarting a new crop every year. If you look at the Cropland with Restored  Ecosystem Services, it is depicted that there is a mutual abundance of natural and human based eco-services. 

While food and crop production has been beneficial in supporting the human population, particularly in the U.S, there is a correlation with intensified farming and environmental damage. eg: Increased use of fertilizer correlates to poor water quality, soil erosion and overgrazing leads to complete loss of arable land. 

The continuance of uninformed farmers, ranchers, and land owners not practicing sustainability with the land the practice on will ultimately result in a more widespread disaster of climate change. 

Abstract: Food Miles Behind Nepali Coffee

Nepal’s coffee sector has grown dramatically within the past decade and is predicted to continue expanding in the coming years. The demand for Nepali coffee in both local and international markets is increasing; Nepali coffee is steadily establishing a firmer position in the world coffee market. While some of the coffee farmers that comprise Nepal’s coffee sector operate independently, many have organized themselves into coffee cooperatives to share resources, expand market access, and secure higher premiums for their beans. The effects of these cooperatives often extend beyond coffee farming to other domains of members’ lives. With a predicted increase in coffee production and number of coffee cooperatives, it is worthwhile to evaluate how cooperatives are reshaping the lives and livelihoods of their members. By using GIS mapped out the food miles behind Nepali coffee from the farmers, to the cooperative, to the storefront, mainly using data coordinates. This research provided insight regarding the challenges for coffee farmers and the effort that is behind every cup of Nepali coffee.

Georgetown City Park Locations Compared to Median Household Income Values

Want to go outside and play? Find a park, Georgetown is full of them. In fact, there are 30 city parks total.  Referring to the Georgetown Parks website, I plotted the location of 28 out of 30 city parks. Then, I used Fact Finder on the Census website to map out reported median incomes in Williamson County. There is a higher density of parks in the lowest income bracket in Georgetown. The middle brackets have few parks. The upper middle class has many parks separated by at least a mile. The upper class subdivision does not have any public parks.

Notice, each income level is distinctly separated in Georgetown. The highest income level lies farthest away from the downtown, while the lowest income levels are nearest the downtown. Parks may be more prevalent in lower income areas because there is a higher need, whereas upper class subdivisions tend to have larger private yards. More, the low income sector in Georgetown also overlaps the historic district. Perhaps, the parks were built first and as development spreads north, there are fewer parks being built.

This map focuses on the amount of elderly, ages 65 and up in Georgetown, TX. Each dot indicates 5 elderly. From the map, one can see the area of Sun City, located down Willams drive, south Willamson county down I-35, and east near Hutto have dense amounts of elderly in the area.