Agenda for September 11th-17th, 2024 Bioregional Learning Journey
NOTE: This page is currently under construction. For more info about the 2024 Bioregional Learning Journey click HERE.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/sunset-at-casco-bay-scaled.jpg)
“For the human species to evolve, the conversation must deepen.”
Anthropologist Margaret Mead
2024 Bioregional Learning Journey
Join us as we embark on a journey through the Casco Bay Bioregion! This will be a six-day adventure with three days of sea kayaking across Casco Bay and three days of biking the watershed. Our goal is to build a much better sense of collective response to coastal ecosystem change in the greater Casco Bay region. Throughout this journey, we’ll have the chance to deepen our sense of place by exploring seagrass meadows, discussing the Indigenous history…
Opening Dinner: Osher Map Library
September 11th:
We will have a reception and dinner on Wednesday, September 11th at the Osher Map Library and Smith Center for Cartographic Education at the University of Southern Maine. You’ll have the opportunity to tour their new exhibit and explore some of the most amazing maps of Casco Bay and the Casco Bay Bioregion. After dinner, Executive Director Professor Libby Bischof will present an inspiring lecture on the many perspectives of Back Cove over the past 400 years! We will get a good night’s rest and meet the following Morning at 9:00 am.
Three-day Sea Kayak Journey Through Casco Bay
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September 12th-14th, 2024
Join us and learn how to see together to connect and accelerate positive change and become part of a Bioregional Transformation Journey!
Day 1:
Departure from East End Beach
September 12, 2024
- Meet at the Portland Paddle headquarters at 8:30 am. Enjoy the view of Casco Bay and meet your new friends who will embark on this journey with you!
- On our first day, we will kayak to Ft. Gorges, Cow Island, and finish at Little Chebeague which will be our base camp for our first night together.
Day 2:
Little Chebeague to Whaleboat Island
September 13, 2024
- We’ll start the day by greeting the sun and enjoying breakfast before moving on to our first group “retreat” convening. This will give us the opportunity to learn about each other further and discuss the work each of us does.
- The rest of our second day will include paddling to Littlejohn Island Preserve and Whaleboat Island. Here we’ll get another chance to take a dip in the water and explore seagrass meadows.
Day 3:
Whaleboat Island to Orrs Island
September 14, 2024
- After breakfast and our second “retreat” convening, we will paddle to Potts Point Preserve. Here we’ll have the chance to explore the extensive tide pools, gravel shoreline, and enjoy the dramatic views of Casco Bay!
- Our final destination for the sea kayak portion of this journey is the amazing Schiller Coastal Studies Center (SCSC) the premiere science facility at Bowdoin College.
Three-day Bike Journey Through the Watershed
September 15th-17th, 2024
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Day 4:
Orrs Island to Wolfe’s Neck Center
September 15th, 2024
- On our third morning, you’ll have the opportunity to take a morning tour of the Marine Science Lab. This will be followed by our third “retreat” convening and then we will switch our mode of transportation from sea kayak to bike.
- On our first biking day, we will cycle to Wolfe’s Neck where we will have lunch and get to learn about some amazing examples of regenerative agriculture. After other fun activities, we will have a beautiful feast that is open to the public. Then we’ll end our day at the Wolfe’s neck campsite.
Day 5:
Wolfe’s Neck to the Presumpscot and Conant Homestead
September 16th, 2024
- We will enjoy a delicious breakfast and head off and enjoy the gorgeous land and seascapes as we head towards the Conant Homestead for lunch. We’ll then paddle down the Presumpscot River in canoes to get a true watershed expiernce.
- We’ll finish our day back at the Conant Homestead where we’ll spend our last night together feasting on local pizza and sitting around the campfire.
Day 6:
Conant Homestead to East End Beach
September 17th, 2024
- As we head off for our final bike ride of this amazing journey we will have a tribute to Chief Polan, Wabanaki Sagamore, the first advocate of the “River of May Falls.”. We’ll then visit an important fish passage at Saccarrapa Falls. This will be followed by a stop at Payson Park where we will explore the amazing potential for large scale tidal wetland restoration at Back Cove.
- We will end the journey with a jump into the water at East End Beach and share some of our stories as well as a pledge of support to the seagrass meadows!
We would love to have you join us on this AMAZING learning journey! For more information click below for the StoryMap with more details.
Presenters of the Bioregional Data T-Lab (Workshop #1)
A series of remarkable leaders will participate with YOU across the three days learning how to better map seagrass meadows in Casco Bay, Gulf of Maine.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Glenn-Page.png)
Glenn Page
My focus is on transforming our relationship with our biosphere, to fall back in love with the places of where we live. While stewardship is essential for our life support system, it’s also about healing ourselves by healing our place. For over 40 years, I have been working at the interface of science, policy and practice with teams of interdisciplinary experts, artists, scientists, decision-makers to bring innovation and systems thinking to complex, messy, cross-scale, “wicked” challenges of our time.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/byrnes_bwheadshot_800_450.jpg)
Assistant Professor, UMass Boston School for the Environment
Jarrett Byrnes
My research focuses on the causes and consequences of complexity in nature. I am interested in how humans alter the diversity and interconnectedness of life on earth. Understanding how these changes alter the services that nature provides is a critical need as we watch ecosystem after ecosystem collapse. I study these questions in the ocean because, let’s face it, the sheer number and diversity of species in the oceans is astounding.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/04/Juliana-Bohorquez.png)
Juliana Bohórquez
Juliana Bohórquez is a leader in the practice of individual and collective transformation. She will share how social technologies are essential to move from hierarchical and pyramidal, to being much more horizontal and co-creative, and from linear to more extensive and systemic. Researcher and co-author of national education programs with the Educational Alliance for Colombia, she has designed and directed impact processes for SENA, COLCIENCIAS, Governación de Cundinamarca, among other national institutions.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/114233495463_Betz20Headshot.jpg)
Jon Betz
Cinematic storytelling is my passion. As a cinematographer and Dive Safety Officer for COBALT/Team Zostera I have broad experience across diverse areas of how to better visualize seagrass meadows in Casco Bay. I work as both a cinematographer and field producer, with experience in story development, pitching, pre-production, logistics and editing. My work has been featured by National Geographic, Smithsonian, Discovery, and Animal Planet among others.
![](https://cobaltlearningjourney.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/lexi_wilkes-scaled-1-768x1024.jpg)
Alexis Wilkes
I’m a first-year PhD student in the Byrnes Lab. Prior to joining the Byrnes Lab. My previous work with Dr. Laura Dee looked at how the robustness of rocky intertidal food webs and their ecosystem services to species loss differs between a climate change-induced species loss sequence and other more common loss sequences. I am exploring how climate change is impacting marine communities using remote sensing and modeling.
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Dwayne Tomah
Dwayne Tomah is a teacher of the Passamaquoddy language and culture. He is the youngest fluent speaker of the Passamaquoddy Tribe and has served on the Tribal Council. He has worked with Animal Planet on a segment called Winged Creatures, highlighting the history of the Thunderbird. His life has been dedicated to working on the language and culture preservation, he edited the Passamaquoddy dictionary and shares Native legends through song and dance.
Some Reflections on the first Casco Bay Bioregional T-Lab/ Workshop #1 January 10-12, 2024
Who attended?
While we do this work in appreciation of the many thousands of people who are working on innovations, this event featured 25 people to build connections and develop deeper relationships across a wide range of expertise and grow through the power of networks and relationships. There were many different sectors and disciplines represented including many who have been contributing to the COBALT/Team Zostera Working Groups and have been invited to serve as advisors and contributors representing diverse perspectives.
DIVERSITY: For an effective bioregional T-Lab/Workshop, we begin with a diversity of perspectives, professions, ages, ethnicities, disciplines, and sectors. The power of a convening such as this is to learn how to see through the eyes of another and that is best accomplished through diversity – so join us for future workshops and bring your perspective but be prepared to learn how to see through the eyes of others!
Why Now?
Many agree that we are in a “global polycrisis” or “meta-crisis.” These terms refers to a time when crises in multiple global systems become entangled in ways that affect human life support, and significantly degrade our prospects of survival. We are all aware that the risks to humanity are profound, spreading in unimaginable ways. In 2021, a Nobel Prize Summit was convened called Our Planet, Our Future and the authors describe this time in the state of the planet as “a critical juncture for humanity.” They emphasize the importance of social innovations at a bioregional scale that align with windows of opportunity to unlock broader levels of change within a governance system.
At local scale, the Casco Bay National Estuary Partnership describes Casco Bay as remarkably healthy compared to many other U.S. estuaries yet warns of a series of major changes “underway that warrant a timely response to protect the Bay and the many people whose livelihoods and quality of life depend upon it.” The Maine Monitor recently reported that “More than 34,000 people moved to Maine during the pandemic…vast majority came from elsewhere in the United States, although the Maine also took in nearly 3,500 international migrants, including many fleeing conflicts in Ukraine and countries in Africa.” Our social and ecological systems are changing rapidly, yet our dominant worldview remains (world as machine, need for separation and fragmentation, problems as simple and linear, the primacy of of top-down command and control, maximizing self interest and prioritizing consumerism). These dominant paradigms frame our our goals and what we do as a society.
We believe simple but profound questions related to how we see, conserve and restore our ecological systems (such as seagrass meadows) are needed to help navigate into this uncertain future. These questions begin with a focus on the places where we are living and how we are living within them. This work is about building an understanding of both the deeper sense of seagrass meadow health and emerging alternatives through engaging with purpose, potential and calling.
What is a T-Lab?
We are building various expressions of a Bioregional Transformation Lab or “T-Lab” which is a concept developed by our colleagues at the Stockholm Resilience Centre and others around the world. T-Labs are intended to be “safe spaces” to discuss questions deeply and if possible to launch innovations that may help to address deep challenges with no clear solutions, no silver bullets. The “magic” is based upon the people who are engaging in the many different expressions of COBALT T-Labs, people who are doing real change work. So these events focus on engaging with the catalysts of transformative change. This begins with inviting people who are willing to spend time to get to know one another, willing to work with new languages and ideas, willing to appreciate and try new practices and willing to be part of something that is not tied to any one organization but appreciates the contributions of the whole.
As noted, a major goal is learning how we better “see/sense” the systems we are living within. This includes both the social and the natural/ecological dynamics. This is why we are calling the series of three workshops “Building a Bioregional Data Lab.” This work requires a sense of history (indigenous and colonial), as well as the implications of decisions made over the past 400 years that have led to where we are.
Going even deeper – our Bioregional T-Lab explores the amazing life associated with our coastal ecosystems that include salt marshes, seagrasses and seaweeds and the power of life and immense value to society that they support. For systems, we mean seeing into our local food/fiber systems, seeing the systems and innovations around food waste, water infrastructure and waste water treatment, energy, tourism, etc. No small task. The “data revolution” and “internet of things” has made all of this suddenly possible so we are creating the Bioregional T-Lab to build the wolds first Bioregional Digital Twin to better learn how to navigate the poly-crisis ahead.
What are the likely outcomes for future Bioregional Data Labs?
Every bioregion has the potential to define its unique sense of character and cohesion, which then nourishes those who live there and entices and enriches guests, and attracts supportive investments. From this “fertile ground,” new, creative projects continuously emerge. Like plants in regenerated soil, individual enterprises prosper. We believe creating a Bioregional Data T-Lab is an essential step to better see, connect and amplify transformative change where communities discover that more becomes possible when seeing together, in a continuous unfolding of learning, healing, vitality and potential. We believe this foundation is essential for communities to develop the kind of adaptation and resilience to withstand future shocks and disruptions. This begins with a deeper sense of place, and we will start by learning how to map seagrass meadows in Casco Bay, Gulf of Maine.
Join us for Workshop #1
Building a Bioregional Data Lab
January 10-12, 2024
The most effective learning journeys begin with good questions, some of which are unanswerable in the short term and lead to better questions. Often we end up with far more questions than answers! If we are truly successful, this may even feature “unlearning” of what we thought we knew about ourselves and our place in this world. A “Bioregional Data Lab” is about developing community and the practice of living within the ecological limits of a place in a manner that can be further developed by future generations!