DATE: January 17, 2008

CONTACT: Bea Bailey, (864) 656-5126
cbeatri@clemson.edu

WRITER: Angela Nixon, (864) 656-0382
anixon@clemson.edu

Clemson to kick-off Focus the Nation

Largest teach-in in U.S. history to address global warming solutions

CLEMSON – Clemson University will host the kickoff for Focus the Nation, the largest "teach-in" in U.S. history in which more than 1,000 colleges and universities across the country will focus on global-warming solutions.

The Clemson event on Jan. 25 will feature national Focus the Nation founder and director Eban Goodstein speaking at Tillman Hall at 7:30 p.m. Goodstein’s presentation will be followed by an open discussion about global warming and ways to end the problem.

“I am thrilled to have our national kickoff at Clemson University,” said Goodstein, “Clemson is already a leader with their Restoration Institute in exactly the kind of thinking and innovation that this country needs to move beyond fatalism and launch a clean energy revolution. The research talent at the university, combined with the political will of South Carolina voters, makes Clemson a perfect fit to launch Focus the Nation.”

Goodstein is an economist focused on the relationship between economics and global climate change. He is the author of “The Trade-Off Myth: Fact and Fiction about Jobs and the Environment” and “Fighting for Love in the Century of Extinction: How Passion and Politics Can Stop Global Warming.” A professor of economics at Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore., Goodstein wrote the textbook “Economics and the Environment,” now in its fourth edition.

Focus the Nation will be observed across the nation Jan. 31. To coincide with the kickoff event, Clemson’s teach-in will be Jan. 25. More than 30 professors will lead discussions in class about global-warming solutions or encourage their students to participate in other Focus the Nation events.

Goodstein’s presentation will cap off a day of “green” events at Clemson, including a Green Exposition, a film festival and a banquet sponsored by Whole Foods Inc.

The Green Exposition will give local vendors a chance to show off their environmentally friendly wares from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. at the University Union Loggia. Organizations such as the University Loft Company, the South Carolina Hydrogen and Fuel Cell Alliance, Carl and Nexsen Architecture and Engineering, Whole Foods, the South Carolina chapter of the U.S. Green Building Council and the League of Women Voters, as well as student organizations such as Students for Environmental Awareness and Roots and Shoots, will have tables at the expo.

A green film festival will run from noon to 4 p.m. in Tillman Hall. The festival will feature the films such as “Treasured Places: South Carolina in Peril,” “Kilowatt Ours,” “Green is the New Red, White and Blue” and “Who Killed the Electric Car?” As a pre-cursor to the film festival, CLEMSONLiVE will sponsor a free showing of Leonardo DiCaprio’s “The 11th Hour” at 9 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 24, in McKissick Theatre.

Goodstein’s lecture, the Green Exposition and the film festival all are free and open to the public.

Invited guests will enjoy a banquet of local foods from Whole Foods of Greenville at the Madren Center at 5 p.m. The three-course meal will feature only locally produced foods prepared by Aramark’s chef. The banquet is invitation-only.

A new electronic journal titled “The Clemson University Sustainability Forum and Digest” will be unveiled at the banquet. The journal will serve as an engaging, online forum where researchers, scholars, students, activists, policymakers and others can share ideas on sustainability and environmental policy. The journal will include peer-reviewed articles, editorials and opinion pieces, book reviews, online meetings and seminars and postings from classes and campus speakers.

For more information about Clemson’s Focus the Nation events, visit www.clemson.edu/focus. For information about the national Focus the Nation effort, go to www.focusthenation.org.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Eban Goodstein will be available to talk to media at 2 p.m. Jan. 25 in the University Union Loggia.