The NAU Review — Welcome back, Jacks! Meet the new VP of inclusive excellence and discover some surprising good news about biodiversity

Aug. 29, 2023

President Cruz Rivera welcomed students to campus in his annual first-day-of-class video message yesterday, and although Monday was the first day of school at NAU throughout Arizona and online, the Flagstaff campus has been humming with activity for a week as students moved into residence halls, got to know their classmates at Welcome Week activities, went to their first sporting events and donned blue and gold T-shirts for the Class of 2027’s Letters photo. It’s an especially exciting time at NAU, as the implementation of Access2Excellence has contributed to the most diverse, most accomplished and most Arizonan class NAU has ever welcomed. Take a look at the numbers for this class of Lumberjacks and find yourself and your friends in photos.

A study published in Nature shows that protected areas don’t just protect the biodiversity inside their boundaries—the protection extends to neighboring lands as well. The study, co-authored by three NAU researchers, analyzed mammal and bird diversity inside and outside of parks across Southeast Asia, which is one of the most diverse regions on Earth. The researchers found that protection extended to nearby unprotected areas, which was a surprise. It’s important information to have if society is going to meet the United Nations’ 30 by 30 global framework for managing nature, which aims to protect 30 percent of Earth’s lands and waters by 2030.