Spring semester students recently completed the first EFC of the semester, Human Rights and the Environment: Rivers, Dams, and Local Struggles.
The course included extensive travel to Northern and Northeastern Thailand and into Laos. Students quickly learned that classes can take many forms during EFCs, as they ranged from formal meetings with governmental organizations to observation based sessions paddling along the river.
As the only ISDSI course that travels outside of Thailand, the journey into Laos, afforded the students the opportunity to begin to comprehend the complications of working with a trans-boundary river (the Mekong River) given the differing views, opinions, needs, and desires of multiple states. During the module in Laos, students had a full day symposium with the Intergovermental Organization, the Mekong River Commission (MRC). The groups also ventured into rural Laos, to visit the Theun-Hinboun Power Company, meeting with company officials, visiting the dam, and visiting relocated and resettled villages.
During the two Thailand modules, students experienced two distinct rivers, he Yom River in Phrae and the Mekong River bordering Laos in the Northeast. Their time on the Mekong provided students with time to observe the riparian ecology as well as contrast the human activity on the Thai and Lao banks of the river as the floated along the Thai-Lao border. In Phrae province, a few hours outside of Chiang Mai, students stayed with host families in the activist village of Don Chai. Villagers in Don Chai have successfully fought the construction of the Kaeng Sua Ten Dam for 3o years and were able to share their intimate knowledge of both the Yom River and their struggle against the government to preserve this river for the future.
Students had a quick turn around in Chiang Mai and have already started their second EFC of the semester, Forests, in Mae Hong Son.
Students work with local instructors to identify the fish that make up the morning catch on the Yom River.
Calm morning on the Yom River.
Breanna and Lourdes examine macroinvertebrates on the rock during a field activity.
Early morning on the Mekong River, Ban Kok Wao village, 1km upstream from the proposed Pak Chom Dam.
Students listen to a speaker at the MRC.
Students ready for the MRC symposium.
Students with their host families in Ban Kok Wao.
Paddling a long a wide stretch of the Mekong.
Cassie and Laura present during mid course seminar.
A visit to the Theun Hinboun Dam in Laos.
