Ecology

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Equity, community, and accountability: Leveraging a department-level climate survey as a tool for action
(Public Library of Science, 2023-08) Barrile, Gabriel M.; Bernard, Riley F.; Wilcox, Rebecca C.; Becker, Justine A.; Dillon, Michael E.; Thomas-Kuzilik, Rebecca R.; Bombaci, Sara P.; Merkle, Bethann Garramon
Organizational climate is a key determinant of diverse aspects of success in work settings, including in academia. Power dynamics in higher education can result in inequitable experiences of workplace climate, potentially harming the well-being and productivity of employees. Quantifying experiences of climate across employment categories can help identify changes necessary to create a more equitable workplace for all. We developed and administered a climate survey within our academic workplace—the Department of Zoology and Physiology at the University of Wyoming—to evaluate experiences of climate across three employment categories: faculty, graduate students, and staff. Our survey included a combination of closed-response (e.g., Likert-scale) and open-ended questions. Most department members (82%) completed the survey, which was administered in fall 2021. Faculty generally reported more positive experiences than staff. Graduate students often fell between these two groups, though in some survey sections (e.g., mental health and well-being) students reported the most negative experiences of departmental climate. Three common themes emerged from the analysis of open-ended responses: equity, community, and accountability. We discuss how these themes correspond to concrete action items for improving our departmental climate, some of which have been implemented already, while others constitute future initiatives and/or require a collective push towards systemic change in academia. Finally, service work of this type often falls outside of job descriptions, requiring individuals to either work more or trade-off productivity in other areas that are formally evaluated. With the goal of minimizing this burden for others, we detail our process and provide the materials and framework necessary to streamline this process for other departments aiming to evaluate workplace climate as a key first step in building a positive work environment for all employees.
Responses of Flowering Plant and Butterfly Communities to Experimental Herbicide and Seeding Treatments for Native Grassland Restoration
(University of Wisconsin Press, 2021-08) Lyon, Nicholas J.; Stein, David S.; Debinski, Diane M.; Miller, James R.; Schacht, Walter H.
Globally, grasslands are among the most degraded habitats, and within that category tallgrass prairies are especially threatened. To restore native species in tallgrass prairie, it is often necessary to concurrently remove exotic plant species while restoring the disturbance processes that many prairie taxa depend upon. Here, we coupled one herbicide application and seed mixture addition with tri-annual prescribed fire and annual cattle grazing to explore the consequences for floral resource (i.e., nectar-producing) plant communities and butterfly communities up to four years later. Each site was divided into three equally sized patches which were placed into either control, “spray-only”, or “spray-and-seed” treatment groups. We quantified both floral resource plant and butterfly communities in the year prior to herbicide application and the four years following that treatment. In the four years post-treatment, we found that floral resource abundance, richness, and diversity increased over time but did not significantly vary among treatments. No response to treatment was observed in butterflies, but butterfly abundance decreased while richness was stable and diversity increased over time, which may indicate that the changes to floral resources at the patch scale supported more speciose and diverse butterfly communities at the site scale. Butterfly abundance decreasing over time could be an effect of baseline management or unrelated regional factors. Regardless of whether either treatment benefited butterflies, we find support for a one-time herbicide application changing the floral community in desirable ways and at least not harming butterflies.

Ecology

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