University of Florida Water Institute Symposium

Date: February 25, 2008

From: Diane Alvarez beautyberrybooks@tampabay.rr.com

Subject: Media Release – Going to University of Florida Water Institute Symposium

Who: Presenter: Dr. Diane S. Alvarez of Beautyberry Books, Sun City, FL

What: Sustainable Water Resources Conference

When: February 27-28, 2008

Where: Hilton University of Florida Conference Center, Gainesville, FL

Why: Introducing current Water Problems and Solutions

How: "Green-Up Our Attitudes, Not Our Yards," Poster presentation of eco-poems to change attitudes and highlight values

This conference focuses on Florida challenges and global solutions for sustainable water resources. The two-day symposium includes 450 participants who are "scientists, engineers, academics, policy makers, water managers, industry representatives, lawyers, students and the public interested in exchanging ideas and considering new ways to address the complex, inter-related challenges to water resources sustainability" (UF Water Institute: www.waterinstitute.ufl.edu/symposium )

Dr. Alvarez will be presenting in the category of "Public Perceptions, Values, and Socioeconomic Factors." She has eight ecopoems that educate and persuade readers to change their attitudes toward water issues, such as: the hydrologic cycle, selling water, yards as living ecosystems, using a rain garden and native grasses, lake ecology, salt water intrusion, and beach therapy. In the summer of 2008, Beautyberry Books will be publishing some of these in a children's book of poems introducing water ecology.

Sean Meehan, a marine biologist with NOAA says: "Diane Strauser Alvarez has wonderfully combined the artistic use of the English language with scientific fact to describe challenges and solutions to some of Florida's ongoing ecological threats."