Rhode Island College

@Rhode Island NSF EPSCoR

Accessibility controls

Pause motion

Motion: On

Play motion

Motion: Off

Increase text contrast

Contrast: Standard

Reset text contrast

Contrast: High

Apply site-wide

As a leader in STEM education, Rhode Island College has been a key collaborator in connecting undergraduates with EPSCoR-supported research. RIC faculty and students have discovered new insights on the lives of purple sea urchins in Narragansett Bay, developed web tools to help educators visualize complex science, and engaged communities in understanding how coastal areas are changing due to the effects of sea level rise and variable temperatures.

Current Projects

SIMCoast

A multidisciplinary research incubator building the state’s research capacity and workforce development, through partnerships with community and industry, to address the challenge of nano and microplastics in our environments.

3CRS

A hub aiming to co-develop processes, expert networks, data streams, local relationships and knowledge needed to expand the capacity of working waterfront communities to become more climate resilient and shape their own future.

SHORE

Opportunities to explore science for high school students can make a significant impact on their future career paths. This program pairs students with faculty at RIC to contribute to innovative scientific research projects.

Teacher Mini-Grants

In partnership with the Rhode Island Environmental Education Association, RIC is leading EPSCoR efforts to support K-12 student learning on topics such as coastal resilience and the state’s Blue Economy.

Latest News

RIC and EPSCoR investigator leads SURF students to engage local communities about microplastics - Microplastics permeate our environment. We inhale them in the air, ingest them in our food and absorb them through our skin. They travel through our bloodstream and settle throughout our body. They’re in our bones and brain, semen and placenta, breast milk and meconium (a newborn’s first stool).
RIC and EPSCoR investigator Narvaez Diaz explores how purple sea urchins eat in coastal waters - Climate change is driving a shift in the distribution of global kelp forests, with the contraction of kelp habitats occurring at warm range edges. Declining kelps often have been replaced by novel algal turf assemblages, which are reinforced by ecological feedback mechanisms and provide fewer ecosystem services. Trophic interactions among marine herbivores, algal turfs, and kelps on algal turf-dominated reefs remain poorly resolved but could have important implications for the stability of algal turf reefs and the potential for kelp forest recovery.
RIC and EPSCoR investigator Lacasse co-author on study examining public perception of emissions and climate - The ambition and effectiveness of climate policies will be essential in determining greenhouse gas emissions and, as a consequence, the scale of climate change impacts. However, the socio-politico-technical processes that will determine climate policy and emissions trajectories are treated as exogenous in almost all climate change modelling. Here we identify relevant feedback processes documented across a range of disciplines and connect them in a stylized model of the climate–social system.