University of Alaska Anchorage
2018-2020 Theme: Building Community Resilience
Established in 2006, the UAA/APU Books of the Year program offers university and community members a chance to use shared texts to engage in conversations around critical themes. The question of how to build community resilience is a hot topic now in communities around the world, including Anchorage. Resilience is the ability of a system – like a family, a country or Earth’s biosphere –to cope with short-term disruptions and adapt to long-term changes without losing its essential character. Today we face four major crises – environmental, energy, economic and equity – that challenge the resilience of the systems we care about as well as our future. These books will help us talk about these critical issues and the opportunities they offer for change. Join us in engaging discussions about these important texts and issues! Learn more about the books of our current theme, "Building Community Resilience."
Upcoming Books of the Year Events

TREKKING THE CLIMATE CRISIS: FROM KNOWLEDGE TO ACTION
A Books of the Year event in partnership with Alaska Common Ground and the Alaska
World Affairs Council
Sept. 25 | 12:00-1:00pm | Virtual Event
Join climate scientist and lifelong Alaskan Zach Brown, PhD, for a journey into the climate crisis and how we can tackle it. Zach will describe his work in the polar latitudes studying how warming and sea ice loss affect the Arctic and Antarctic ecosystems. Returning closer to home, he will give scientific perspective on the recent dramatic climate impacts here in Alaska -- by far the fastest warming state in the union -- from salmon kills to glacial melt to unprecedented wildfires. Finally, Zach will speak on the true nature of the climate crisis, revealing why global leaders have failed time and again to rise to the challenge, and the dramatic action we must take to solve it.