New Directions: Science, Humanities, Policy will conduct a three-day workshop in New Orleans March 22-24, 2006 on "New Orleans, the Mississippi Delta, and Katrina: Lessons from the Past, Lessons for the Future." This workshop builds on previous New Directions efforts to promote the integration of ethics and values concerns with scientific and technical knowledge to address pressing societal issues.

This workshop will focus on the environmental and societal challenges surrounding New Orleans/Mississippi Delta in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. The workshop hypothesis is that scientific and technical knowledge can have a more beneficial societal influence when placed in an interdisciplinary context where the ethics and values dimensions of both knowledge and societal/environmental needs are made explicit.

Issues to be discussed include:

• The past and future of lower Mississippi valley wetlands region
• Educating the public
• Informal science Education: what should be taught grades K-12?
• International perspectives: compare New Orleans to other cities and rivers
• Environmental justice
• Environmental restoration
• Urban Planning
• Geological Perspectives on engineering New Orleans
• Risk: Perceptions, managements, responsibilities
• Disaster prediction, preparation, and response (past and future)