Achievement

I-WATER Fellows were involved in a two-semester integrative research activity examining impacts of climate change on fresh water sustainability in the Poudre watershed. Fellows held weekly meetings to develop interdisciplinary strategies to address freshwater sustainability. This activity provided fellows with experience communicating across disciplines, working together to frame a problem, narrowing research questions from numerous disciplines down to a single goal or question, and integrating their respective disciplines. Fellows realized quickly that interdisciplinary research is very different from multi-disciplinary research in that it must include the very important and complex feedback mechanisms. In addition, fellows learned that for interdisciplinary research to be successful a clear and concise question needs to be established. They also learned that a leader must emerge, but that mutual trust among the group members is critical.