Northern Michigan University's Earth, Environmental and Geographical Sciences Department will host a joint meeting of the West Lakes and East Lakes Divisions of the American Association of Geographers Oct. 13-15 in the University Center. 

About 180 students, faculty members and professionals from at least nine states and three countries will convene to share their scholarly activities through posters and paper presentations on Friday and on Saturday morning. Many attendees will explore the physical and human geography of Marquette County on Saturday afternoon field trips led by EEGS faculty and students.

Glen MacDonald, AAG President and Inaugural John Muir Memorial Chair of Geography at UCLA, will deliver a keynote Friday night titled "Beyond the Perfect Drought: Climate Change and Water Resource Sustainability in California." He also directs the UC White Mountains Research Station and the UCLA Canadian Studies Program. For more information, visit https://glenmmacdonald.com/.

Weronika Kusek of the EEGS faculty is the conference chair and all departmental faculty members are assisting in some way to prepare for the conference. Students in Professor Richard Eathorne's practicing geography class are gaining professional experience by helping before and during the conference.

U.S. attendees are coming from Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Iowa, Missouri, Illinois, Indiana, Ohio and California. There are also registrants from Peru and Germany.