Chilliwack – Climate change has far-reaching implications for our planet, with intensifying weather causing changes to the landscape, displacing communities, and threatening our long-term survival.
An unhealthy planet also affects our daily lives. At an upcoming Science Café on Wednesday, March 18 at the UFV Chilliwack campus library (45190 Caen Ave., Building A), four speakers will discuss how climate change impacts our physical, mental, social, and spiritual health.
Science Cafés offer casual, dynamic interactions between the audience and scientists. For this event, UFV professor emeritus Dr. Tim Cooper will be joined by Dr. Amber Heckelman, Dr. Kristine Lawson, and Dr. Leah Douglas, associate professor in UFV’s School of Social Work and Human Services.
The Science Café, which is free to attend and open to everyone, takes place from 2:30 to 4:30 pm. During that time, the speakers will cover a wide range of topics within the central theme of healthy planet, healthy people.
“We are deeply connected to the land with a foundational relationship of oxygen/carbon exchanges to make breathing and other things possible,” says Lawson, project director and community practice lead for Narratives Inc. “When the earth is impacted, whether we acknowledge it or not, we are also impacted.”
Lawson is a cultural anthropologist who explores relationships between people, lands, and waters, across cultures and worldviews. At the Science Café, she’ll challenge attendees to think about their relationship to the lands, waters, and skies and ask two questions; how do they take care of us and how do we take care of them?
Dr. Amber Heckelman works with Fraser Health, collaborating with medical and environmental health officers to support municipalities creating healthy, sustainable, and resilient communities. Heckelman will explore how both Healthy Built Environment and Climate Change teams embed health-promoting design, nature-based solutions, sustainable infrastructure, and equitable community planning into municipal planning and design — helping to form places that are safer, more livable, and more resilient to climate-related challenges.
Last year, Dr. Leah Douglas authored a book titled Trauma-informed conversations about mental health issues related to extreme weather and climate events: A guide for Canadian social workers (2025). Douglas is the chair of the Eco-Social Work Community of Practice for the BC Association of Social Work, and Co-Chair of the Green Social Work Education Caucus for the Canadian Association of Social Work Education.
Douglas has presented her research related to eco-social work, social innovation, and Indigenous allyship in Switzerland, Norway, Austria, and across Canada.
At the Science Café, she’ll discuss how to build personal and community mental health resilience.
Dr. Tim Cooper is a longtime environmental advocate who has run for provincial office as a Green Party candidate. During his many years at UFV, Cooper has published more than 50 research papers in the field of intermediate energy nuclear physics, won the Faculty of Science teaching prize in 2014, and given more than 200 presentations on the science and economics of climate change.
At the Science Café, he’ll talk about melting permafrost — why it’s happening and why it’s bad. He’ll also discuss the problems with gas stoves and alternatives to cooking with natural gas.
Light refreshments will be available, along with door prizes. Guests are invited to bring their own reusable coffee mug. Please arrive early enough to find and pay for parking. If UFV parking is full, additional parking is available near the Vedder dog park.
