Annual Symposium
The Wallace Stegner Center annually holds a symposium during spring semester on an environmental or natural resources topic of regional, national, and international importance. The symposium is interdisciplinary in nature, and includes speakers from the sciences and social sciences, academia, government, industry, and the legal profession.
Through the symposia and other programs, the Stegner Center has brought numerous luminaries to the College of Law, including Bruce Babbitt, Sally Jewell, Wendell Berry, Helen Caldicott, Jane Goodall, Bill McKibben, Pat Mulroy, Naomi Oresekes, Lynn Scarlett, George Schaller, Michael Soule, Sandra Steingraber, Lawrence Susskind, Rebecca Watson, Terry Tempest Williams, Mary Evelyn Tucker, Eric Freyfogle, John Leshy, Patty Limerick, Pamela Matson, Zygmunt Plater, Robert V. Percival, Joe Sax, Paul Schullery, Alan Weisman, and Charles Wilkinson among others.
The R. Harold Burton Foundation was the founding donor for the symposium in 1996 and has been the principal donor each year. Other donors who have provided support for multiple years include the Cultural Vision Fund and the Nature Conservancy in Utah.
Wallace Stegner Center 30th Annual Symposium
Breathing Easier: Air Pollution Challenges and Solutions | March 20-21, 2025
The symposium will consider air pollution’s environmental and human health tolls—including the unequal burdens air pollution places on disadvantaged communities. Despite gains in many places, air pollution remains a vexing problem across the nation. In Utah, winters bring inversions and particulate matter pollution, and summers deliver increased ground-level ozone pollution. The Wasatch Front regularly exceeds national ambient air quality standards, exacerbated by the region’s unique geography and meteorology.
Finding solutions to these thorny problems becomes only more vital with each passing year. Emerging threats like dust from the shrinking Great Salt Lake and intensifying wildfire smoke further compound longstanding air pollution problems. Experts will share potential solutions, including those that have found success in other parts of the country.
Past Symposia
Twenty-eighth Annual Symposium, 2023
The Future of the Great Salt Lake
Website | Video Archive
Twenty-seventh Annual Symposium, 2022
The Colorado River Compact: Navigating the Future
Postcard | Video Archive
Twenty-sixth Annual Symposium, 2021
The Plastics Paradox: Societal Boon or Environmental Bane?
Postcard | Video Archive
Twenty-fifth Annual Symposium, 2020
Food and the Environment: Resilient and Equitable Food Security for the West
Brochure | Video Archive
Twenty-fourth Annual Symposium, 2019
Recreation Challenges on Public Lands
Brochure | Video Archive
Twenty-third Annual Symposium, 2018
Public Lands in a Changing West
Brochure | Video Archive
Twenty-second Annual Symposium, 2017
Water in the West
Brochure | Video Archive
Twenty-first Annual Symposium, 2016
Green Infrastructure, Resilient Cities: New Challenges, New Solutions
Brochure | Video Archive
Twentieth Annual Symposium, 2015
Air Quality: Health, Energy and Economics
Brochure | Video Archive
Nineteenth Annual Symposium, 2014
National Parks: Past, Present and Future
Brochure | Video Archive
Eighteen Annual Symposium, 2013
Religion, Faith and the Environment
Brochure | Video Archive
Seventeenth Annual Symposium, 2012
Silent Spring at 50: The Legacy of Rachel Carson
Brochure | Video Archive
Sixteenth Annual Symposium, 2011
Wildlife Conservation in the 21st Century
Brochure | Video Archive
Fifteenth Annual Symposium, 2010
The Challenge of Sustainability
Brochure | Video Archive
Fourteenth Annual Symposium, 2009
Wallace Stegner: His Life and Legacy
Brochure | Video Archive
Thirteenth Annual Symposium, 2008
Alternative Energy: Seeking Climate Change Solutions
Brochure | Video Archive
Twelfth Annual Symposium, 2007
The Colorado River Compact in the 21st Century: Time for Change?
Brochure | Video Archive
Eleventh Annual Symposium, 2006
Global Climate Change: The Arctic to the Rocky Mountain West
Brochure | Video Archive
Tenth Annual Symposium, 2005
Private Property and Nature Conservation: Land Ownership in the 21st Century
Brochure
Ninth Annual Symposium, 2004
Wilderness: Preserving Nature in a Political World
Brochure
Eighth Annual Symposium, 2003
The Nuclear West: Legacy and Future
Brochure
Seventh Annual Symposium, 2002
Seventh Annual Symposium, 2002
Powell and Stegner: Fifty Years After The Hundredth Meridian
Brochure
Sixth Annual Symposium, 2001
Metropolitan Growth: From Regional Visions to Real Results
Brochure
Fifth Annual Symposium, 2000
The Presidency and the Environment: The Twentieth Century and Beyond
Brochure
Fourth Annual Symposium, 1999
Where the Rivers Flow: Sharing Watersheds and Boundaries
Brochure
Third Annual Symposium, 1998
Exploring Aldo Leopold’s Legacy: The Land Ethic and the American West in the 21st Century
Brochure
Second Annual Symposium, 1997
To Cherish and Renew: Restoring Western Ecosystems and Communities
Brochure
First Annual Symposium, 1996
The Native Home of Hope: Community, Ecology and the West
Brochure