San Juan, Puerto Rico

May 23, 2007

Week 6

Completing the IQP

It’s down to the last week now, and over a handful of days our project has become almost ready for submission. Our interviews from weeks four and five have proven to be extremely helpful, and we were able to define our final project goals once the exotic species problem was specifically defined. While it was unsettling at first to have to define our project on our own, it proved to be a valuable experience since we were able to design the project based on our own academic needs while simultaneously working to satisfy the needs of the Puerto Rican government.

We’ve spent the last few days furiously editing and revising sections of the final report. It’s very confusing to keep track of which editions are the most recent, so we need to be careful. This process would be much more difficult with more than two group members, so I am thankful to be in a smaller group for this portion of the project. Dividing and combining the work is a challenge that we will see many times in the future after we graduate and find jobs.

Sarah and I decided that our final IQP would consist of three documents: a PDF file of our final report, a PDF of the disposition protocol decision-making tree, and our final presentation. Our final report is approximately 140 pages and is divided into several chapters:

1. Introduction (introducing the exotic species problem)
2. Background and Literature Review (background research)
3. Methodology (summary of our interview methods and research tools)
4. Results and Analysis (information learned through interviews and research)
5. Conclusions and Recommendations (using the important findings from Results)
6. Appendices (other related information, the disposition protocol, and interview summaries)

The Recommendations are the cornerstone of our IQP. Based on the information we found in our interviews with DNER and other agencies on the island, we were able to see exactly what needed to be improved or developed on the Island in order to enhance their management of exotic animals. These consisted of recommendations for improve communications between DNER and other agencies, recommendations for developing preventative policies in airports and marinas, and recommendations for public education programs.

So what exactly did we discover from our interviews?

First, we discovered that the Cambalache Center (the facility for temporarily holding confiscated animals) was being flooded with a significant number of exotic animals. On the day that we visited the center, it held about 65 animals, including 11 mammals. According to Atienza, the ranger in charge of the center, he had received more than three times as many mammals in the past two weeks than in the entire 2004-2005 year. To us, this indicated that the exotic species problem was growing on the island, and that future policies for enforcing the DNER’s laws and regulations should be developed as soon as possible.

We also discovered that the process for determining the final destination of a given confiscated animal was unnecessarily complex and bottlenecked by a lack of technology. The Cambalache center, for example, does not have a single computer with internet access or any sort of electronic record-keeping routine. The process for getting information between Cambalache and the DNER offices relies on fax and telephone communications, both of which are hardly adequate for the 2007 world. Better record-keeping methods would enable the Center to send weekly or monthly reports to the DNER offices so that long-term analysis on the number and type of animals confiscated could be performed. Other IQP groups ran into similar technological barriers; one group, for example, performed one interview at an office in which a telephone line had only been installed the previous week.

We learned that Puerto Rico is not the only place dealing with large influxes of potentially invasive species. Hawaii, for example, created an Invasive Species Council (HISC) to combat the threat of exotic species to the island of Hawaii. The HISC synthesizes the information collected from environmental agencies on the island and makes recommendations for new legislation and research as deemed necessary. A similar program for sharing information in Puerto Rico could help foster communications between local and federal environmental agencies on the island, leading to improved tracking of illegal animal trends.

Lastly, we discovered several potential channels for exotic species smuggling. In Luis Muñoz Marin airport, for example, there is no DNER Ranger present between 6pm and 10am. Rangers are also nonexistent in the dozens of small coastal marinas scattered throughout the island. While there are enough Rangers in Puerto Rico to perform these duties, they must be reassigned to these new locations if these locations are determined to be risks for illegal animal smuggling. Furthermore, we learned that drugs and firearms smuggling appears to be linked with illegal animal smuggling. Legal and illegal shipments of animals could contain hidden drugs or other controlled substances. This was a cause for great concern when we discussed it with local agencies.

To summarize our recommendations, we came up with a list.

We recommend that DNER:

• Further develop their educational programs for exotic species
• Use their updated permit database to keep track of potential permit abuses
• Grant a permit extension to the Mayaguez Zoo to foster their animal relocation programs
• Use the disposition protocol developed by Sarah and I for the animals at Cambalache
• Relocate rangers to airports and marinas as deemed necessary
• Develop a handbook for rangers that outlines standard procedures for performing inspections
• Create and promote the use of a centralized database for sharing information between all local and federal environmental agencies on the island such as USDA, DNER, U.S. Fish & Wildlife, and the Rangers, among others.

These recommendations will be discussed in our presentation, along with our reasons for recommending each one.

Tonight, I will be staying up late to practice my portion of the final presentation, which will be given in Spanish tomorrow (4/30). Once the presentation is complete, we can finish the final editing and formatting of our paper before finally submitting it online to our advisors. I’m hoping to get a positive response from all the DNER employees that will be present tomorrow afternoon at our presentation. Speaking of which, I need to go iron my suit…wish me luck!

Coming up
Next week, I’ll debrief the entire IQP process and write about some of the cultural things I learned while we were on-site. ¡Hasta luego!

April 26, 2007

Week 5

First Results!

Our final round of interviews we set up in Week 4 paid off for us tremendously. Because interviews are our primary method of collecting data to set up our final recommendations, we have to make sure that we get all of the information we need from each interviewee. In many cases, such as our first interview at the Cambalache State Forest, going back for a second visit is extremely difficult to fit into our tight schedule. Even though Puerto Rico is relatively small (you can drive to the west coast from San Juan in about 3 hours), it's extremely difficult to get where you need to go when you don't have a car at your disposal.

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April 9, 2007

Week 4

Redefining Our Project

Things have been happening so quickly here that it’s difficult to keep up at times. Our project has reshaped itself immensely, just as a large blob of clay is reshaped into a beautiful sculpture by a master craftsman. Sarah and I were worried at times that the largest issue surrounding an off-campus IQP (the definition of the project) would never be resolved, and that we would be forced to define the project ourselves for our sponsor. Fortunately, in the past two weeks some key things have changed, and I’ll attempt to summarize them here.

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March 26, 2007

Week 3

Weekend Trips

Although we’ve been here only two weeks, when we arrived we were anxious to explore everything the island had to offer. On the weekends, we are no longer students living in San Juan; instead, we are transformed into tourists with a vicious appetite for everything Puerto Rican. We know all of the best places to visit due to the recommendations of the professors and fellow students who came here last year, but we must not forget that the most valuable resource on the island are the residents themselves. One of the techniques we used for finding the best local restaurants during these first few weeks was to simply ask a person on the street for a recommendation. It takes a certain amount of confidence to be able to do this, especially if you are not sure if the person speaks English, but in the end, it always pays off. Puerto Ricans are very friendly people in general, and they are tolerant of our questions as long as we are polite and respectful.

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March 21, 2007

Week 2

Settling In

It’s been a week since we arrived on the island, and yet it feels like a lifetime. There are a million things happening at once; between project work, exploring the island, and settling in to our new two-month home, I’ve been so busy that my head is spinning. It all becomes worth it, however, during those times when we just lie on the beach staring out to sea and forget about the noise and bustle of the city behind us.

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March 14, 2007

Week 1

About me

My name is Justin Cox and I’m currently a Junior in WPI’s ECE Department. I’m also doing a minor in Spanish, which I hope to finish next year. I am also involved with IEEE and the Robotics club, and I’m the current president of the Shotokan Karate Club. I’m excited to be sharing my experience online, and I hope that, through this blog, parents and students can better understand what WPI’s global projects are all about.

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