Brian Mayer – författare

What do unions and environmental groups have to gain by working together and how do they overcome their differences? In Blue-Green Coalitions, Brian Mayer answers these questions by focusing on the role that health-related issues have played in creating a common ground between the two groups. By recognizing that the same toxics that cause workplace hazards escape into surrounding communities and the environment, workers and environmentalists are able to collaborate for the protection of all.Mayer examines three contemporary cases of successful labor-environmental alliances to demonstrate how health and safety issues are used to create durable and politically influential social movement coalitions:•Alliance for a Healthy Tomorrow, a coalition of environmental, labor, community, and public health organizations in Massachusetts that has developed a successful prevention-based approach to safe workplaces and a clean environment;•the Work Environment Council in New Jersey, which succeeded in passing the first statewide right-to-know law and concentrates on protecting citizens from the dangerous toxics generated by the state's chemical industries;•the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition, an organization that began in the 1980s fighting hazardous high-tech practices that were affecting the Valley residents and the high-tech industry's largely immigrant workforce.In Mayer's ethnographic accounts of the challenging work of bringing these blue-green coalitions together, it becomes clear that stereotypes about environmentalists and workers are largely irrelevant when thinking about who is at risk of exposure to dangerous toxic substances. Both movements share a common concern for protecting their members' health from toxic hazards that are by-products of the modern industrial economy.

What do unions and environmental groups have to gain by working together and how do they overcome their differences? In Blue-Green Coalitions, Brian Mayer answers these questions by focusing on the role that health-related issues have played in creating a common ground between the two groups. By recognizing that the same toxics that cause workplace hazards escape into surrounding communities and the environment, workers and environmentalists are able to collaborate for the protection of all.Mayer examines three contemporary cases of successful labor-environmental alliances to demonstrate how health and safety issues are used to create durable and politically influential social movement coalitions:•Alliance for a Healthy Tomorrow, a coalition of environmental, labor, community, and public health organizations in Massachusetts that has developed a successful prevention-based approach to safe workplaces and a clean environment;•the Work Environment Council in New Jersey, which succeeded in passing the first statewide right-to-know law and concentrates on protecting citizens from the dangerous toxics generated by the state's chemical industries;•the Silicon Valley Toxics Coalition, an organization that began in the 1980s fighting hazardous high-tech practices that were affecting the Valley residents and the high-tech industry's largely immigrant workforce.In Mayer's ethnographic accounts of the challenging work of bringing these blue-green coalitions together, it becomes clear that stereotypes about environmentalists and workers are largely irrelevant when thinking about who is at risk of exposure to dangerous toxic substances. Both movements share a common concern for protecting their members' health from toxic hazards that are by-products of the modern industrial economy.

The high-profile topic of gaming in libraries gets thorough consideration from two educator-librarians, who explain exactly how designer board games—which are worlds apart from games produced strictly for the educational market—can become curricular staples for students of all ages. Drawing on their experience as game aficionados and developers of a nationally recognized program that brings games to school library media centers, the authors equip colleagues with everything they need to initiate a board game project with * Direct links between board games and curriculum * Suggestions for building a core collection across grade levels * Strategies for program development and implementationFrom promoting the idea to teachers and administrators to aligning specific games to state and national education standards, this book will help you build a strong collection that speaks to enhanced learning and social development and is just plain fun.

Slavery is a sensitive topic in American history. This book provides resources and lesson plans for a week-long unit covering slavery, the Underground Railroad, and the abolition movement built around an award-winning board game. In Freedom: The Underground Railroad, students will take on the role of abolitionists helping slaves reach freedom in Canada. Background knowledge, primary source documents, and detailed lesson plans on teaching slavery and using the game provide full support for instruction. Customized Freedom mini-game scenarios designed by Brian Mayer and Christopher Harris. Game: Freedom: The Underground Railroad. Brian Mayer. Academy Games, 2013.