AMS ONLINE WEATHER STUDIES: TEACHING WITH CURRENT WEATHER

The American Meteorological Society (AMS), with support from the National Science Foundation (NSF), nationally offers Online Weather Studies, an introductory college-level, online distance-learning course in meteorology. The principal innovation of Online Weather Studies is that students learn about the current weather by utilizing learning materials written in real time and delivered using the course homepage. The AMS Education Program designed and services this course and makes it available to colleges and universities as a turnkey package with electronic and printed components. Over 170 institutions have used the course since it was nationally implemented in Fall Semester 1999.

The AMS delivers Online Weather Studies partially over the Internet. Students have hands-on learning experiences by completing two investigations each week based on current weather. Course components include a textbook, a study guide containing the first part of each twice-weekly laboratory investigation, and a course homepage providing the second part of each investigation and current weather maps and data. The AMS designed the course for offering in a variety of instructional settings, including totally online and on-campus lecture and laboratory, by professors with a range of meteorological experience. Although most institutions offer Online Weather Studies as a semester-long course, it is easily implemented in a quarter system or summer session through the use of archived learning materials and investigations that may be used at any point during the course.

The AMS received NSF support to introduce Online Weather Studies to 100 minority-serving colleges and universities over a 4.5-year period beginning in 2002. Through this Geosciences Diversity/National Dissemination Project, the AMS invites faculty members at participating minority-serving institutions to a course implementation workshop at the National Weather Service (NWS) Training Center and a Diversity Session at the AMS Annual Meeting. Fifty-one undergraduate institutions are already participating in the Project. The AMS encourages students taking Online Weather Studies to consider further education and careers in the geosciences by facilitating faculty partnerships with local NWS Offices and through a Student Resources area on the course homepage.