STRATEGIES FOR EXPANDING COURSE OFFERINGS IN COMMUNITY COLLEGE GEOSCIENCE PROGRAMS

One of the challenges faced by geoscience programs at 2-year colleges is in creating viable courses beyond those which are traditionally transferable and meet specific degree requirements for our students. Two ways in which Red Rocks Community College has been successful at broadening class offerings is by teaching many 1- and 2-credit weekend courses, and by partnering with faculty in other disciplines in offering extended field trips.

Our 1-credit and 2-credit courses each focus on a narrow topic and meet over a condensed timeframe, typically during a weekend or two. We currently offer six courses that have been formalized into the curriculum of the Colorado Community College System (e.g. “Geology and Evolution of Caves”, “Introduction to Global Positioning Systems”) at least once a year. Other courses are offered on a trial basis under a special topics designation. Recently, these have included, “Survey of Mars” and “Geology of Rocky Mountain National Park”. All of these classes are attractive to students interested in the subject matter who are not able or willing to invest the time in a higher-credit course without the guarantee of transferability. The times at which they are scheduled also make them popular with students with full-time jobs, and make full-day field trips possible. Instructors appreciate the opportunity to teach about regional geology, areas of particular expertise, and subjects of current societal relevance.

Interdisciplinary field trips taught with other faculty in the Science Department are also attractive to our students. In recent years, we have offered Field Geology/Biology courses in Hawaii and Costa Rica, with preparatory class meetings during the spring semester and travel in late May, prior to the summer session. The complementary disciplines both strengthen the course and help in attaining sufficient enrollment. Students love the travel to exotic locales and are often inspired to pursue further coursework or even degrees in science. Faculty enjoy teaching in the field and traveling to places which allow us to investigate areas of specialization we may not get to focus on at home (e.g. modern coastal geology).

Both of these types of classes are recommended to other programs as effective strategies for diversifying course offerings in a way that is attractive to both students and faculty.