INTEGRATING BASIC FIELD SKILLS, RESEARCH AND SERVICE IN A 300 LEVEL GEOENVIRONMENTAL FIELD CLASS: RESULTS FROM THE FIRST OFFERING

A 300 level geoenvironmental field class was offered to provide field experience to earth and environmental science majors and geology majors. The course was created in part to satisfy a field experience requirement for earth and environmental science majors. The only prerequisite for the course is a 100 level geology lecture. The course is designed to provide a skill set for those entering the environmental consulting industry and to provide an improved knowledge base of earth surface environments for students entering upper level undergraduate sedimentology and stratigraphy as well as hydrogeology classes. Input from the environmental industry was sought and integrated into course content. Topical areas emphasized in the class include bed rock geology (rock identification, fractures) glacial geology, groundwater, water sampling and sediment sampling. Broader skills emphasized in the class include note taking, safety, basic hypothesis testing, organization and team work. Two weekend field trips and several 4 hour class period fieldtrips were held. Students showed demonstrable increases in knowledge base in all areas, particularly in the description of bedrock, rock identification, stratigraphic descriptions and water table maps.

Owing to a university wide increased emphasis on providing research experiences for undergraduates, one field trip was organized such that class work was incipient to undergraduate research projects. Several satellite projects have developed from the course where approximately 50% of students in the class have participated at some level. These spin out projects have included follow up field excursions and laboratory work, culminating in the submission of abstracts.

Challenges include maturity and participation level of some students, logistical aspects of coordination between two campuses and backfilling holes in backgrounds of students. There also was a need for several teaching assistants (n=3) for field outings and some laboratory exercises owing to the knowledge gaps many students had.