LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE FIRST YEAR OF A GEOPATHS PROJECT: WHAT WORKED, WHAT WILL CHANGE

We discuss four programs initiated during the 2017-18 academic year as part of an NSF IUSE: GEOPATHS project that sought to increase the number of students interested in pursuing undergraduate degrees in geoscience through the design and testing of new approaches for engaging high school students in authentic, career-relevant experiences.

The four elements of the project included: i) A Summer Camp – A no-cost five-day day camp for early high school students. The high school students interacted with geoscience students and professionals and participated in activities involving geology (tour of campus building stones), marine science (aquaculture lab visit) and atmospheric science (weather balloon launch). ii) An Open House visitation program in which high school students interacted with geoscience research faculty and learned about ongoing research projects. iii) A Teacher Workshop program were we worked with local K-12 teachers to create lessons with the potential to introduce active learning strategies in earth and environmental science classes. iv) A two-week Colorado River GeoJourney bridge course offered prior to the Fall semester to matriculating first-year university students. Travelling from Denver to Las Vegas along the Colorado River, the 3-credit course focused on interactions between geoscience and society along one of the continent’s most iconic rivers.

Our experiences suggest that the Summer Camp and GeoJourney course were both successful in engaging students with the geosciences. Implementing a place-based educational opportunity (GeoJourney) provided students with context about the course content and introduced them to a variety of geoscience career opportunities The 2019 GeoJourney offering will include more geology content delivered online to participants prior to the trip to increase their base of geoscience knowledge. The Open House events successfully provided opportunities for student/faculty interactions but were lightly attended. Based on attendance and subsequent teacher feedback, we anticipate modifying the open house experience by creating multimedia activities that teachers will incorporate into classroom lessons. This will remove the scheduling challenges of having students travel to campus to participate and reach a larger population of students.