DITCHING LECTURES AND MAKING ROOM FOR PROJECT BASED LEARNING AND UNDERGRADUATE FIELD RESEARCH IN INTRODUCTORY OCEANOGRAPHY COURSES

Pasadena City College is an Aspen Institute “Top Ten” college and ranks #1 in California in awarding degrees to minority students. Part of this success includes faculty professional development opportunities including infusing curriculum with best practices like project based learning (PBL) and undergraduate field research. After learning more about these practices at the CDEBI Community College Workshop 2017 and PCC Project-Based Learning Workshop in 2018, I converted the curriculum of a traditional lecture-based introductory Physical Oceanography course to a PBL course where students complete a 10 week extended Undergraduate Research Project at Cabrillo Beach or Catalina Island. This presentation explores the "lessons learned" from implementing this curriculum change, reflections on the practicality of adopting PBL in community college classrooms, and shares digital PBL resources on how to do this in your own course.