BROADENING PARTICIPATION THROUGH ONLINE INTRODUCTORY GEOLOGY COURSES: CHALLENGES FROM THE GLOBAL PANDEMIC

The state of Mississippi is ranked highest priority for change in rural education and has the highest US African American population. The state also has the oldest community college system in the country, and many students often begin their higher education at a community college. However, prior to 2018, only one of 15 community colleges regularly offered introductory geology courses. To streamline 2-year transfer students and increase underrepresented student interest in the geosciences, our NSF IUSE GEOPAths project, Geo-SPARCC, developed online physical and historical geology classes/laboratories through Jones College which were made available to all community college students through the MS Virtual Community College consortium (MSVCC). Geo-SPARCC is starting its 3^rd year of course offerings in Spring 2021. Although the program had successes by recruiting students from 3 MS community colleges to date, Geo-SPARCC is still challenged in statewide student enrollment because many students are still unaware that these courses exist as science electives within the MSVCC. One of the early Geo-SPARCC successes was the well-received local field excursion, which brought students to a local outcrop where they could participate in hands-on field activities and connect the local landscape to the content they had studied. Unfortunately, COVID 19 forced cancelation of field excursions in Spring and Fall 2020. Additionally, recruiting trips to community college campuses to make advisors, as well as students, aware of these course offerings were also canceled. The lack of onsite field excursions and outreach events impacted our ability to build enrollment in the courses. The 2020 Geo-SPARCC project results indicate that local dissemination of course information on community college campuses is more vital to course awareness and enrollment that what was originally anticipated. Face-to-face local field excursions also appear to play a larger role in piquing students’ interests towards geosciences.