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Important issues related to undergraduate geoscience education

Important issues related to undergraduate geoscience education. Preparing future geoscience professionals Educating an intelligent citizenry Helping students with career planning Increasing diversity in the profession Preparing future teachers. Focus of this presentation.

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Important issues related to undergraduate geoscience education

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  1. Important issues related to undergraduate geoscience education • Preparing future geoscience professionals • Educating an intelligent citizenry • Helping students with career planning • Increasing diversity in the profession • Preparing future teachers

  2. Focus of this presentation • Improving the quality of teaching at the undergraduate level • Attracting students to geoscience courses and geoscience majors • My aim is to enlist your help

  3. Improving teaching at the undergraduate level • Change is occurring slowly • Need for on-going professional development for geoscience faculty

  4. Professional development for geoscience faculty • Many individual initiatives over the past 6-7 years • Focus on a program called On the Cutting Edge

  5. 5-year NSF-funded initiative begun in spring 2002 • PIs: Heather Macdonald, Cathryn Manduca, David Mogk, Barbara Tewksbury • Co-sponsored by NAGT and DLESE • Builds on previous successful programs sponsored by NAGT, DLESE, and PKAL over past 7 years

  6. Why focus on this program? • By the end of 2006, program will have developed a significant infrastructure, momentum, and leadership base • This is program is designed for continuation into the future • Member societies can play a crucial role in maintaining momentum

  7. Components of the program • Workshops • Website • Leadership development

  8. Workshops • Emerging theme workshops: to develop ways of bringing emerging research topics in geoscience and pedagogy into the classroom • Mature topic workshops: to disseminate best practices • Early Career Faculty Workshop • Graduate Student/Post Doc Workshop • Workshop on Effective and Innovative Course Design • Teaching Petrology in the 21st Century (2003); Teaching Structural Geology in the 21st Century (2004)

  9. Web site • Support for individual workshops • Development of on-line delivery for aspects of certain workshops • Resource for geoscience faculty • On-line registration system

  10. Leadership • Involvement of 5-10 new individuals in each of 6-8 workshops each year • Instruction in workshop “best practices”

  11. After 5 years, what will we have? • Robust models for successful workshops of many types • Track record for workshops that faculty wish to continue to attend • Stable and efficient system for on-line registration and support • Large number of potential leaders

  12. What would we like your help with? • Help with spinning off workshops that can augment the existing program • Example: Incorporating Planetary Geology into Geoscience Courses at the Undergraduate Level • One-day workshop at GSA Annual meeting 2003 • Co-sponsored by GSA Planetary Geology Division and On the Cutting Edge • Example: Using Data to Teach Earth Processes: An Illustrated Community Discussion • Special poster session at GSA Annual meeting 2003

  13. What else would we like your help with? • Finding ways to continue these workshops after NSF funding expires • Example: Teaching Economic Geology in the 21st Century

  14. Increasing the number of geoscience majors • Undergraduate geoscience degrees granted annually now lower than any time since the 1960s • High of 7200 in 1982, then declined dramatically to low of about 2600 in 1991 • Rose to about 4800 in 1995, followed by precipitous decline • 2001: about 2100 • Impact on departments, the profession, and society

  15. What do we need to do? • Teach better and emphasize the relevance of geoscience • Do more than passively accept those who are interested in a geoscience major • Recruit actively • Encourage those who are interested in other career paths to major in geoscience as undergraduates • Be proactive in creative career advising

  16. What can member societies do? • Think creatively about how we can help departments recruit more effectively • Seek out and publicize success stories and develop models for success • Develop strategies to increase the number of top high school students who pursue geoscience research topics in high school

  17. Questions for brainstorming • How might your society become involved in extending the On the Cutting Edge professional development program, either now or after 2006? • What might your society do to help departments develop strategies to attract more students to geoscience courses and majors? • What might your society do to increase the number of top high school students who pursue geoscience research topics?

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