Guidelines
Term projects, written individually or collaboratively by student teams, are key products to be completed after returning from the field laboratory. A major objective of the writing exercise is to expand knowledge of available literature and to broaden concepts and abilities to interpret data, and to reconcile this information with the experience obtained during the field laboratory. Students are encouraged to use this opportunity to begin developing research proposals relevant for the target environment and audience.
Interdisciplinary teams of students are formed before rendezvousing with counterparts in Mexico from UADY and UV. An attempt is made to assure that teams comprise disciplines in the several biological, physical and social science fields. Each team is guided during the trip and the spring semester by participating professors. Pertinent themes are identified for each team with students and student teams preparing papers on topics relating to the group themes and the problem focus of the course. The term paper will be no less than 10 pages in length. Team papers must clearly show the division of labor in preparation (e.g., who wrote what?). Each theme group will consolidate and distill information from their papers to prepare an video conferenced oral presentation on their respective topics during the spring semester. A discussion by the entire class follows each presentation.
The term paper will account for 60% of the final grade. The oral presentation of the group theme will account for 20% and attendance plus class participation will account for 20% of the course grade. Class participation includes demonstrated familiarity with the information in the assigned readings. The final team presentation should represent a careful integration of selected information from the various term papers, thus reflecting a balanced treatment of the theme.
