Introduction to Environmental Science

PROJECT

The learning objectives for this class are the following:

-understand the basic environmental processes that shape the natural world around them.
-evaluate the reciprocal relationship between human and environmental systems.
-consider environmental problems from both a global and a local perspective.
-understand the impact of human decisions on the natural environment (both positive and negative).
-understand some of the ways in which scientists gather information, as well as, analyze and communicate their findings.

Everything we did in class was aimed at improved your understanding and skill related to these learning objectives. I don't want you all to leave as scientists, but I want you to be able to navigate scientific information related to environmental issues with some understanding and ability to take it apart and use it to make well-informed decisions.

The final project isdesigned to give you the opportunity to reflect the improvement in your understanding and skill and to consider your relationship to the environment. For this project, you will select a behavior that you engage in, that has an impact on the environment. This behavior will be the foundation of a research question that investigate and use to inform your perspective on this particular environmental behavior. The guidance below will describe the project and the remaining class time that we have together will be used to work towards its completion.

Step 1: Develop a research question about your behavior that can be researched in two ways.

1. You should be able to research the question using existing literature.
2. You should also be able to research the question by experiment or survey.

Step 2: Review and report on the existing literature related to your question. The purpose of this step is to inform your understanding of what is already known about the impact the action in your research question and related impacts. The resources you use to inform your understanding may include class resources, like videos, PowerPoints, class notes, your text book, etc. It should also include outside resources that you find on your own. You should have 5 resources, that you will cite, to inform your understanding of your topic.

Step 3: Conduct your own data gathering. You may choose one of the following ways to gather data to help you better understand your topic:

1. Conduct surveys/interviews to elicit the perspectives of others on the behavior you are investigating. You may choose this option if your aim is to know more about how people feel about, how many people engage in, or what obstacles people perceive to improving the behavior you are investigating. You will interview/survey no fewer than 5 people and I have to approve the interview guide prior to interviews taking place.

2. Engage in a behavior change related to your topic for no fewer than five days. You may choose this option if your aim is to understand the impact of a change in behavior you might engage in or if you want to better understand your own perspective and obstacles related to the behavior. I will approve your behavior change plan and data table prior to implementation.

3. Interview and expert in Las Vegas. You may choose this option if your aim is to better understand the local perspective on a global problem. Your interview should be in depth and I will approve an interview guide prior to the interview.

Step 4: Data analysis and write up. For this step you will consider the information you gathered; what is already known and the new things you found out from your own investigation. How do they compare? What were the insights? How does this information add to your ideas about the behavior you selected and the relationship it creates between human beings and the environment?

The outcome of your research will result in a paper that will meet the following requirements:

1. Your essay should be at least 5 pages double-spaced.

2. You should use at least 5 resources to support your essay. This may seem like a lot, but remember, these might be things we have looked at in class, as well as new resources.

3. You must include a reference list and cite your references when you use them in text. I am not a stickler for format, but I want to see where you are using your references.

4. Your paper should include the following sections:

a. Introduction with research questions: What are your research questions and why are you asking them?
b. Literature review
c. Method of data collection: What did you do and how did you do it?
d. Results of data collection
e. Analysis and insights

Draft Scaffold

A. INTRODUCTION

Why is this topic/question one that you wanted to ask?

Why is it important that we learn more about this topic/question?

My research question(s) is/are...

B. LITERATURE REVIEW:

What do we already know about this topic?

C. METHOD

How are you collecting original data/information?

Why is that method the right one for the question you are asking?

Who are your participants?

How do you have access to your participants?

What questions are you asking them? OR In what ways are you modifying a behavior?

D. RESULTS

If you have some results already what are they?

If you don't have results already, consider your questions or your actions, what do you expect to see?

How do you plan on displaying your results? (This might be a table, if you have multiple participants, it might be a written paragraph for each question that you ask, it might be a log of your behavior modification, day by day)

E. ANALYSIS AND INSIGHTS

What did your literature review tell you in answer to the research question that you asked?

What did your original data collection tell you in answer to your research question?

Did your original data collection support or correspond with what you found in your literature review?

What did you find challenging about you behavior modification, if that is what you did? How did your survey/interview participants struggle with the questions that you asked, if that was your method of data collection?