PARENT SESSION
Poster Session #11: Education: Post-graduate and Outreach.
Monday, August 5. Presentation from 5:00 PM to 6:30 PM. Exhibit Hall B & C, TCC

Interdisciplinary immersion education at Biosphere 2 Center.

Titus, Jonathan^*,1, Cockerill, Kristan¹, Cox, Wylie¹, Kendrick, Karolyn¹, Gupta, Anu¹, Mondt, Rod¹, Peterson, Andrew¹, Burgess, Tony¹, ¹ Columbia University's Biosphere 2 Center, Oracle, AZ

ABSTRACT- Columbia University operates the Biosphere 2 Center in Oracle, Arizona, where Earth Semester, an integrative environmental studies course, is offered. Earth Semester is a pedagogically unique immersion program with a curriculum of ecology, geoscience, social science, integrative seminar and independent research. The Sonoran Desert provides the key setting to discuss inter-relatedness among landforms, adaptations, culture, and resource management. The key goals of the program are to have students integrate science and policy, use techniques that assess the physical environment and apply their findings to management planning, appreciate cultural contexts, use models to analyze global systems, and develop strong communication and group work skills. The first half of the semester focuses upon the development of a riparian zone management plan, and the second half is based upon global carbon management negotiations. Our goal is to enable students to think critically about their roles as technology users and planetary managers, and to apply integrative lessons learned in Earth Semester to their own disciplines throughout their education and future careers. Students practice their research and integration skills during field exercises in places like the Grand Canyon, Anza-Borrego State Park, and Puerto Penasco, Sonora, Mexico.

KEY WORDS: interdisciplinary , immersion education