GCE Outreach and Education

Overview

Schoolyard LTER quadrat sampling
(photo courtesy of Trisha Hembree)

The goal of GCE outreach is to enhance scientific understanding of Georgia coastal ecosystems by the public, coastal managers, and scientists. To this end, we run a schoolyard program, support the Georgia Coastal Research Council (GCRC), train undergraduate and graduate students, and interact with scientists inside and outside the LTER network. These components of our outreach program are described below.

Schoolyard LTER

Educational research has shown that one-time events are largely ineffective in improving teacher skills or epistemology (i.e. understanding of how knowledge is acquired). Our program, built around long-term contact with educators, is obtaining lasting results: over 90% of teachers remain invested, incorporating GCE science concepts into their curriculum. We host one or two 10-day workshops on Sapelo Island each summer. Each includes some new and some returning teachers. Teachers split their time between working on GCE research alongside GCE scientists and discussing ways to implement GCE science into their classrooms. Participants remain in touch electronically with each other and GCE scientists throughout the year. Evaluations indicate that the teachers' epistemology of science has been revised to include a more sophisticated, constructivist view of science as active, temporary, and local, and that teachers report a new sense of empowerment and comfort in their practice. In addition to improving their skills, participants serve as mentors for other teachers in their schools and have presented papers on the use of GCE science in the classroom at state and national conferences.

Trisha Hembree, our schoolyard coordinator, has raised external funds to almost triple schoolyard funding, made numerous presentations based on the schoolyard at science education conferences, participated in meetings about developing a cross-site teacher education program, and co-authored the Education Handbook for system-wide SLTER programs. In addition to ongoing evaluations by Hembree, the program has been evaluated by science education researcher G. M. Bowen, UNB, Canada. We will continue to support the schoolyard program during GCE-II, and we are also in the process of developing a book focused on salt marshes for the LTER children's book series.

Georgia Coastal Research Council

We provide outreach to coastal resource managers by partially supporting the GCRC, which is headed by Merryl Alber. The GCRC has 86 affiliated scientists from 9 Universities, 6 Federal agencies, and 4 State and regional agencies. It promotes science-based management of coastal resources by hosting workshops, assisting management agencies with scientific assessments, and distributing information on coastal issues. GCRC presentations have ranged from invited briefings to the Georgia legislature and the Georgia DNR Emerging Leaders Program to more traditional venues such as the Ecological Society of America and the Coastal States Organization. Other presentations have been geared towards the general public, with audiences such as the Georgia River Network and the Georgia DNR Community Docks & Marinas Stakeholder Group.

An example of the GCRC in action was its response to the dieback of marsh vegetation along the Georgia coast in 2002 and 2003. The GCRC set up monitoring and remote sensing subcommittees, collated monitoring results, and wrote a technical report summarizing research on dieback in other areas. In 2004 the GCRC and investigators from Louisiana organized a workshop to exchange technical information. One outcome was a collaborative proposal to study dieback in both states, which was recently funded by the USEPA.

Our affiliation with the GCRC allows us to communicate results of GCE research to coastal managers in a timely manner. For example, our current work on marsh-upland linkages will be of great interest to the State. How much Georgia should regulate the development of small marsh islands (hammocks) is currently a highly contentious issue, and coastal managers need a better scientific understanding of hammocks to develop regulations that will withstand legal challenges.

Student Training

We routinely incorporate undergraduate and graduate students in our work. As of February 2007, 32 undergraduates from UGA, GA Tech, IU, UH, Savannah State and U. Kiel have participated in GCE research. In addition, classes at Georgia Tech (Environmental Field Methods) and UGA (Marine Biology) have field components based on GCE research (see the GCE Education News page). Theses and dissertations from GCE-sponsored graduate students are available online in the GCE Bibliography and File Archive, and students are also encouraged to submit data from their research for inclusion in the GCE Data Catalog.

Other Outreach

GCE scientists and staff give talks to the public about GCE research and coastal issues on a routine basis. On the Georgia coast, we also partner with organizations such as the Altamaha Riverkeeper, Georgia DNR, NADP, SINERR, TNC and USGS to collect data of mutual interest. For example, GCE is currently working with SINERR to examine how increasing tidal circulation by replacing a culvert with a bridge will affect the health of a large marsh upstream of the culvert on Sapelo Island.