Establishment of the Upper Clark Fork River Basin Long-term Characterization Project: Platform for Discovery-based Undergraduate Teaching and Research

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By adapting and integrating the total station techniques implemented by field camps at Eastern Illinois University and Rutgers, we have established the Upper Clark Fork River Basin Long-Term Characterization Project. This project adapts GPS indexing (Jacobs, et al, 1997 and Anderson, et al, 1997) which creates a series of evolving, web-based datasets and initiates a series of cross-disciplinary environmental studies in western Montana. The foundation for the project is a series of undergraduate laboratories and undergraduate research projects implemented at all levels of the geology curriculum. Exercises and undergraduate research projects adapt discovery-based learning, focused on the Earth as a system, and are geared toward teacher preparation and integration of technology into education (Ireton, et al. 1996). The projects rely on three types of equipment purchased with NSF support: 1) two total station surveyors for high resolution surveying of topographic surfaces; 2) a kinematic GPS for high resolution absolute positioning in 3-D; and 3) a grain size analyzer for characterization of fine-sediment grain-size distributions. Each piece of equipment has been successfully implemented into undergraduate teaching and research programs elsewhere (e.g. Cowan 1993; Bryce and Taylor, 1995; Anderson et al., 1997; O'Driscoll et al., 1997). By adapting the approaches described by these previous studies and by using this equipment to quantify changes in topography and sediment grain size at a series of study sites across western Montana, different generations of UM students are able to compare data sets from year to year, document the evolution of these systems through time, and hence more clearly understand and appreciate the natural processes that shape them. The utility of such time-series data bases in research and education was presented by the National Research Council (1991) and Post et al. (1998). Student data sets and accompanying interpretations are made available at (http://www.cs.umt.edu/GEOLOGY/FAC/hendrix/hendrix.html), presentations at national meetings and publication in peer-reviewed journals. The teaching effectiveness of the project is evaluated twice per year by a departmental oversight committee that includes students, project PI's and other faculty.