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Back to Archive List

Nature of course request C02530 :

Description change		Prerequisite change		Change credit hours
400/500 course

From:
Course Prefix & Number	Descriptive Title	Credits/Hours
ES 491/591	Depositional Systems	3 - 3
To:
Course Prefix & Number	Descriptive Title	Credits/Hours
ES 491/591	Depositional Systems	4 - 0

Abbreviation for Class Schedule(20 spaces) DepSyst

Current Course Description: ES 491/591 Stratigraphy and Depositional Systems (3) Course designed for both Earth Science majors and general interest audiences. Course offers an overview of clastic depositional environments and sequences, including continental, marine marginal and deep marine settings. Concepts and applications of facies and stratigraphic modeling will be explored, with an emphasis on natural resource exploration and recovery. Offered alternate years. Three hours of lecture and active learning. Prerequisite: a general geology course or consent of instructor; recommended ES 392

New Course Description: ES 491/591 Stratigraphy and Depositional Systems (4) Course designed for both Earth Science majors and general interest audiences. Course offers an overview of clastic depositional environments and sequences, including continental, marine marginal and deep marine settings. Concepts and applications of facies and stratigraphic modeling will be explored, with an emphasis on natural resource exploration and recovery. Four hours of lecture and active learning. Offered alternate years. Prerequisite: ES 203 or consent of instructor.

Justification for changing the course (e.g. alignment with other institutions, program revision, etc.): The purpose of ES 491/591 is to introduce students to the techniques and critical thinking skills necessary to reconstruct ancient depositional environments. At the present time it impossible to spend the time necessary to undertake laboratory-type activities to introduce sedimentary rocks and structures to visually supplement photos and descriptions from lecture, and to permit students to actually engage in the types of analysis that a geologist would use in reconstructing ancient geological systems. I have attempted to partly overcome this problem by printing off my powerpoint slides for every student. This, however, is not an adequate replacement for hands-on activities. Indeed the absence of an active learning component is a nearly universal complaint of students taking the course. WOU has an excellent collection of sedimentary rocks to use as a basis for hands-on activities. Since the other option in the sedimentary geology/Earth history area of the ES major is ES 431 (which is already a 4 credit course), this change would have no impact on our majors. It would impact Earth Resources minors slightly, increasing the minor from 27 to 28 units. If this is perceived as a problem, it is suggested that this course be removed from the Earth Resources minor and replaced with another option. Graduate students rarely take this course, but it has been my experience that these students are willing to dedicate the time to thoroughly understanding the subject, and that enrolling them in the course while lacking the prerequisite will not significantly decrease their ability to adequately master course content. Additionally, both ES 491/591 and ES 431/531 are general interest courses that deal with the interpretation of ancient Earth systems. My ability to teach both of these courses has been hampered because students who have not had a course in historical geology have little perspective of Earth history, the context of geological time, and of the approaches that geologists use to reconstruct ancient Earth systems. Indeed, it is not uncommon for students in these courses to lack the conceptual skills to understand that the geological events we discuss in class happened in the long distant past.

Students/Program affected: Earth Science majors, Earth Resources minors, graduate students.

Approval Queue C02530

Attached Files: