Course Titles and Narratives

The Institute is a two-week intensive program covering a variety of environmental topics, from science to policy, to offer students a broad and comprehensive view of Environmental Studies. Students participate in scientific investigations of karst geology, forest community ecology, freshwater ecology, and wildlife ecology on site in the 1,000-acre nature preserve. Discussions on topics, such as sense of place, environmental policy, and environmental thought, place current environmental issues in a philosophic and cultural context. Service learning opportunities and participation in “Focus Topics” are the action pieces of the Institute, where students put theory and their ideas into practice. During “Focus Topics,” students work directly with environmental professionals to gain an in-depth understanding of a particular career field within environmental studies. We select topics that allow students to address real world environmental issues, provide hands-on and problem-solving experiences, and allow students to learn about potential careers. Each “Focus Topic” group engages in a specific project or activity relevant to the work of these professionals. Projects or activities are developed in small groups and presented by students during the closing session of the Institute.

Below are course narratives for the Institute. The two-week curriculum is inherently interdisciplinary and will be taught in an integrated manner. The following descriptions represent the academic topics, or courses, addressed by the activities of the two weeks.

Alternative Agriculture
Students will visit and tour a local organic Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm to discuss the meaning of sustainable agriculture. They will directly compare the methods practiced on the CSA farm with those of the neighboring industrial landscape. The students should leave with a firm understanding of the basic problems confronting agriculture, and possible solutions toward environmentally friendly food production.

Alternative Building
During this practical course, students will discuss the pros and cons of various alternative building methods and why these methods are becoming more prominent in today’s society. Students will tour a passive-solar, straw-bale home. As students examine the structure, they will learn what special considerations needed to be taken into account for the passive-solar design, why certain materials are used and how the home was physically constructed. Students will participate in an on-going alternative building project.

Bio Blitz
This field course compliments the Environmental Restoration Course and serves to help students develop a deeper understanding of Ohio prairies, restoration projects, the challenges of those projects, and the skills needed for plant identification. Students learn how to use a dichotomous key to identify forbs species in a local, restored prairie. Students are combined in pairs and given the challenge of (correctly!) identifying as many species as possible in the time allotted. Through first-hand exploration of this habitat, students address issues raised in the classroom course, assessing the ecological value of the restored property. Students gain a glimpse of the kind of work restorationists engage in as they assess sites before, during, and after restoration projects.

Cuba Film Screening and Discussion
We will watch the award-winning documentary film, The Power of Community: How Cuba Survived Peak Oil (2006), produced by the local non-profit Community Solutions. The film illustrates the response of Cubans as they transitioned from a highly mechanized, oil-driven society after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1990, which cut oil and food imports by more than half. Following the film, students will dialogue with filmmaker Megan Quinn Bachman on her experiences in Cuba, making the film, and updates on the situation in Cuba. Students are also encouraged to share their reactions and responses to the material presented.

Environmental Education in Motion
Students learn how hands-on exploration and activities enhances one’s understanding of environmental concepts. In the nature preserve, students have an opportunity to put environmental education theory into practice through the use of educational games, activities, and self-led discovery. Students learn how to develop activities that allow for educational and personal growth, and how to utilize the natural world as a classroom for teaching children. At the end of the program, students develop an activity to demonstrate one of the environmental concepts learned during the program.

Ecological Footprint
How do we create a just, humane, and sustainable world for ourselves and for future generations? This session allows students to identify and plan what they want their future to look like. First, students examine the correlation between resource use and consumer goods. Then students collect data about personal habits and calculate their individual ecological footprints. Using an action-planning model, students visualize their desired future, identify objectives, develop a plan to address local and global issues, and implement their vision through action and service learning. This course serves to empower students with practical steps they can take as individuals to lessen their environmental impact.

Environmental Policy/ Activism
Students view a PowerPoint presentation about the instructor’s journey from the polluted oil fields of Prudhoe Bay to and throughout the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Students will then see how the instructor turned those personal experiences into political action through presentations and lobbying, working both individually and with groups like the Alaska Wilderness League. Students then brainstorm how they can make a difference through personal lifestyle changes, and share the actual change that they intend to make. Finally, students brainstorm how they can make a difference as an environmental activist, and discuss change that can occur by evaluating the institutions of our country and world.

Environmental Problem Solving
This course serves to strengthen student leadership skills by facilitating the development of a format in which students will actively address a real-world environmental problem of their choosing. This discussion and brainstorming course engages students in a critical examination of the dilemmas we face when attempting to mitigate detrimental effects of human activities on the environment. Value choices are examined through guided discussions of situations where difficult choices must be made when attempting to solve an environmental problem. This course is designed as an exercise in critical thinking and activism.

Environmental Restoration
Students delve into theory and practice of ecological restoration. By exploring concepts within the sciences, social sciences, and humanities, this course will help students gain a well-developed sense of the interdisciplinary nature of ecological restoration projects. Students will explore ongoing local habitat restoration efforts, with emphasis on understanding the challenges presented by invasive plants and their control methods. From the social sciences, students gain an understanding of the psychological benefits of volunteer opportunities, the relationship of environmental policy to restoration practices, as well as how public values and opinions impact both the policy and practice of ecological restoration. Students also approach some of the larger, overarching philosophical and ethical questions within restoration, such as: Do we have a responsibility to restore nature? Is restoration simply another instance of human domination over nature? Are restored areas “natural”? Is restoration trying to “fake” nature? If restored areas are “fake” nature, do they then have a lesser social or ecological value? This course will give the students the theoretical background to have a deeply meaningful hands-on experience in the Bio Blitz course, and will help students understand the conceptual challenges that face professional restorationists.

Environmental Thought
Students explore the intersections between environmental problems and contemporary environmental thought. Combining eastern and western perspectives, traditional and post-modern philosophy, aesthetics, feminism, policy, and economics, students question the development of environmental sensibilities and the relationship between these sensibilities and one’s conception of the human role within the non-human world. Students discuss the culture-nature relationship and the myriad ways this relationship is borne out in theory and practice. This material provides an intensive exposure to the intellectual developments, conceptual frameworks and challenges within contemporary environmental thought. This course offers student background in the theory and ideology related to the many hands-on experiences planned for them during the Institute. This course is offered toward the end of their experience as a way of encouraging students to think about the ethical and philosophical dimensions of their own relationship with the natural world.

Food for Thought
This course is a fun and interactive session that seeks to inform students about the environmental consequences of food choices. Students role-play as if they are customers in a restaurant, selecting items from a menu that reflect the ecological price of the food. Program staff portrays restaurant staff and environmental activists seeking to educate customers on their food choices. The course concludes with small group discussions that seek to inform and educate students on the ecological impacts of the various menu items. Students learn about product life cycles and learn to evaluate choices to make informed environmental decisions.

Forest Community Ecology
Students examine the diversity of plants that occur in Glen Helen, as they are introduced to over 50 forest species in the nature preserve. Students examine the species composition of several of the Preserve’s plant communities. The interrelationships of the various species will be examined, and the environmental factors that allow the communities to persist. Students develop an understanding of the reasons why certain plants associate with one another and how human factors (i.e., land use or time since release from management) and environmental factors (i.e., slope, acidity of soil, and drainage) determine distribution patterns.

Global Ecology and Public Policy
Students study the massive destruction of the environment since the Industrial Revolution, then consider current proposals on how best to reverse lethal trends and institute global policies designed to protect the environment for the survival of future generations. Case studies of Collapse as elucidated by Jared Diamond will be used.

Introduction to Environmental Studies
Students explore and critically assess the wide range of ideas, ways of understanding, and practices encompassed within the field of Environmental Studies. More specifically, students gain a better understanding of the complex interactions and interdependencies between environmental science, environmental thought and ethics, environmental practice or policy, and the development of practical and successful solutions to environmental problems. This course will introduce students to the environmental problems facing our planet as well as some of the strategies for remedying those problems. Students also explore both direct and root causes of those problems so that students can understand the cultural and consumptive causes of environmental degradation. Offered at the beginning of the Institute, this course provides students with the background necessary to engage deeply and thoughtfully with many of the more advanced courses to follow.

Land Management
Students examine the impacts of humans on natural areas, and seek solutions to allow humans enjoyment of nature so that the ecology of the area is preserved. On a hike through the nature preserve, students identify land management issues, and then use problem-solving strategies to develop alternatives to the problem. Students are exposed to land management challenges, participate in land management activities, and will discuss the public relation challenges that arise in regards to management issues, such as use of herbicides and control of deer population.

Landforms/Hydrogeology
Students examine the geology of Glen Helen, investigate earth history in the region, and explore how topography and underlying rock structure and composition affect soils and water quality. Students observe such phenomena as fossils, glacial erratics and karst landforms as clues to the Preserve’s geologic evolution. Current hydrogeologic conditions are studied in the context of ground and surface water quality issues.

Nature Journaling
This course develops the student’s personal connection and response to nature. By using drawing exercises to encourage the art of seeing, writing exercises to encourage self-expression, and personal time to encourage reflection, students come away with a greater sense of place and connection to the natural world. Students explore patterns, texture and color together during a brief hike, before the students have a time of solitude to further record their personal responses. A short presentation on the history of nature journaling begins the workshop and a voluntary time of sharing our observations closes it.

Planning for a Post-Oil World
Using the information presented in the Cuba film on the coming decline of world fossil fuel production and it’s implications for our communities, economy, and lives, students will envision possibilities and strategies for reducing energy dependence and living more locally. After a brief presentation offering the latest projections for the unfolding energy crisis, students will break up into groups to brainstorm newspaper stories from the year 2025. Together they will simulate the front page of a local newspaper on a large pad of paper, including headlines, articles beginnings, photos and captions, etc. Each group will present their news stories to the rest of the students, followed by a short discussion on what the students learned from the exercise.

The Population Connection
With the world population nearing seven billion, it is essential to understand human population history and the effect that growth trends have on natural resource use and social systems. Are there limits to our growth? In this course, students engage in inquiry-based activities that build understanding of growth trends for humans and other species, including limiting factors and fertility trends. Students explore the relationships between population growth, resource consumption, environmental health, social well-being, and carrying capacity.

Sense of Place: Photography
This course introduces the basic fundamentals of the language of photography: tonality, time, space, texture, structure, and context. Students will learn how the choice of photographic camera controls: aperture, focus, and shutter speed, can affect the meaning of their images. The course explores how photographers have used photography to create a visual sense of place through specific details, quality of light, color and texture, and through a careful observation of the atmosphere of that place.

Stream Ecology/Watershed Management
Students engage in hands-on investigation of stream ecology and human impacts on water quality in Glen Helen. Students use state-of-the-art equipment to measure chemical and physical parameters and collect and analyze samples from a stream upstream and downstream of the Preserve. These activities include a field-intensive investigation of watershed health in the heart of the nature preserve. Students explore habitat survey, chemical analysis, and benthic macroinvertebrate populations as indicator of stream health. Students examine land use in the watershed area and the natural and human factors that influence water quality.

Wildlife Ecology and Rehabilitation
Students explore habitats and ecology of species indigenous to the nature preserve. Students study birds of prey as examples of wildlife threatened by human activity during a visit to the nature preserve’s regionally acclaimed raptor rehabilitation center. Raptor biology will be introduced, with emphasis on specialized adaptations in birds of prey. Raptor ecology, habitat requirements and threats to raptor populations and individuals will be discussed as well as issues in rehabilitation and release of recovered birds.

Wildlife Natural Heritage
Students explore Ohio’s wildlife heritage since the time of European settlement from the 18th Century to today. Students understand the reasons for the extirpation of certain wildlife species from Ohio such as the Woodland Bison and Mountain Lion and the relationship between the disappearance of species and land use changes that occurred in Ohio in the 18th & 19th Century. The Instructor provides information and gives a description of each major ecosystem types in Ohio. Student groups research representative wildlife species found in each ecosystem type, and teach their peers what they have learned. Students examine the efforts and successes of the Ohio Division of Wildlife with the re-introduction and restoration of species such as the Bald Eagle, River Otter, and Peregrine Falcon.