Structural Geology @ Hamilton College

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Quantitative, experiential learning in the Geosciences

I currently teach two core courses at Hamilton. The first is Our Interconnected Earth , an introductory level course that survey's the geosciences around the theme of how Earth's many systems connect and depend on one another. The second is Structure and Tectonics, a course focused on how Earth's crust deforms from the plate scale to the microscale, and how structural geologists investigate geologic structures to learn about Earth's history and processes.

Motivation and Approach

The ability to think like a geoscientist is increasingly important in our society. The global challenges of this century--climate change, water scarcity, stress on our food system--are almost all geologically related. Through teaching in the classroom, in the field, and by involving students in active research, I hope to educate the next generation of global citizens in our deeply interconnected Earth system.

I use a quantitative, data-driven approach to teaching that gets students working with real geologic data, interracting with physical phenomena in activities and labs, and collecting and analyzing the geologic records on field trips. I hope students leave my classes with a firm understanding how we observe our world, go about analyzing data, and making well-supported interpretations.