Professors and local high school teachers partner in wetland workshop
Georgia Highlands College held its annual wetland workshop last week for local and surrounding area elementary teachers. The workshop is part of a Math Science Partnership grant with Northwest Georgia RESA (Regional Educational Service Agency). The participants were elementary school teachers from NWGA RESA's service region.
GHC professors led the workshop, which included a morning walk around the lake to the wetlands, where they used collecting equipment in order to collect aquatic macroinvertebrates and other biota from the wetlands to be returned to the lab for further educational research studies.
The workshop was led by Mark Knauss, Interim Dean, Division of Natural Sciences & Physical Education, with support provided by Assistant Professors of Biology Andy Dawson and Veronica Morin. Lab Coordinator Jason Christian also presented and aided in the workshop.
After collecting, the group returned to the lab for a quick lunch and then spent the remainder of the afternoon assessing the collected materials for aquatic macroinvertebrates, which were identified to general type (order) and genus.
The wetlands were developed during the late 1990's by GHC biologist Leigh Callan with funding and materials support from a number of sources, including Georgia Power, Temple-Inland Rome and the Georgia Soil and Water Conservation Commission. The wetlands were intended to serve as an outdoor laboratory and educational resource; it has been visited by hundreds of school children, who have enjoyed guided tours conducted by college faculty and staff.
Georgia Highlands College has had a long history of community service. Mark Knauss and Andy Dawson (both biologists) became involved with an MSP grant project with Kennesaw State University in 2008, where they became experienced in providing content support to elementary school teachers. They transferred their expertise to the NWGA RESA MSP project starting in 2011. The improvement in educational effectiveness of STEM disciplines has been recognized as a need at the national level. Through the dedication and energy of faculty like Knauss, Dawson, Morin, Morris and Easton, GHC makes its impact on improving STEM educational effectiveness in our regional schools.
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