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Course Overview

This 2 credit course provides a capstone practicum experience for students who have completed Rnge 440 Restoration Ecology ( 3 cr.), Fish 513 Aquatic Restoration Ecology (3 cr.), For 526 Fire Ecology (1 cr.), and CSS 572 Human Dimensions in Restoration Ecology (3 cr.). The practicum experience will also serve as the final course in the required series for students to secure a Restoration Ecology Certificate (12 cr.) from the College of Natural Resources. The certificate provides students with breadth, depth and application of knowledge in general restoration ecology, social and human dimensions of restoration ecology, aquatic restoration ecology, and fire ecology.

Introduction

Welcome to CSS 580 Restoration Ecology Practicum!  At this point, you all should be familiar with definitions, key concepts and ideas, and the process of restoration ecology from several courses you have already taken here in the College of Natural Resources at the University of Idaho. This course will be different in that it is a practicum designed to provide you with structure to help further explore how restoration ecology projects are identified, designed, implemented, monitored, and evaluated. 

Central to the design of this course is that it is project-based.  That is, you will need to choose a current or potential restoration project for which you can develop a plan of implementation.  Ideally, this project will be one you are personally responsible for, or at least involved in implementing.  However, you can choose some other project, as long as you will be able to obtain adequate information about it.  In this case, ideally you will be able to submit your final project report to whomever is responsible for that project, and it will assist them in project implementation. 

Also, a key dynamic of the course will be the sharing that takes place between you the students. We will all learn from each other about a variety of restoration ecology projects that are being implemented all over the United States and abroad through this process.

The course is designed to allow students the freedom to identify, analyze, and present their restoration ecology projects to the Instructor and classmates through a series of objectives that will be completed, and then shared on-line in group discussion format. 

The course is organized around objectives that are completed by all class members during the semester. Each of you will be completing “progress reports” that will then be submitted to the instructor and your peers for review. During the time these progress reports are being developed and submitted, you will also maintain a journal that will be guided by questions asking you to describe trials and tribulations regarding the project itself, anything they may have learned during the development of the section, and any insights you may have for future restoration ecology projects to operate more smoothly. 

The final project has you to collate the three sections that you have already completed, as well as your responses to and follow up on comments and suggestions made to you, in an integrated report.  It includes a section in which you summarize and discuss unique characteristics of the project. This section will ask you to draw on journal entries and synthesize lessons learned into the final report.