SNR 506: Independent Project in Natural Resource Sustainability (2 credits)
Instructors: Steven Radosevich and Denise Lach
Timeframe: Fourteen weeks; the entire period of Certificate Program

Course Description

Students identify an important natural resource sustainability problem within their country, region, or organization. This identification should also include a particular area of land on which the problem is especially significant. Students will learn to pose, frame, and analyze the various components of the problem and, at the end of term, present a possible resolution(s) to it in both oral and written forms.

Approach

After selection and approval of a natural resource problem by the instructors in charge, students must identify and be assigned a faculty mentor from the pool of Certificate Program instructors who have agreed to serve as mentors. (See list of faculty mentors.) The mentor will assist the student pose, frame, and analyze the natural resource problem important to his/her country, organization or region. Students must work through a set of eight weekly assignments, relating to course instruction and reading material, to assure that satisfactory progress is being made throughout the term. The class will meet periodically for lectures on integration and on the process of building case studies. Written reports or other documentation are required for the completion of each assignment.

The final two weeks of the term are devoted solely to working with the faculty mentor and completion of the student’s sustainability project. A final written report must be submitted to the faculty mentor and instructors of record at the end of term. The last day of class meeting will be devoted to oral reports of the individual’s problem analysis.

Learning outcomes

• Development of a practical case study in sustainable forest or natural resource development.
• A procedure for implementation by the students’ organization or agency.
• Incorporation of principles, concepts, and approaches learned throughout the entire curriculum is expected.

Assignments

1. Identify faculty mentor and sources of information about the individual’s natural resource problem. Identify potential sustainability issues for the selected area.
2. Describe the current status of the land, including vegetation types and their species composition, predominate land use on habitat structure, species composition, water and soil condition, animal abundance, etc.
3. Identify the social issues for the selected area. Describe the social, cultural, economic, and ethical processes affecting the resource in the area.
4. Prioritize and select the key sustainable issues, based on previous work. Identify indicators, variables, or drivers of the ecological and social systems of the study area. Prepare a matrix of the ecological and social system’s indicators, variables, and drivers for each land use in the area of study.
5. Based on assignments for weeks 1-4, diagram the linkages between the ecological and social systems for each land use.
6. Identify and prioritize desirable and feasible changes that would make the area and its human system more sustainable.
7. Modify all matrices and diagrams based on the improved conditions identified in Assignment 6.
8. Identify ‘owners’ (individuals, agencies, industries, NGOs) of the processes that create or allow changes for sustainability to occur.

Final Report and Grade

A final report must be submitted to both the student’s faculty mentor and the instructors in charge. Grade will be P/N, and based on satisfactory completion of all assignments and the final report.