For the past six years Michigan State University Department of Forestry has offered a course,  Natural Resource Data Analysis,  that has evolved as computer skills, there are three principle objectives in the course: identifying a natural resource problem and obtaining relevant data; conducting an objective, quantitative analysis of data; and presenting the analysis in a way that is clear to a non-technical audience. The course consists of a combined lecture/lab where fundamental concepts oral and written communication, quantitative analysis, and spatial analysis/cartography are introduced and a hands-on lab where students practice specific computer and analytic skills. The ultimate course objective is the presentation of an analysis of a natural resource problem via World Wide Web pages, a written report and an oral, computer-assisted presentation

Fried, Jeremy S.

Stevens, James A.

English

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Natural Resources and Environmental Issues Volume 7 University Education in Natural Resources Article 74 1998 Natural resource data analysis: Finding comfort with computers James A. Stevens Department of Forestry, Michigan State University, East Lansing Jeremy S. Fried Department of Forestry, Michigan State University, East Lansing Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/nrei Recommended Citation Stevens, James A. and Fried, Jeremy S. (1998) "Natural resource data analysis: Finding comfort with computers," Natural Resources and Environmental Issues: Vol. 7 , Article 74. Available at: https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/nrei/vol7/iss1/74 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Journals at DigitalCommons@USU. It has been accepted for inclusion in Natural Resources and Environmental Issues by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@USU. For more information, please contact digitalcommons@usu.edu. 246 Natural Resources and Environmental Issues Volume VII*Graduate residents develop extensive natural history knowledge and critical naturalist skills.  The graduate studentsthat come to TSS arrive with exceptional undergraduate backgrounds in the sciences, yet they have very little practical,field experience and direct knowledge of nature.  At TSS, their theoretical knowledge is grounded in real world expe-rience in nature which promotes their effectiveness as communicators and teachers.  The curriculum of the PREEprogram has as a fundamental focus the notion that the essential character of any kind of environmental or naturalresource education is helping students find a “sense of place” in their natural and human community.*Graduate residents learn natural resource conflict management skills, including effective communication, negotiationand mediation.  Often graduate students that spend a year at Teton Science School arrive with academic training inresource and environmental policy and management, but have had little real life experience working with and throughconflict.  Their communication skills are primitive and their understanding of the nature of conflict is underdeveloped.We help to improve these skills by exposing them to regional conflict and asking them to teach these skills to visitingstudents.  In addition, each student participates in three intensive seminars in which they explore their personal andprofessional communication skills, their ability to work through conflict and their awareness of the essential elementsof a professional life.*Graduate residents use long-term, TSS field research projects as educational opportunities with students that visitTSS.  Although many graduate students come with some research experience, the opportunity to teach the researchprocess to students as well as to help them collect and analyze data, deepens their appreciation for and understandingof the nature of science.  They become communicators of good science and effective management rather than merelytechnicians.Offering direct exposure to these sorts of skills and experiences is difficult in more traditional university settings.  The Profes-sional Residency, because of its experiential and real-world setting, presents an interesting and effective complement to moretypical natural resource education.NATURAL RESOURCE DATA ANALYSIS:FINDING COMFORT WITH COMPUTERSJames A. Stevens and Jeremy S. FriedAssistant Professors, Department of Forestry, 126 Natural Resources,Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI 48824ABSTRACT: For the past six years Michigan State University Department of Forestry has offered a course, “Natural ResourceData Analysis,” that has evolved as computer technology and the skills that students bring to the class have changed.  Inaddition to the mastery of basic computer skills, there are three principle objectives in the course: identifying a natural resourceproblem and obtaining relevant data; conducting an objective, quantitative analysis of the data; and presenting the analysis ina way that is clear to a non-technical audience.  The course consists of a combined lecture/lab where fundamental concepts oraland written communication, quantitative analysis, and spatial analysis/cartography are introduced and a hands-on lab wherestudents practice specific computer and analytic skills.  The ultimate course objective is the presentation of an analysis of anatural resource problem via World Wide Web pages, a written report and an oral, computer-assisted presentation.When the course was first offered in 1993, the primary course objective was to increase student proficiency in the use ofcomputer applications and to help them become more comfortable with computers.  Few students at that time came to thecourse with a high level of computer competence and confidence.  Today’s students are more likely to have gained some1Stevens and Fried: Natural resource data analysis: Finding comfort with computersPublished by DigitalCommons@USU, 1998University Education in Natural Resources 2471998computer experience before enrolling in this course, so we have now refocused to concentrate more on analysis and communi-cation objectives.The course has always involved teaching the core software tools that are essential in almost every professional setting: wordprocessing, spreadsheet and presentation applications.  Early on, instruction in the design and use of relational databases wasincluded; this module has since been replaced with an introduction to GIS and geospatial analysis (which includes someelements of data management).  Despite a changing mix of software, the course has always had an emphasis on integrating theapplications for seamless communication through reports, spreadsheet generated graphics and slide show presentations.The data gathering stage of the course has changed dramatically since 1993 when instructors supplied students with researchoriented data sets (e.g., plot data from a regeneration study or timber price time series, fire history databases).  In part due toenthusiastic student response to the GIS module, spatial information now plays a more prominent role in the course. Studentsare now provided with core sets of Michigan county-level geographic, demographic, socio-economic, and resource-based data.They can then supplement this core with data appropriate to the natural resource term paper topic of their choice.  We expectto realize significant advantages such as improved consistency in student projects as a result of building common data setswhich can also be used for weekly homework exercises.Requiring students to search for some of the data they will analyze acquaints them with the variety of data resources nowavailable including library reference materials, CD ROM data bases, and an increasingly rich stockpile of on-line data sources.One challenge is to teach students to think critically about the data that they find and to evaluate its suitability for the analysesthey wish to conduct considering such issues as resolution/scale, lineage, accuracy, objectivity, and currency.  A few years agoit was a challenge to make students aware of the World Wide Web as a resource; today the challenge is to make them under-stand that it is not the only resource.The data analysis objectives for the course have been refined and are now articulated as a set of analytic tools such as descrip-tive statistics, trend line analysis, histograms, thematic mapping, and spatial query with which students should be proficient bythe end of the course.  These tools are demonstrated by the instructors and practiced by students using in-class and homeworkexercises.  Students are expected to appropriately use a certain number of these techniques in the course of the analysis theyconduct for their term projects.All class components are integrated in the term project (which builds gradually over the semester in a series of incrementalblocks). As students gather project data and develop a project prospectus, they are expected to design and publish a web sitethat describes the goals of their analysis and documents the sources of the data they will use.  By the end of the course, studentsare expected to be capable of creating appropriate, clear graphics, generating focused text slides, and presenting a lucid oralreport with a question and answer session. Students must also write reports that integrate tabular and graphic presentation ofanalysis results with documentation of analytic methods.  Examples of recent student projects include: Great Lakes WaterQuality, Urban Sprawl and Land Use Change in Michigan, Fire Effects in Northern Michigan Forests and Michigan SuperFund Sites.Other uses of technology during the course include a web-based discussion page on which students are encouraged to postquestions that come up between class sessions; other students and/or course instructors (who regularly monitor the site) canrespond with suggestions or clarifying questions.  Groups are paired so that they can offer feedback to another group on theirweb page information based on certain criteria (e.g., Is it clear? Are the data sources reliable?).  Homework grades areregularly posted on-line allowing students to track their progress.  Another innovation has been the addition of on-line quizzesavailable only during lab sessions.  The results are automatically emailed to the teaching assistant and serve to reinforce keypoints as well as tracking attendance.As the importance of computer and analytic skills has been more widely recognized, this course has been added as a require-ment for both Forestry majors and as an option for Resource Development and Fisheries and Wildlife majors. The emphasis ofthis course has been to train students to take advantage of computer technology to make them more marketable and effectivenatural resource professionals. One benefit of the course is that it allows instructors of upper division courses to teach at ahigher level since basic computer competency can be assumed. Comments from previous students suggest that they have beenable to apply these skills both in their later education and on the job.2Natural Resources and Environmental Issues, Vol. 7 [1998], Art. 74https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/nrei/vol7/iss1/74

Natural resource data analysis: Finding comfort with computers

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Natural resource data analysis: Finding comfort with computers

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