I took ENSC 350 Humans: Creatures of the Coast in my Spring semester, Sophmore year, to fulfill the Quantitative/Scientific Perspectives requirement. I did not have many expectations when going into this class, mainly because I didn’t have a great interest in this topic, but found I was pleasantly surprised by how much I actually enjoyed it. While I found the further I went into the course that I began to find it more interesting, the professor’s enthusiasm in the class also helped to increase my interest as well. I think my grade in this class also reflected this, as I saw that I was able to have a higher grade in information that I found more appealing and engaging, and overall I was satisfied with the work I had done in this class and the grade that resulted. There were moments I found myself only doing the bare minimun in work, but this was few and far between, and I felt as though I went into depth on important details when we completed the multiple projects in this class.
One project we had to complete for this class was a group project on a preassigned environmental issue. We were required to find multiple sources for our specific issue and compose a PowerPoint project that would be presented in class on a multitude of different topics, for example the environmental costs and benefits of the project being addressed. Because this was at the end of the semester, it was easy to find the required information because of the knowledge gained in class of the different topics being addressed, and even when there was confusion or a question, the other group members were able to help in clearing it up. By the end of the project, we were able to give an in depth review of the issue and even answer questions posed at the end of the presentation, showing we were knowledgeable on our topics. I think this project and class showed me that it is important to know what is going on in the environment instead of just being clueless to the issues that everyone may face, and the best way to address these issues.
A New England Town’s Repsonse to Sea Level Rise; Alexis Henry, Kiara Bowman, Ariel Birkholz, and Jacob Smidt; 12 April 2021. Group project looking at the response to the environmental issue of sea level rise in a small town, including issues for both the environmental level but also reactions at the human level.