PBIO 1090 - Americans and their Forests: Ecology, Conservation and History

• Athens: Fall Semester, Every Year
• Regional Campuses: Regional Campuses Course Offerings

• Students will be able to explain basic terminology, concepts and methods of plant ecology, landscape/ecosystem dynamics, and community structure using forest communities of North America as examples.
• Students will be able to describe and apply the essential steps of the scientific method in the context of plant communities based on their hands-on experience formulating and testing hypotheses.
• Students will be able to interpret forest composition and structure using current models including those involving landuse transitions, atmospheric physics of fire, and ecological succession.
• Students will be able to apply scientific methods of inquiry appropriate to plant ecology and landscape dynamics to gather and analyze data and draw evidence-based conclusions about forest community structure.
• Students will be able describe how physical and biological processes are reproducible within a forest ecosystem while also varying between major ecosystems, and the range of variation within each.
• Students will be able to interpret the composition and structure of forest communities using foundational knowledge of plant ecology, regional climate, and geology.
• Students will be able to communicate how observations of plant community dynamics (specifically the structure and dynamics of forest communities) are influenced by historical managment and exploitation and how they have shaped modern forest ecosystems..
• Students will be able to evaluate evidence-based scientific arguments about forest conservation and management and distinguish between scientific and non-scientific narratives and conclusions.