Symposium to Build a Better Capstone at SRM Annual Meeting

Do you think we can do more to prepare students for careers in natural resources?  Dr. Susan Edinger Marshall, a professor at Humboldt State University, is offering 15 one-day passes ($150 value) to attend a symposium titled "Building a Better Capstone" in conjunction with the Annual Meetings of the Society for Range Management in Sacramento February 5, 2015.  Educators, agency personnel, private consultants and business owners are encouraged to attend and/or apply for this scholarship.

Educators are sensitive to the needs of students in finding satisfying and meaningful careers in natural resources management.  Universities often provide a Capstone course, recognized among experts as a "High Impact Practice" that profoundly enhances student learning. In Capstones, students usually work in teams to address natural resource problems using different research and management techniques learned during their undergraduate career. Then students communicate their results in written and oral forms in a professional manner to an open audience. However, many real natural resource problems are much more complex than what is accomplished in a quick capstone. 

In the real world, the water quality staff member may not appreciate the financial and operational constraints of a beef cattle producer. Or a rancher may not be prepared to craft an effective public relations campaign. Or data collection should span decades instead of three weeks. Recent graduates will, hopefully, be working in multidisciplinary teams in agencies and consulting firms to solve thorny problems. But are they getting that diverse experience in their capstones? 

Faculty members from Humboldt State University, in collaboration with Oklahoma State University, Colorado State University and the University of Wyoming, received funding from USDA to hold this one-day symposium in Sacramento on February 5. The symposium will start with prepared talks from nationally recognized experts in higher education. In the afternoon sessions, World Cafe sessions will spawn multiple conversations about opportunities for improvement in higher education across institutional boundaries, using hybrid on-line and field-based teaching strategies.  The end goal of this symposium is to build a team to write a larger $750,000 USDA grant to fund a pilot project - a better capstone.

Please contact Susan Edinger Marshall at sem11@humboldt.edu for an application for the one-day pass or visit the SRM Annual Meeting site for more information about the annual meeting.

This post was provided by Susan Edinger Marshall.