What Are Distributed Graduate Seminars | Current DGS Awarded
Past DGS | Articles About NCEAS DGS
What Are Distributed Graduate Seminars?
Distributed learning provides a training model in which resources and instruction are independent of time and place. NCEAS' Distributed Graduate Seminars (DGS) combine elements of traditional and distributed learning and build on the collaborative approach that is a hallmark of NCEAS' research. These integrated, multi-campus graduate seminars are designed to engage students in ecological analysis and synthesis.
Early DGS at NCEAS emerged directly out of the activities of NCEAS Working Groups. They resulted in multiple publications with both faculty and graduate students participating as first authors, attention from national and local media, and data resources that are accessible via the NCEAS Data Repository. Based on these successes NCEAS has identified DGS as the fourth way to participate in research at NCEAS (along with Working Groups, Sabbatical Appointments, and Postdoctoral Fellowships).
In 2006 NCEAS issued its first "Call for Proposals" for DGS and intends to sponsor two DGS a year. A Principle Investigator can propose a research question with data needs too large for one group to tackle independently. Faculty members at participating universities conduct seminars that address this question. Graduate students use previously existing local or regional data, learning to assemble, synthesize and analyze the data using ecoinformatics tools. At the end of the seminar, faculty leaders and two students from each university come to NCEAS to participate in a cross-site analysis and synthesis, comparing patterns and results from the various locations.
DGS provide students with an experience of collaborative research and training in techniques and tools to acquire, manage, and synthesize multi-scale data. They also provide an opportunity for the next generation of investigators to become aware of the importance and availability of shared data, and to understand the role of ecological synthesis in discovery.
Faculty leaders benefit from the opportunity to collaborate with their colleagues at widely distributed universities while engaging in meaningful and creative pedagogy at their home institutions.Current DGS Awarded
Ushering in a New Era of Functional Ecology: Dynamics in a Changing Environment
InvestigatorsCleland, Elsa E. | Human activities are increasingly altering the environment in ways that impact plant communities and ecosystems. Climate change, invasive species, and nutrient enrichment of natural ecosystems are all examples of such environmental changes. The seminar will focus on emerging areas of research that are advancing functional ecology. A major goal of the DGS is to develop approaches to help predict how plant species and communities will shift in response to environmental changes. In particular the team will seek to connect plant traits, which reflect both ecological function and evolutionary history, to species responses to altered environmental conditions. To accomplish this goal they will bring together datasets from numerous locations throughout North America, including experimental manipulations of nitrogen, water, temperature and species composition, as well as observational datasets along existing environmental gradients. The capstone NCEAS meeting will combine analyses and techniques from each institution to generate predictions regarding national-level responses of plant communities to environmental change such as invasive species and nitrogen enrichment. Participating Universities Columbia University Fall 2007 |
The Role of Marine Protected Areas in Ecosystem-Based Management: Examining the Science and Politics of an Ocean Conservation Strategy
InvestigatorsPavia, Robert Lindholm, James |
Participating Institutions California State University, Monterey Bay Summer-Fall 2008 |
Recent reports by the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy and the Pew Oceans Commission recommend specific actions necessary to drive advances in ocean governance, including the use of marine protected areas (MPAs) as tools for ecosystem-based management. With coastal development, pollution, and resource extraction pressures on MPAs increasing, national and international efforts are focusing on developing MPAs in the context of the ecosystems, both terrestrial and marine, in which they occur. We will conduct a Distributed Graduate Seminar dedicated to clarifying the role of MPAs as tools for ecosystem-based management. The National Marine Sanctuary Program, one of the primary MPA management programs in U.S. Federal waters, will serve as a vehicle for this exploration. Graduate students from Hawaii to New Hampshire will examine how our growing scientific understanding of ecosystem processes within MPAs, and evolving ocean-observing capabilities, can allow us to manage MPAs as integral components of the ecosystems in which they reside.
Past Distributed Graduate Seminars: Participants, Data and Results
Biodiversity, Conservation and Ecosystem Services in Managed Landscapes
Economic Impact of Non-native Forest Pests and Pathogens in North America
Habitat Conservation Planning for Endangered Species
A Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity
Prospectus for an Analysis of Recovery Plans and Delisting
Articles about NCEAS DGS
Andelman, S.J., C.M Bowles, M.R. Willig and R.B. Waide. 2004. Understanding environmental complexity through a distributed knowledge network. BioScience 54(3):240-246.
Boersma, P. Dee and DeWeerdt, Sarah. 2001. Tapping the ivory tower; how academic-agency partnerships can advance conservation. Conservation Biology in Practice 2(3): 28-32.
Savage, Lisa T. 1998. Innovative national graduate student seminar analyzes habitat conservation plans. Integrative Biology: Issues, News and Reviews 1(2): Pages 45-48.
DGS Contact: Stephanie Hampton
Call for Proposals
