Energy policy is typically evolutionary as opposed to revolutionary. We can look to historical policies to understand how we've inherited the policies governing our energy use today. But looking backward only tells us part of the story. In the face of climate change, we need to look ahead and instead envision a more revolutionary change to our energy systems and the policies that govern them. This class takes you on that journey to energy policies past, present, and future. We look at the political realities of addressing climate change at various scales of governance and work together to craft our own ideal scenarios of what a responsible energy future will be.

Through a higher-order integration of concepts and observations, students can combine information from several field labs, all discussed in the Starting Point collection, to construct an overall geologic history of the local region. This site details the learning goals, teaching notes and materials, method of assessment, and context of use of this lab. It also provides links to additional references and resources.

Think science has all the answers? Think again. This course will use real, authentic data to explore and investigate modern controversies in Earth Sciences. Use tide gauge records to understand how countries around the world attempt to protect themselves from tsunami events. Process seismic data to predict earthquake recurrence in the New Madrid seismic zone, right here in the breadbasket of the US. Sort through the millions of years of the geologic timeline to shed some light on what actually did, and did not, kill the dinosaurs. Finally, use global atmospheric data to understand how misrepresentation of data can be used to paint a distorted view of past, present, and future climate.

This text is provided to you as an Open Educational Resource which you access online. It is designed to give you a comprehensive introduction to Geology at no or very nominal cost. It contains both written and graphic text material, intra-text links to other internal material which may aid in understanding topics and concepts, intra-text links to the appendices and glossary for tables and definitions of words, and extra-text links to videos and web material that clarifies and augments topics and concepts. Like any new or scientific subject, Geology has its own vocabulary for geological concepts. For you to converse effectively with this text and colleagues in this earth science course, you will use the language of geology, so comprehending these terms is important. Use the intra-text links to the Glossary and other related material freely to gain familiarity with this language.

Geology is a core science, along with physics, chemistry, and biology. It uses rigorous methods of inquiry that illuminate the history of the earth and its present-day geological activity. Geology allows us to discover how earth‰ŰŞs history and activity determine the state of the planet and its life forms. The study of geology also shows us how human behavior affects the earth. Topics we will cover include plate tectonics, earthquakes, volcanoes, rocks, minerals, geologic time, glaciers, rivers, geologic structures, layers of the earth, and reading maps. This course includes laboratory work and lab credit.Login: guest_oclPassword: ocl

This is a review of an assignment that can be used in a variety of introductory geology classes to introduce students to the geologcial time scale. This review is by Dr. Achim Herrmann (Department of Geology and Geophysics, LSU).The resource is here: https://louis.oercommons.org/courses/starting-out-with-earth-history

This activity asks students to place 6-10 events in Earth history on a timeline, first working in small groups and then as a class. Then, through questions, important points such as how certain events are dated, where humanity fits in, and so forth, can be brought up. The Starting Point website builds a context for the exercise by detailing the learning goals, teaching notes and materials (downloadable), and additional resources.