Specialized Knowledge
Geography is a living, high technology driven profession and the aim is to give students the opportunities to truly understand the profession. The Geography program needed to develop a way to help students understand the specific knowledge and skill sets required to be successful in geographic and geospatial programs and industries. Using the Geography Capstone course and ePortfolio pedagogy, geography faculty created a series of assignments that focus more directly on geographic inquiry and the scientific method through a spatial perspective. Each of these assignments are accompanied by reflecting writing opportunities for students to further apply their learning and synthesize their understanding of geographic and geospatial concepts.
Geography faculty also chose to align programmatic learning outcomes with national standards, specifically Geography for Life, Geospatial Technology Competency Model (GTCM), National Council for Geographic Education (NCGE), and National Geographic Society standards. At this time, the department is not aware of any other institution of higher education in the country that intertwines academic learning outcomes for geography with the GTCM, whose standards focus more on competency for employment.
The purpose and logic of this alignment is two-fold: to establish a basis for articulation agreements between the Geography program at SLCC and other 4-year institutions within Utah and to provide clearer pathways for students to transfer. Currently, only four courses from the SLCC’s Geography program directly articulate to 4-year institutions in Utah and those articulation agreements vary by institution. Those courses include: Physical Geography, Regional Geography, Human Geography, and Mapping Our World. The program has chosen to make these four courses the core of the degree program because they articulate and focus directly on geospatial technology--a specialized field of inquiry in geography. These geospatial courses focus more on the competencies outlined by the GTCM. Thus, students successfully completing the Geography AS degree will not only be able to transfer to any 4-year institution within the state seamlessly, but also be highly competitive in the market place.
The gateway for students to the associate degree will be through the DQP. Individually, each course will not completely fulfill each component of the DQP, holistically the program will. Using high impact practices such as ePortfolio pedagogy along with the DQP, students will demonstrate their knowledge and skill sets outlined by the Geography program.
Geography faculty also chose to align programmatic learning outcomes with national standards, specifically Geography for Life, Geospatial Technology Competency Model (GTCM), National Council for Geographic Education (NCGE), and National Geographic Society standards. At this time, the department is not aware of any other institution of higher education in the country that intertwines academic learning outcomes for geography with the GTCM, whose standards focus more on competency for employment.
The purpose and logic of this alignment is two-fold: to establish a basis for articulation agreements between the Geography program at SLCC and other 4-year institutions within Utah and to provide clearer pathways for students to transfer. Currently, only four courses from the SLCC’s Geography program directly articulate to 4-year institutions in Utah and those articulation agreements vary by institution. Those courses include: Physical Geography, Regional Geography, Human Geography, and Mapping Our World. The program has chosen to make these four courses the core of the degree program because they articulate and focus directly on geospatial technology--a specialized field of inquiry in geography. These geospatial courses focus more on the competencies outlined by the GTCM. Thus, students successfully completing the Geography AS degree will not only be able to transfer to any 4-year institution within the state seamlessly, but also be highly competitive in the market place.
The gateway for students to the associate degree will be through the DQP. Individually, each course will not completely fulfill each component of the DQP, holistically the program will. Using high impact practices such as ePortfolio pedagogy along with the DQP, students will demonstrate their knowledge and skill sets outlined by the Geography program.
DQP Indicators for Specialized Learning
At the associate's level, students pursuing a degree in Geography will:
- Describe the scope of the field of Geography, its core theories and practices, using field-related terminology, and offers a similar description of at least one related field.
- Apply tools, technology, and methods common to the field of Geography to selected questions or problems.
- Generate substantial error-free products, reconstructions, data, juried exhibits, or other forms of academic presentation in the field of Geography.
- Define and explain the structure and practices of Geography using relevant tools, technologies, methods, and specialized terms.
- Investigate a familiar but complex problem in the field of Geography by assembling, arranging, and reformulating ideas, concepts, designs, and technologies.
- Frame, clarify, and evaluate a complex challenge that bridges Geography and one other field, using theories, tools, methods, and scholarship from those fields to produce independently or collaboratively an investigative work illuminating that challenge.
- Apply the major theories, research methods, and approaches to inquiry and schools of practice within Geography and illustrates application to allied fields of study.
- Assess the contributions of major figures and organizations in Geography, describes its major methodologies and practices, and illustrates them through projects, papers, or other forms of academic presentation.
The bulleted indicators listed above for each level of academic pursuit are just slightly modified from the DQP by the Geography program to align better with the discipline. There is no direct intent on the program determining what should or should not be taught at the 4-year institutions. The goal is to start a conversation within the State of Utah and nationally on what all three levels should look like.
Open Source eTextbooks
Intermediate GIS (coming soon...)
Spatial Analysis (coming soon...) |
Cartographic Principles (coming soon...)
Remote Sensing of Earth (coming soon...) |
NOTE: More signature assignments will be developed over the coming years that align with this core indicator of the DQP. All assignments licensed as Creative Commons Attribute-ShareAlike will be stated.
Signature Assignments
Coming soon... Signature assignments will be developed over the coming years that align with this core indicator of the DQP. All assignments will be licensed as Creative Commons Attribute-ShareAlike.
Program-Level Showcase
With student permission, the Geography program plans to showcase student artifacts demonstrating how students have acquired broad, integrative knowledge while going through the program.