Field studies of ecological principles for sustainable natural resource use and management. Examination of natural environments in Georgia (water, soil, vegetation, biodiversity) provides context for case studies and site visits to industries or municipalities utilizing novel approaches to environmental challenges.

This field and lab based course will be taught at UGA Marine Institute on Sapelo Island. Students will be immersed in exercises and material to understand ecological processes and interactions in marine and estuarine environments ranging from microbes to vertebrates. Students will also use methodological techniques to run experiments, and gather and analyze data.

This program will provide students with a broad overview of issues involved in the study, conservation, and management of marine mammals, with a focus on marine mammals common in the southeastern US (bottlenose dolphin, North Atlantic right whale, and Florida manatee).

The UGA Interdisciplinary Field Program (IFP) is an eight-week course in introductory Geology, Anthropology, and Ecology that travels throughout the Western U.S. during summer semester. It uniquely integrates basic concepts from each discipline and applies them to North American landscapes through hands-on learning in a mobile, outdoor classroom.

The Costa Rica Ecology Program is an interdisciplinary tropical field course involving the study of tropical environments, their natural history, and their people. Located between Nicaragua and Panama in Central America, Costa Rica is a small country known for its pioneering role in tropical conservation, its peaceful, democratic traditions, and its commitment to education, health, and diplomacy.

Our goal is to get to know some of the common invertebrates found in the different tropical marine environments (Everglades, mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs), learn about these ecosystems, and explore the animal’s and plant’s basic biology and ecology. We will pick a reasonable research project that can be completed in about a week, learning to form and test hypotheses, conduct experiments, analyze data, write a scientific paper, and make an oral presentation. The course will take place in Key Largo, Florida.