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syllabus

Page history last edited by Dr. Dann 4 years ago

In Search of Symbiosis:

Ecological Facilitation in the Potomac River Valley

EVPP 692 (1.0 credit for MS and ND students) and 991 (Ph.D. students),

SPRING 2010 - Thurs. 4:30-7:10pm in Innovation Hall Room 215G

Goals
Approach
Course Web Site(s)
Course Schedule
Texts and Materials
Performance Assessment
Grading Procedure
Disability Accommodation
Honor Code
Absenteeism
About the Instructor

Goals

This course aims to create a team of environmental scientists and policy-makers that are wise to the ways of ecological facilitation in our area's ecosystems and thus able to apply its lessons for the betterment of humanity and other forms of life.

By the end of this course, students should be able:

Distinguish the relationships, patterns and roles of mutualistic symbioses in creating, structuring and facilitating ecosystems.
Recognize ecological facilitation in naturally present and human-modified ecosystems of the Potomac River Valley.
Derive lessons to inform their pursuit of interactions that appropriately integrate cooperation with traditional competitive and consumptive patterns of human activity.

Approach

Unlike typical graduate seminar courses, this course will be organized by both the professor AND you though a series of collegial seminars and workshop activities. As a result, the syllabus may be augmented and adjusted as student interests and expertise are revealed. To keep on track, please refer to the Session Plans page which will link to session plans and assignments at least 1 week in advance.

Course Web Site(s)

Mason's Blackboard site [http://courses.gmu.edu] will provide you access to grades and link to our activities site [ http://sp10mutualism.pbworks.com ]. Updated syllabus, all assignments (including deadlines), submissions and professor's presentations and students notes will be posted to this site. In addition, read-only access to our Zotero group for references and readings is also available as a web site [ http://www.zotero.org/groups/potomac-symbiosis ].

Course Schedule

TBD

SESSION #	DATE	TOPIC / ASSIGNMENTS / READINGS - See Session Plans	Presenters	SESSON SUMMARIES
1.	Jan 21	Session 01. Introduction and Overview	[none]	Summary 01 by Maheen
2.	Jan 28	Session 02. Lichen Photobionts, Symbiogenesis, and Ecological Facilitation Structuring of PRV Ecosystems	1. Dr. James Lawrey 2. Richard Groover 3. Dr. Dann Sklarew	Summary 02 by Pete! ;-)
3.	Feb 4	Session 03. Coral Holobionts, [Microbial Mats,] Black Band Disease, and their Chesapeake Bay Analogs	1. Dr. Esther Peters 2. Dr. Robert Jonas 3. Julia Welch	Summary 03 by Lauren
4.	Feb 11	OPTIONAL SESSION (5-6pm) via winter webinar: (a) Ecological Facilitation/Symbiosis Continuum: Discuss Richard's proposal for organizing our final semester presentation, per course products page (b) VAS Presentation Title: For those interested, title(s) for [y]our Virginia Academy of Science presentation(s) due TOMORROW - got words? (Dr. Dann is emailing instructions for joining the webinar.)	N/A	N/A
5.	Feb 18	Session 04. Mycorrhizae: Mutualistic Plant/Fungus Symbioses	1. Dr. Al Torzilli 2. Lauren Kinne	Summary 04 by Julia Welch
6.	Feb 25	Session 05. More Nonhuman Mutualism: Crawling Invertebrates (Richard), ?? (Charles), and intraspecific example (Eileen)	1. Richard Groover 2. Charles Milling 3. Eileen	Summary 05 by Eileen
7.	Mar 4	Session 06. Still More Mutualism/Cooperation: Interspecific example(s): Bivalves(Wendy) Intraspecific example(s): Musk Turtles (Maheen)	1. Maheen 2. Wendy 3. All: types of intra-specific partnerships [brainstorm]	Summary 06 by Damien
8.	Mar 11	SPRING BREAK	[none]	[No Summary]
9.	Mar 18	Session 07. Intraspecific Mutualism in Humans, Transhumans and Cyborgs	1. Dr. Dann (discussion) 2. Damien 4. All: course products	Summary 07 n.a.?
10.	Mar 25	Session 08. Interspecific Mutualism with Humans (+Ecosystem Services Discussion?) Human mutualisms with Dogs, Horses, and Livestock (Adam) ??? (Charles) ??? (Dana) ??? (Pete)	1. Adam Carpenter 2. Charles Milling 3. Dana Griffith 4. Pete Goddard	Summary 08 by Richard
11.	April 1	Session 08b. Unscheduled	TBD	Summary 08b?
12.	April 8	Session 09. Planet-scale Symbiosis	1. Dr. Thomas Lovejoy 2. Adam Carpenter	Summary 09 by Dana
13.	April 15	Session 09b. Unscheduled	TBD	Summary 09b by Wendy
14.	Apr 22	Session 10. Ecological Facilitation in the Potomac River Valley (All-Hands Class Presentation and Summary)	ALL	Summary 10 by Dr. Dann's video tape. ;)
15.	May 3	Course Evaluations Due	n.a.	n.a.

Texts and Materials

All texts and materials will either be accessible via our Zotero Group, http://www.zotero.org/groups/potomac-symbiosis, or handed out in class.

Students should feel empowered to add to this list as they see fit to convey their discoveries and ideas.

Performance Assessment

Students scores for the course will be based on performance on the following activities:

Masters and Non-Degree Students (1 credit):

20% x the average of scores (0-4) for active participation on 5 (MS and ND students) or scheduled sessions
20% x the average of scores (0-4) for active participation on 5 on-line forums or journal entries
10% for 1 adequate and accurate session summary for 1 session (0-4 score)
10% for 1 in-class paper review and presentation/class discussion leadership (0-4 score)

Doctoral Students (2 credits)

10% x the average of scores (0-4) for active participation on 10 scheduled sessions
10% x the average of scores (0-4) for active participation on 10 on-line forums or journal entries
10% for each of 2 in-class paper reviews and presentation/class discussion leadership opportunities (0-4 score for each)

Assignment and Rubric	1	2	3	4
1. Participation	Partially and passively attend	Fully attend, but passive	Attend and participate	A leader in contributing substantively and actively
3. In-Class Leadership	Delivered but irrelevant	Marginally on topic and informative	Informative and professional	Publish this!
2. Journals/e-Fora	Submission off-topic and incomplete	Submission on topic, complete but excluded journal reference OR incomplete but included journal reference.	On-topic, complete with journal reference	Innovative and exceptional contribution + on-topic, complete with journal reference
4. Session Summary	Submitted but irrelevant	Captures what occurred (activities), but does not adequately cover outputs (substance of information created/produced) or impacts (what was learned)	Broadly captures both outputs and impacts.	Fully and specifically captures outputs and impacts.

Participation: Students are expected to participate actively in every. If you need to miss a session, please inform your professor in advance and make extra effort to participate on-line that week. Doctoral students who attend less than 10 scheduled sessions and Master's students who attend less than 5 scheduled sessions will be required to make supplemental contribution to the course products in order to receive full participation credit. (See your professor for details.)

Grading Procedure

The final grade is based on your performance out of the possible 100 points:

Grade	Points
A - Exceptional/Passing	90.001 - 100
B - Satisfactory/Passing	80.001 - 90
C - Unsatisfactory/Passing	70.001 - 80
F - Unsatisfactory/Failing	0 - 70

In the past, roughly half of the students in this course have received A's and half B's, however a few have also received a C. The professor is not required, but reserves the right to provide + or - to grades to provide further clarification regarding the quality of students' work.

Disability Accommodation

If you are a student with a disability and you need academic accommodations, please see Debbie Wyne and contact the Disability Resource Center (DRC) at 703-993-2474. All academic accommodations must be arranged through the DRC.

If you are unable to attend class in person, please make arrangements in advance [if possible], so that the professor can try to make accommodations for your participation via skype.

Honor Code

Adherence to the GMU Honor Code is expected of all students, specifically:

Members of the George Mason University community pledge

not to cheat, plagiarize, steal, or lie in matters related to academic work.

In all assignments and communications, plagiarism will not be tolerated. This applies equally to oral and written communications in the context of any evaluated (graded) course assignments. In presenting quotes, paraphrasing statements or logical arguments from others in any medium (on-line, oral or written), students should properly cite their source. Results of team work should only be attributed to those who directly contribute to the final product (even if more than those people were designated as being part of the team). Any or all members of a student team may be held accountable for any Honor Code violations in their shared work. Any public usage of original material from this course (e.g., presentations, images, etc.) without explicit permission of its creator shall be construed as stealing. As stated in the Honor Code, infractions may result in invalidated credit for dishonorable work and lowered grade, including failure from the class, suspension or dismissal. Inquiries for clarification from the professor are welcome. Thank you in advance for your conscious attention to these issues.

Absenteeism

As adults with outside responsibilities, many of you may have to miss a class once during the semester. If you know this is likely to happen, please contact your professor as soon as possible to arrange means to ensure you can still learn the material and/or obtain full credit for any learning activities.

Due to the exceptional threat posed by pandemic flu this season, students who promptly inform the professor of their flu symptoms (see next underlined link hereafter) are then strongly urged to stay at home, per CDC direction here. Do not come to class until 24 hours after any [>100^oF] fever passed without medication. Insofar as students adhere to the GMU Honor Code when declaring their flu-related need to work from home, they will be eligible to receive reasonable accommodation for their illness, as deemed appropriate by the professor.